Steampunk Fan

January 2018 Income At-A-Glance

Gross Income for January: $205,842

Total Expenses for January: $66,463

Total Net Profit for January: $139,379

Difference b/t January & December: -$4,114

Why We Publish An Income Report

This monthly income report is created for you, Fire Nation!

By documenting the struggles we encounter and the successes we celebrate as entrepreneurs every single month, we’re able to provide you with support – and a single resource – where we share what’s working, what’s not, and what’s possible.

There’s a lot of hard work that goes into learning and growing as an entrepreneur, especially when you’re just starting out. The most important part of the equation is that you’re able to pass on what you learn to others through teaching, which is what we aim to do here.

Let’s IGNITE!

**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below.

Josh Bauerle’s Monthly Tax Tip

What’s up Fire Nation, my name is Josh Bauerle. I’m a CPA and the Founder of CPA On Fire, where we specialize in working with entrepreneurs to minimize their tax liability while keeping them in line with the ever-changing tax laws.

I’ve been working with JLD & Kate at Entrepreneurs On Fire for years now, and they’ve included me in these monthly income reports with unlimited access to all their accounts so I can verify that what they report here is complete and accurate.

And because they believe in delivering an insane amount of value to you, my job doesn’t stop at the verification level; I also provide a new tax and accounting tip every month!

Josh’s January Tax Tip: How to handle the 1099’s you receive

Well Fire Nation, it’s that time of year again: tax season.

As I prepare to go into my tax season hole to grind away at 500+ tax returns, I wanted to give you one last tip to make sure you don’t get hit with an unexpected IRS letter this year.

I want you to ensure the 1099’s you receive are addressed properly.

This may seem like a minor issue, but incorrect 1099’s are one of the biggest reasons we see clients get audited by the IRS.

What happens most often is one of the wonderful people who paid you money over the previous year sends you a 1099 made out to you personally instead of your business. Then, you claim it in the business, and the IRS thinks you failed to claim the income altogether since they expect to see it on your personal return.

Next thing you know, you’re receiving a love letter from the IRS demanding thousands of dollars for unreported income.

Here are a few scenarios that could easily cause this to happen:

You switch your sole proprietor to an S Corp mid-year and either don’t update your clients who issue 1099’s, or they fail to make the change.

Your business is a partnership, but your clients use your personal info for the 1099 not knowing the details of the entity.

You mistakenly fill out your W-9 with your personal info instead of your business info because you weren’t quite sure what they were asking.

I’ve seen incorrect 1099’s issued for all the reasons above – plus many more.

Here are4 steps you can take to make sure you aren’t getting a surprise letter from the IRS due to an incorrect 1099.

1. Check every 1099 you receive to make sure it is issued to the right name and tax ID number.

Unless you are a sole proprietor using your SSN as the business tax ID, your name and/or SSN should never be used on the 1099.

2. If you find a 1099 incorrectly made out to you personally, immediately contact the person or company who sent it and ask them to issue a corrected 1099.

Make sure they send the corrected version to both you and the IRS.

3. If they refuse to issue a corrected 1099 (and some will) you’ll need to note it very carefully on your tax returns.

Assuming the 1099 was made out to you instead of the business, you will claim the 1099 on your personal return Schedule C, and then put an expense for the same amount with the description “Claimed on 1120’s (or whatever business return you file) EIN XX-XXXXXXX”.

Hopefully if you own a business you are using a professional for your taxes, in which case you can simply make sure they’re taking the steps above.

4. Now that we are into a new year, make sure that all your clients who issue 1099’s have your accurate W-9 on file.

You should have one on file at all times with the correct info so you can be sure you are giving new clients the correct info to prevent mistakes in the future.

No more love letters from the IRS, especially ones that could be avoided with some simple due diligence!

By making sure the 1099’s you receive are accurate you can drastically reduce your chances of receiving a nasty letter from our good friends at the IRS.

As always, please feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss what would be best for YOUR business. I LOVE chatting with Fire Nation!

*Bonus* Claim your spot in Josh’s FREE Course on Business Entities!

David Lizerbram’s Legal Tip

How to Hire a Lawyer for Your Business – Part II

For Part I of this series check out our November 2017 income report

Sooner or later, every business is going to need legal representation. A lawyer can either be:

An expensive line item, or

A huge asset for your business.

As an entrepreneur, it’s up to you to make that choice.

If you haven’t hired a business attorney before, the process can be intimidating. I’ve seen the process many times, having been hired by hundreds of clients to represent them over the course of my career.

When the client (that’s you) is informed and knows what they’re looking for, there’s a much greater likelihood of having a positive result for both sides – the lawyer and the client.

Ultimately, we both want the same thing: a mutually-beneficial, long-term business relationship.

To help you achieve that result, I’ve put together this list: 7 Keys to Choosing the Right Lawyer for Your Business. (For the first 4 points, be sure to check out our November 2017 income report!)

5. Choose a lawyer who brings other resources to the table

Let’s be honest: good legal services aren’t cheap.

Here are some questions you can ask to help get the most bang for your buck:

Does this law firm host regular events for their clients to meet and network? (These may take the form of live events, webinars, or other virtual resources.)

Do they have a network of other attorneys and professionals they can refer you to when you have specialized needs?

Are they members of trade associations or other groups you can benefit from?

Are they willing to make introductions to other clients, potential customers, and strategic partners?

Don’t be afraid to ask these types of questions and dig for detailed answers. But approach this line of inquiry with a bit of skepticism: beware the attorney who over-promises.

Use your best judgment.

6. Do you need a lawyer in your city or state?

This one can vary depending on your specific needs.

Of course, it’s great to be able to meet face-to-face on a regular basis, but I find that even with my local clients, the vast majority of our contacts are through phone and email rather than in person.

If you live in a small town or a place without a lot of lawyers (how depressing!), you may not have easy access to a local attorney who has the skills and experience that you need. And often, that’s not really a problem.

Now, if your attorney has to go to court, he or she may have to live near you, or at least in your state. But for many business law needs, an attorney who lives in another state may be able to serve you just as well. This means that you can cast a wide net and seek out the best legal counsel for you.

So feel free to look for legal counsel outside of your geographic area, but be sure to let them know where you are and confirm that they’ll be able to handle the transactions you require.

Tip: If your business has customers, vendors, or partners in another country, be sure to ask if the firm has relationships with attorneys in that country.

7. Make sure you’re comfortable with their fee structure

Your potential lawyer should not be afraid or nervous to discuss fees with you, and you shouldn’t be hesitant about bringing it up. Whether you’re a solopreneur or seeking legal advice for a big company, you still need to be able to plan for your legal costs.

Traditionally, most business lawyers work on an hourly basis. This means that each attorney has an hourly rate, and the attorney bills in increments of that rate (for example, 1/10 of an hour, with a minimum of 2/10 of any hour for any particular task.)

Some lawyers have moved away from hourly billing entirely and only bill a fixed amount for each service.

The most common approach is a hybrid of hourly and fixed fee billing, depending on the project. For example, if your business needs help with a complex contract negotiation, it can be very difficult for the attorney to estimate the amount of time involved, so billing based on the clock might make the most sense.

But if they’re doing the type of filing that they’ve done many times before, and they know pretty much what it’s going to take, both sides might be better off with a fixed fee for that project.

The most important part of this conversation is to be sure that the arrangement works for you, the client. If you prefer one or the other – hourly, fixed fee, or some other type of arrangement – be sure to communicate that to the attorney.

As long as you’re upfront about your expectations, he or she should be able to work with you; if not, this probably just isn’t a good match.

And that’s OK: as I said at the top, not every attorney-client pairing is a good match. Hopefully, applying these 7 Keys will speed up the process of finding the right match for you and your business.

Bonus Tip: This is not a “Till Death Do Us Part” decision.

Ideally, you’ll establish a relationship with a lawyer that will last for the life of your career. Maybe you’ll even become good friends. But just like with any other type of business relationship, there’s no way to know that on Day 1.

It’s possible the day will come when you have to tell your lawyer “It’s not you, it’s me.” Or whatever your preferred breakup line might be.

Nobody wants to hear this from a client. Believe it or not, lawyers are people too. We have feelings like anyone else. But, for the most part, we’re also professionals, and we know that not all client relationships are going to last forever.

If you get the feeling that you and your lawyer aren’t on the same page, the best thing you can do is pick up the phone and express your concerns. I suggest you avoid doing this over email – despite all the advantages of technology, when things get sticky, it’s best to talk it out whenever possible to avoid escalating the situation.

If you can get together in person, even better.

If that doesn’t work, and the situation just can’t be reconciled, your lawyer is, in most circumstances, obligated to return your files to you or forward them to your new attorney.

If you have funds remaining in the firm’s client trust account (also referred to as a “retainer account” or “IOLTA account,”) those must be returned to you as well.

If you have a legal question that you’d like me to cover on a future Income Report shoot me an email with your request! I’ll be sure to give you a shout-out when I join John & Kate to talk about your legal questions!

*Bonus* Download David’s FREE Checklist on Intellectual Property for Entrepreneurs!

What Went Down In January

Memoir is LIVE!

I’ve always loved biographies, and with Memoir, I have a great excuse to dive deep into the lives of the men and women who changed the world.

The first feature is Alexander the Great, and let me tell you, this man packed a LOT into 32 years.

Visit Memoir.one to listen or visit iTunes here :-)

We hired a Tech Marketing Strategist

Making the decision to hire a tech / marketing strategist on retainer was a big decision – and an even bigger investment.

We’ve always run a super lean team here at Entrepreneurs On Fire, and with our focus shifting towards unraveling the complexity of what our business has become, bringing another consultant on retainer on board wasn’t a quick or easy choice.

This brings our monthly consultant retainer to five (our CPA, our accounting team, our designer, our web guy, and our tech marketing strategist).

But one thing John said during the many conversations we had about hiring a strategist is that being good always keeps us from being great.

One month into our contract we’re feeling great about the decision, and we wasted no time getting straight down to business.

Since she came on board we’ve:

Initiated a full website redesign (with the goal of making the UX 10x better)

Focused in on our campaign conversions

Started to revamp our quiz to more closely relate to our ideal customer

Identified our top 5 focuses for the next 6 months

We’ll keep you posted as we continue on with these exciting projects, and be sure to check out JLD’s Facebook page every once in a while: that’s where we post behind-the-scenes looks at our active projects!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

January 2018 Income Breakdown*

Product/Service Income: $153,835

TOTAL Journal sales: 882 Journals for a total of $32,992

The Freedom Journal: Accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days!

TheFreedomJournal.com: $1,836 (38 Hardcovers & 12 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $16,068 (429 Freedom Journals sold!)

Total: $17,904

The Mastery Journal: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus in 100 days! +2

TheMasteryJournal.com: $1,671 (33 Hardcovers & 14 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $13,417 (382 Mastery Journals sold!)

Total: $15,088

Podcasters’ Paradise: The #1 Podcasting community in the world!

Recurring: $28,218 (237 monthly, 4 annual)

New members: $14,814 (34 new members)

Total: $43,032

Podcast Sponsorship Income: $72,500

Podcast Websites: $5,000 Your all-in-one podcast website peace of mind

Skills On Fire: $30

Podcast Launch: Audiobook: $228| eBook: $53

Free Courses that result in the above revenue:

Free Podcast Course: A free 15-day course on Podcasting

Free Webinar Course: A free 10-day course on Webinars

Free Goals Course: A free 8-day course on Setting & Accomplishing Goals

Funnel On Fire: A free 8-day course on Creating a Funnel that Converts!

Kickstarter On Fire: A free 5-day course on going from Idea to Launch on Kickstarter!

4 Days To Mastery: A Free 4-day course on how to master Productivity, Discipline & Focus!

Affiliate Income: $52,007

*Affiliate links below

Resources for Entrepreneurs: $37,682

Audible: $512

BlueHost: $600 (Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials)

Click Funnels: $25,741

Coaching referrals: $2,747 (email me for an introduction to a mentor for overall online business or a Podcast focused mentor!)

Easy Webinar: $0

Mentorship: $7,500

ConvertKit: $356

Disclaimer Template: $49 (legal disclaimers for your website)

Fizzle: $128

LeadPages: $0

Infusionsoft: $0

SamCart: $49

Courses for Entrepreneurs: $10,546

Create Awesome Online Courses by DSG: $0

Webinars that convert by Amy Porterfield: $485

Copywriting Academy by Ray Edwards: $1,318

10k Readers by Josh Turner: $94

The Amazing Seller by Scott Voelker: $0

Self-Publishing School by Chandler Bolt: $8,500

ASK by Ryan Levesque: $149

Resources for Podcasters: $1,949

Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player: $82

Podcasting Press: $519

Libsyn: $1,246 (Use promo code FIRE for the rest of this month & next free!)

UDemy Podcasting Course: $102

Other Resources: $1,830

Amazon Associates: $711

Other: $1,119

Total Gross Income in January: $205,842

Business Expenses: $63,628

Advertising: $14,674

Affiliate Commissions (Paradise): $1,628

Accounting: $849

Cost of goods sold: $3,175

Consulting: $0

Design & Branding: $952

Education: $15

Legal & Professional: $560

Meals & Entertainment: $475

Merchant / bank fees: $1,190

Amazon fees: $9,081

Shopify fees: $36

PayPal fees: $260

Office expenses: $813 + 123

Payroll Tax Expenses / Fees: $2,016

Paradise Refunds: $2,573

Promotional: $0

Total Launch Package fees: $0

Sponsorships: $11,500

The Freedom & Mastery Journal: $5,000

Travel: $2,555

Virtual Assistant Fees: $4,523

Website Fees: $1,630

Recurring, Subscription-based Expenses: $2,835

Adobe Creative Cloud: $100

Boomerang: $70 (team package)

Brandisty: $24

Authorize.net: $70

Cell Phone: $202

Google: $45

Internet: $154

eVoice: $10

Infusionsoft CRM: $396

Insurance: $551

Libsyn: $258

Manychat: $65

Chatroll: $49

Shopify: $176

TaxJar: $19

MeetEdgar: $19

Taxes & Licenses: $523

Interact Quiz Software: $89

Zoom: $15

Total Expenses in January: $66,463

Payroll to John & Kate: $15,900

In our May 2014 Income Report and our June 2016 Income Report, Josh focuses on how to pay yourself as an entrepreneur. Check them out!

Wondering what we do with all of our net revenue? We share all in our April 2017 Income Report :)

Total Net Profit for January 2018: $139,379

Biggest Lesson Learned

Daily gratitude can go a long way

Have you ever had one of those days where everything is irritating and frustration is around every corner?

It doesn’t matter if you had a great night’s sleep, a kick-butt workout that morning, or the best breakfast in town – something just feels off.

It’s not only causing irritation with just about everything that’s going on around you, but it’s also affecting your productivity and motivation.

WHAT GIVES?

I’ve had more of these days over the past couple of months than I like to admit, and they aren’t fun. I don’t feel like ME, and I know it’s not the way I want to be living my life.

So I’ve done a considerable amount of research around this: what is it that makes these days different from others (besides the fact that I’m irritated and don’t feel very motivated?)

It’s my lack of gratitude.

It’s having a great night’s sleep, but neglecting to wake up and smile because of that.

It’s crushing a kick-butt workout, but then going on with my day like I’m owed that.

It’s making the best breakfast without taking the time to realize that not everyone can do that whenever they want.

Gratitude.

So next time your alarm goes off and you wake up, crush a great workout, have an amazing breakfast, get to kiss your loved one, take a few minutes to call your parents up to tell them you’re thinking of them – don’t take it for granted.

Be Grateful.

Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!

Until next month, keep your FIRE burning!

~ Kate & John

Note: we report our income figures as accurately as possible, but in using reports from a combo of Infusionsoft & Xero to track our product and total income / expenses, they suggest the possibility of a 3 – 5% margin of error. 

Click here for all of EOFire’s Income Reports

This post was written by Kate Erickson, Content Creator and Implementer at EOFire. Follow Kate on Social:

The post Entrepreneurs On Fire: January 2018 Income Report appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

As an entrepreneur you’re taking on a lot of responsibility, and it can sometimes feel like you’re doing everything yourself – because likely, you are.

And it makes sense: you decided at some point that you had an idea worth pursuing and a vision and mission to carry out. So you started to do the work necessary in order to accomplish that.

But once you have the foundation set and your business is ready for growth, you can’t continue to be the one working in your business; otherwise, you’ll never get to be the one working on your business.

Plus, scaling a business on your own is virtually impossible.

Hiring a virtual assistant or employee

In order to make this switch – from doing everything yourself and constantly feeling overwhelmed, to actually having time to brainstorm new ideas, implement them and start to scale – you have to consider hiring a virtual assistant or employee to help.

If you’re happy running your business on your own and aren’t interested in hiring a virtual assistant or employee, then that’s perfectly fine. But understand that in making that choice, you are choosing a particular type of business: a business that might provide you exactly what you want and need, but that will never be a scalable business.

So, let’s look at the specific steps you can take and the considerations you should have in mind.

1. Choosing your type of business

Before we dive into hiring a virtual assistant or employee, let’s make sure that’s the right move for you.

Choosing your type of business is actually quite simple, and it’s tied directly to two things:

What you want your business to accomplish (your vision)

What you want your lifestyle to look like (your end goal)

Let’s take Entrepreneurs On Fire for example.

John launched Entrepreneurs On Fire in September 2012 with a vision to inspire millions.

He was willing to put in long hours, hire others to help, and run into whatever roadblocks came his way. He would find a way around them.

But he also started out with two virtual assistants on his team, who were both general virtual assistants, meaning they worked on a variety of tasks in the business, including:

Social media

Graphics

Website updates

Guest scheduling for the podcast

and more

This allowed John time to focus on the things most important to the growth and sustainability of the business long-term, like:

Producing a great podcast people wanted to listen to;

Connecting with amazing entrepreneurs;

Becoming a better interviewer;

Attending conferences and events to get his name out there;

and so on.

This wouldn’t have been possible at the same level had John started out on his own.

As Entrepreneurs On Fire found its footing and the team collectively established the initial business foundation, it was time to start thinking about growth and scalability.

At this point John had:

Established credibility and authority through the podcast,

Published over 100 episodes (and therefore had built 100 relationships with successful entrepreneurs), and

He was showing an increase in listeners week after week.

Once his audience started reaching out to him via social media and email with questions and feedback, he could see the growth opportunity standing right in front of him.

His audience was reaching out with questions and feedback like:

I’m LOVING the show so much! Thank you! (confirmation)

John, how did you launch your podcast? (interest: podcasting)

A daily show?! FINALLY! (confirmation)

I have an idea, and I want to turn it into a business. Where do I start? (interest: starting a business)

John listened to his audience, and regardless of whether it was a comment or a question, he kept a running list of the things people were saying on social media about the podcast and things people were emailing him about.

Through doing this, he started to see the opportunities more clearly:

My audience wants to learn about podacsting

My audience is interested in starting their own business

John knew he could help with these two things because of his experience starting his own business and podcast, and so he started offering one-on-one coaching to those who were interested.

And sure enough, more people started asking him for similar advice.

That’s when he knew that in order to start scaling the business – creating a community platform, a product, more services – he needed to hire someone else to help him implement and establish all of this.

That’s about the time I came on board as employee num. two.

Today John and I run a team of six:

John, host / founder

Me, operations / systems

JM, John’s VA

Jess, customer service

Tipu, repurposing / video & audio

Claire, social media manager

I share this progression and story with you for a very specific reason: we’ve made the conscious decision that this is how big we want our team to be, and there’s no way we’d be where we are today if we didn’t have this team in place.

We’ve had fewer employees throughout the years and we’ve had more employees throughout the years, and in making the decision to run a team of six we’ve established the type of business we want to run.

We know that there are great opportunities available to us with this team – which we’ve already proven – and we also understand that there are limits to what we can accomplish with this team – and we’re okay with that.

We’re still able to accomplish our vision to inspire millions, and we’re still able to live the lifestyle we want.

So the very first thing to consider before hiring a virtual assistant or employee to help scale your business is the type of business you want to run.

2. The type of virtual assistant or employee 

Once you’ve established the type of business you want to run – and have confirmed that requires at least one virtual assistant or employee – it’s time to figure out the type of virtual assistant or employee you need.

The best way to do this is to take inventory of the tasks and projects you have going on in your business.

Exercise: Take inventory

This exercise will take you one week to accomplish, and it’s very simple: let a piece of paper follow you around for one week and write down every task or project you spend your time working on each day.

It could be as big as “worked on website launch”, or it could be as small as “checked email”, but you do want to be as specific as possible.

At the end of the week, take a look back at the things you’re spending your time working on.

This will not only be eye-opening (maybe there are several tasks you’re working on that really aren’t that important based on the goals you’ve set for your business), but it will also help you start organizing the tasks that are:

most frequent

take up the most time

The tasks that are most frequent and take up the most time (that don’t require you) are the ones you should be considering hiring a virtual assistant or employee to help with.

Tasks that don’t require you are ones where the outcome will not be different if someone else performs the task.

3. Create a job description and overview

Once you’ve identified the tasks that are most frequent and take up the most time (but that don’t require you), you’ve essentially described the type of virtual assistant or employee you should hire.

That might be a general virtual assistant who does a wide variety of tasks, like helping you manage your calendar, posting on social media, and formatting and scheduling your content; or it might be a specialized virtual assistant or an employee who has experience in a specific area, like social media, customer service, or website management.

Take some time to write out an actual job description, including the number of hours you think you might need your virtual assistant or employee for per week, and a range you’re willing to pay them for their services.

4. Reviewing your business goals

Once you have your job description and overview, how does it stand up against the goals you’ve set for your business?

When you’re looking to build a team you have to be clear about where you’re business is headed for several reasons:

If you hire a virtual assistant or employee, you’re becoming their leader;

Delegating tasks that aren’t important to helping you reach your goals will lead you nowhere;

Your virtual assistant or employee has to be on board with your mission and vision.

These are just a few reasons why being clear about where your business is headed – and having the right goals set that will help you get there – is so critical.

If you’re not clear about the specific goals you’re working towards over the next 3 – 6 months, then I strongly urge you to join Free Goals Course. Then, set your SMART goals for the next 3 – 6 months before taking another step towards hiring a virtual assistant or employee.

5. Start your search

You know what type of business you want to run, you know the tasks and projects you need the most help with, you’ve created a job description, and you have a clear vision of where your business is headed based on the SMART goals you’ve set – NOW it’s time to start your search.

There are several ways to go about finding the virtual assistant or employee you want to hire, and it’s largely going to depend on the tasks and projects they’ll be working on.

Hiring someone local

If you need someone who is local and who can come into an office or have in-person meetings with you from time to time, then you’re looking at more of an employee role than a virtual assistant role.

If this is the case, then ZipRecruiter is a great place to start your search.

ZipRecruiter helps match you with the perfect job candidate and makes the process super easy. When we moved to Puerto Rico, ZipRecruiter is who we used to find our first local hire.

Because ZipRecruiter is a sponsor of the Entrepreneurs On Fire podcast, you can post your first job for free by going to ZipRecruiter.com/fire!

Hiring someone virtually, but high-level

Let’s say you’re looking for someone who can handle high-level tasks and projects, but you don’t need them to be in your area – maybe you’re looking for a project manager.

In this case, Priority VA is a great resource where the founder, Trivinia, and her team will get on a call with you, figure out exactly who you’re looking for, and then go out and find them for you from their pool of experienced virtual assistants.

Project-based hiring

Maybe you want to hire a virtual assistant, freelancer, or contractor on a project basis – meaning you need them to be super specialized in a particular area, and you’re not necessarily looking to keep them on full time moving forward.

If this is the case, then UpWork is a great site to check out.

Hiring a general virtual assistant

Finally, if you’re looking to hire a general virtual assistant at a low cost who can do a lot of different tasks for you – and who doesn’t have to be local – Chris Ducker’s Virtual Staff Finder is an excellent service.

Chris and his team have Virtual Staff Finder set up in the Philippines, and the way it works is:

You submit your job description,

They go out and source 3 general virtual assistant candidates for you,

You interview each of them and choose your favorite.

They also have more specialized virtual assistants if you’re looking to go that route.

Preparing for the change

Now that you know all the steps you can take and the considerations you should have in mind, let’s talk about preparing for the change.

Hiring a virtual assistant or employee is a big step and an exciting move for you and your business! But it’s not easy, and it will require your focus and time, especially in the beginning as you onboard them and delegate tasks and projects to them.

The great news is, hiring a virtual assistant or employee will be a game-changer for you and your business if you’ve followed the steps above. Because this is where you get to make the switch from doing everything yourself and constantly feeling overwhelmed, to actually having time to brainstorm new ideas, implement them and start to scale.

To get our complete resource guide on how to grow your team, including interview questions, how to onboard your virtual assistant or employee and more, be sure to check out EOFire.com/team!

The post 176: How to scale your business by hiring a virtual assistant appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

Each year we like to put together a list of the top conferences for entrepreneurs because we get asked the question often:

What conferences should I attend?

But knowing the answer to that question for YOU, as an individual, would require that we know way more about your business, your goals, and where you’re at right now on your entrepreneurial journey.

So first, let’s talk about a few steps you can take to figure out what conferences are right for YOU in 2018.

What conferences should I attend?

First things first, you have to know what your goals for your business and life are for the next three to 12 months.

Once you have your goals set, you’ll be able to look at conference opportunities from a new perspective: will this conference help me get one step closer to accomplishing my goal?

You can determine whether a conference will help you accomplish your goal by looking at things like:

The main topics they’ll focus on

The speaker lineup

The time commitment

The monetary investment

For example, if your goal is to improve your stage presence, learn how to be a great speaker, and eventually get paid to speak, then attending a conference like Michael and Amy Port’s Heroic Public Speaking is definitely one to look at.

Whatever your goals, interests or focus this year, be sure you weigh your options, talk to people who have attended the conference you’re interested in and ask about their experience, and consider the time commitment and the investment involved.

One things for sure: attending events can make a HUGE impact on your journey, and more often than not the most pivotal moments on one’s journey are directly tied to an experience, a mindset shift, or an individual they connected with at a conference.

Conferences to attend in 2018

Here’s our list of the top conferences for entrepreneurs to attend in 2018, including notes on where you can find us this year!

Podfest

Podfest is an annual podcasting conference that hosts about 100 attendees from around the world.

Dates: Feb 8 – 10

Location: Orlando, FL

Who it’s for: If you’re a podcaster, or thinking about becoming a podcaster, then this is a great event! Surround yourself with like-minded people and take advantage of a more intimate, single track format.

Traffic & Conversion Summit

Traffic and Conversion Summit brings together some of the brightest marketing minds in the online space to share the strategies and tactics that are working right now in email marketing, social media marketing, and online sales.

Dates: Feb 26 – 28

Location: San Diego, CA

Who it’s for: Existing entrepreneurs who are looking to scale and grow their business through online sales and automation.

*Bonus: JLD is a featured speaker!

Social Media Marketing World

Social Media Marketing World is one of the biggest events in the world around social media, hosting nearly 5,000 social media experts and students, and it’s THE place to meet with the brightest minds in social media today.

Dates: Feb 28 – Mar 2

Location: San Diego, CA

Who it’s for: Entrepreneurs looking to dominate social media and learn about the latest strategies and tactics working in social media today.

*Bonus: JLD is a featured speaker!

Funnel Hacking Live

Funnel Hacking Live is an event hosted by the software ClickFunnels and it’s focused on building funnels that will help you automate and scale your business.

Dates: Mar 21 – 24

Location: Orlando, FL

Who it’s for: Established entrepreneurs looking to sell products and services to their audience through email marketing.

Social Media Day Denver

Social Media Day is internationally recognized as a day to focus on – and learn more about – the powers of social media.

Dates: June 30

Location: Denver, CO

Who it’s for: Anyone looking to enhance their social media skills, meet other entrepreneurs and like-minded people in the Denver area, and meet the top-notch speakers who are there to share their skills and knowledge!

Podcast Movement

Podcast Movement has been bringing together thousands of podcasters every year – for five straight years – to celebrate this incredible medium: podcasting.

*Use promo code FIRE for $50 off your ticket!*

Dates: July 23 – 26

Location: Philly, PA

Who it’s for: Whether you’re thinking about starting a podcast, have been hosting a podcast for years, or just like being around podcasters, this event will not disappoint.

Agents of Change

Agents of Change focuses on three major categories in the digital marketing space: Search, Social and Mobile.

Dates: Sept 20 – 21

Location: Portland, ME

Who it’s for: Entrepreneurs looking for tips and advice on how to build a strong foundation for their business and grow their online presence.

Youpreneuer Summit

Youpreneur Summit, put on by Chris Ducker, shares a little bit of everything when it comes to growing and monetize your online business.

Dates: Nov 3 – 4

Location: London, UK

Who it’s for: Entrepreneurs both new and seasoned who are looking to connect with incredible, like-minded people and have an amazing time while learning loads about what it means to be a Youpreneur.

Conclusion

Attending events is a powerful thing. Not only does it give you the entrepreneur to learn from the experts in your industry or niche, but it also gives you the opportunity to build meaningful – and hugely impactful – relationships with like-minded people.

Now, we’d love to hear from YOU: where will you be this year?

The post 175: Top Conferences for Entrepreneurs in 2018 appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

Manage overwhelm, plan and delegate: three things strong enough to hold any entrepreneur back.

How do you make any progress when you simply have too many tasks on your plate, causing you to wonder where to even start?

A few months ago I attended an event in London put on by Chris Ducker called Youpreneur Summit. The event was incredible for several reasons, but one of my favorite things about the event was that I got to meet and spend time with someone I’ve been friends with online for a while now.

His name is Gerjo – you might remember him from previous seasons because he’s always gracious enough to leave me a voice message with his feedback on the content he wants to hear about most. In fact, Gerjo is the one who reached out to me and requested that I create a post and episode around these three things.

Does this sound familiar?

When Gerjo asked me about these three things, I thought to myself: I’ve struggled with the exact same things. His words sounded SO FAMILIAR to me.

Because I’ve also struggled with how to:

Manage overwhelm

Plan

Delegate

I remember so clearly starting my day feeling like I was already so far under water that there was no hope of me getting to float before the day was over – let alone get out of the water completely.

But last week, yesterday – today – I didn’t feel that way, and it’s because I’ve managed to accomplish beating overwhelm, being dedicated to a plan, and diligently delegating tasks that I know I shouldn’t be working on.

My goal with this post

My goal with this post and episode is to share with you exactly how I did it.

Warning: There’s going to be a little bit of tough love in this post and episode – and a lot of precise steps you can take right now to manage overwhelm, plan and delegate. With reading this post and/or listening to this episode comes great responsibility: I don’t create content so that nothing can be done after consuming it. I create it so you can take action.

The tough love and precise steps are exactly what I needed in order to turn the corner, and I was lucky to have John by my side giving it to me. Today, I’m paying it forward and giving it to you.

Here’s the bottom line

So here’s the bottom line: managing overwhelm, planning and delegating is just about doing it.

Sounds like no help at all, right?

That’s because you’re over-complicating it, just like I was.

So stop right now and make a commitment to yourself: “I will not over-complicate this process.”

I’m going to break down each of these three struggles, give you a “quick win” you can implement right now, and then talk about making your actions consistent so that this won’t be a one-time thing, but rather an ongoing process.

How to manage overwhelm

Overwhelm is a feeling you get when you have too many things going on, or too much to accomplish all at once. Therefore, in order to manage it we need to learn how to let things go.

Now I don’t mean in the sense of writing them off, or completely deleting them from your life. I mean choosing a priority knowing that you will get to the things that matter most to you when it’s their turn.

Quick win for managing overwhelm

If you don’t already have a to-do list for your day, take 5 minutes to create it now.

Your to-do list should include the tasks you need to accomplish today in order to feel as though you’ve been productive.

Once you have your to-do list for your day take another 5 minutes to reorganize it.

What is the number 1 MOST important task on your list: the one that you simply cannot skip?

Move that task to the top of your list.

Continue to put your tasks in order of priority. Once your list is “in order” start from the top.

Set a timer for 30 minutes (or whatever timeframe you feel is necessary to complete your first task – anywhere between 15 minutes a 1 hour).

If you think your task will take more than 1 hour to accomplish, then it’s too big of a task; break it down into smaller tasks.

Once you set your timer you are committing to being FULLY FOCUSED on the one single task you’ve said is your BIGGEST priority for the day. No distractions.

When your timer goes off, give yourself a score. On a scale of 1 – 10 (1 the lowest and 10 the highest):

How productive were you?

How disciplined were you?

Now, set your timer for 5 minutes and take a well-deserved refresh break!

Didn’t that feel amazing?

You just organized your task list and accomplished the one thing you said was MOST important in less than 1 hour!

Being consistent with managing overwhelm

You now have the exact framework you can use every single day to set yourself up for success – and beat overwhelm.

Each day try to increase the number of FOCUS sessions you complete.

Some days it might just be one FOCUS session, depending on whether you have a full-time job, a family, or other life commitments.

Some days it might be three or four FOCUS sessions.

Practice this every single day, and before you know it you’ll not only be checking the MOST important tasks off your list, but you’ll also be proving to yourself that a lot of the tasks on your to-do list really aren’t that important – otherwise they’d be at the top, and you would have accomplished them already.

At the end of your first week – where you’ve practice managing overwhelm with the system I’ve shared above – take our your task list, and ask yourself:

What tasks really aren’t necessary?

What tasks aren’t going to help me make real progress in my business?

What tasks don’t contribute to a specific goal I’ve set?

I’m willing to bet there are a lot of tasks on your list that really aren’t necessary – at least not right now. So go ahead and back-burner those tasks that can wait; literally get them off your list.

Asana is really helpful for this because you can document ALL of your tasks so that you don’t forget about them. Those tasks that aren’t a priority right now don’t have to disappear; but they do have to get off your to-do list, because they are the ones causing your feelings of overwhelm.

How to plan

Planning can sometimes seem like an unnecessary step; you already know what steps you need to take in order to accomplish something, so you just dive right in and start doing the work.

While I LOVE your enthusiasm for just starting, this is not the way to go about planning because there are way too many distractions and roadblocks that will come up in the process that will derail you and push you off course.

Having a plan in place will not only save you so much time, it will also:

Save you bandwidth on trying to figure out what to do next (which can be SO exhausting), and

Take the guesswork out of making progress (just move on to the next step on your list!), and

Quick win for planning

Pick a bigger project that you’re currently working on and using a tool like Asana (or just a piece of paper) write out the name of your project.

Underneath the name of your project write the date you will accomplish that project by.

Then, below that, write down numbers one through five (as though you’re making a list).

By each of those five numbers write down – in order – which steps you’ll take in order to complete your project.

If your project requires more than five steps, continue writing out as many steps as you need in order to complete your project.

If you’re not sure exactly what every step will be, that’s ok – just focus on what you know you need to do right now.

With your goal date in mind (the date you’ll finish your project by), write down a due date for each one of your steps. This should be easy to back into since you know the date you want to finish the project by.

There you have it! You’ve just create a lose project plan for yourself!

Being consistent with planning

In order to dive deeper into planning – and actually make it a habit – take time to map out the bigger goals you’re focused on over the next 3 months.

Schedule one hour in your calendar as soon as possible, and during that one hour follow these steps:

Write out, in order of priority, the major projects (or goals) you’re working on over the next 3 months.

Take the first project (goal) – your highest priority – and make sure it’s SMART (click here for this exercise).

Just as you did in the “quick win” section above, take your SMART goal and start creating your plan for it, including the date you’ll accomplish it by, the steps necessary, and a due date for each of your steps.

Keep your plan CLOSE throughout your project so you know exactly what your next step is – and so you can check in with your progress.

Rinse and repeat! Once you’ve accomplished your goal, move to the next goal on your list, make sure it’s SMART, and then create a plan you can execute on.

How to delegate

For purposes of this post I’m going to assume that, if you’re struggling with delegating, then you have at least one employee, contractor, or virtual team member who is helping you in your business.

Quick win for delegating

Identify one task you do daily (or multiple times per week) that you shouldn’t be doing. Considering that you’re overwhelmed with tasks, this shouldn’t be an issue.

You’ll recognize a task as one you shouldn’t be doing because the task:

Is a $10 / hour task (you could pay someone $10 / hr to do that thing for you)

Doesn’t require that YOU be the one doing it (anyone capable could perform this task and it wouldn’t make any difference in the outcome)

Once you’ve identified that one single task, create a video tutorial of how you accomplish that task or a checklist that walks through each step you take.

Loom is a great resource for recording a video, and Asana or Process.st are great platforms for creating checklists and processes. All of these recommendations have a free version available.

You’ve identified the one task, you’ve documented how you do that task, and now it’s time to delegate it.

Get in touch with your team member (employee, contractor, virtual team member, etc) and let them know you have a new task you’d like for them to handle. Give a brief explanation of the task, why it’s important to the business, and send them the video link or checklist of how to do it.

Have them do it once, check their work, and smile: you’ve just delegated a task!

Being consistent with delegating

Delegating is not easy – I get it. Oftentimes your instinct is to just do it yourself because you:

Already know exactly what to;

Can do it quickly;

Don’t want to spend the extra time to teach someone else how to do it.

If you can’t get over this mindset, you will continue to feel overwhelmed. You have to believe that the time you’re investing in delegating a task to someone else will pay off – and it will.

Now that you know how to identify those tasks you shouldn’t be working on, make it a weekly habit to check in on your to-do list and continue delegating those tasks.

Actually schedule it in your calendar: “Check to-do list for tasks I can delegate”. Set it to recur once per week. Add a notification or reminder so you don’t forget.

Conclusion

There is not one step I’ve shared with you here that is difficult. It just requires your time and patience.

This is such simple process to follow, but it’s not going to be easy (if it were, then you wouldn’t be wondering how to manage overwhelm, plan and delegate).

You have to commit to being disciplined about this, and that means not just doing it one time and then falling back into your normal routine of “I’ll just do this task one more time before I delegate it cause it’ll be easier”.

Now it’d be silly to pretend that I’ve done this all on my own.

I already mentioned that John gave me some tough love to help me beat overwhelm, conquer planning and make a consistent habit out of delegating. But he also gave me this: The Mastery Journal.

Here’s what it looks like and how The Mastery Journal works…

By using The Mastery Journal daily I’ve been able to get more done before noon than I used to get done all week.

With the help of four FOCUS sessions per day, my task list has never been cleaner, and I’ve never made so much progress towards accomplishing my projects and goals.

Trust this process.

Following the steps above, and using The Mastery Journal daily to help keep you on track, is how you win.

The post 174: How to manage overwhelm, plan and delegate appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

A New Year, a new you? It doesn’t have to be quite so drastic…

But one thing is for sure: if you’re looking for different results, then different actions are necessary.

Let’s take growth, for example – it’s typically a big one when considering goals. Personal growth, business growth, financial growth – they’re all things you want.

But how do you put together a growth-focused goal with the smaller steps necessary to actually help you get there?

It starts with setting a SMART Goal

A SMART Goal is:

Specific

Measurable

Attainable

Relevant

Time-bound

You can check out this post for a deep dive into how to get started with your own SMART Goal, but for example’s sake we’ll cover one here in this post, too.

Creating a SMART goal is important because it’s what will allow you to put a plan in place you can execute on, along with a specific goal date to help hold you accountable.

Goal: Get more qualified leads for your business

Let’s say your growth goal is business-related: you’re looking to get more qualified leads for your business.

But getting more qualified leads for your business doesn’t meet any of the SMART criteria, so you’ll have to put it to the test.

Specific: Bring on paid beta members for my new marketing services package who are tech savvy business owners.

Measurable: Bring on 5 paid beta members for my new marketing services package who are tech savvy business owners.

Attainable: If I can reach out to and engage 250 qualified leads, then I know a 2% conversion (5 of 250) is attainable.

Relevant: Yes, beta testing my marketing services will help me turn this into a strong offer moving forward.

Time-bound: I will bring on 5 paid beta members for my new marketing services package who are tech savvy business owners by May 1, 2018.

Now that you have your SMART Goal set, it’s time to start putting a plan in place you can execute on.

Putting a plan in place

You know from reading about the importance of knowing your avatar, your niche and building a strong foundation for your business that you can’t just jump from launching a website, or a blog, or a podcast, or a YouTube channel, to suddenly getting lots of qualified leads on your list that you’ll automatically convert into paying customers.

So your first step, which you could think of like your first micro-goal, is to understand who this marketing services package is for, specifically.

Go ahead and brainstorm it out…

What does this person’s business look like now?

What are their biggest marketing struggles?

How will your services help them solve those struggles?

Where do they want to be in their business?

Once you know exactly who it is you want as a beta member, there are a couple of different options.

Option 1

Do your own lead generation to find this person.

Option 2

Automate your lead generation with a platform like LeadFuze.

Let’s look at option 1 first.

Doing your own Lead Generation

Since you’ve already defined who it is you want as a beta member, you know who you need to find.

Now, you need to figure out where you’re going to find them.

This means your next micro-goal will be to decide where you’re going to find your avatar, and which manner you’ll engage with them:

Online communities or at in-person events

Through referrals

With content marketing

It might be on social media, in online communities, at in-person networking events, or through personal referrals.

You could also take the content marketing route and try to attract your avatar to you through providing free, valuable and consistent content. This is what we’ve done here at Entrepreneurs On Fire with our daily podcast.

This will take time and require hard work, so you have to patient.

Remember, this is a measurable goal, so you should always be checking in with your timeline to be sure you’re on track when you start a new micro-goal.

In this example, given that you need to find 250 leads, which route will you take?

Once you’ve decided where you’re going to find your avatar, the fun part comes into play: engaging with them!

You not only need to know your avatar is on point (meaning, the avatar your defined actually exists, you’ve found them, and they’re interested in what you have to offer), but also that they’re a good fit for you and your services.

Your next micro-goal is to have at least 10 one-on-one conversations with your avatar – offer up a free 10 minute chat, or meet up at a coffee shop to chat about what they have going on.

Your goal in connecting and communicating with them one-on-one is to confirm that:

They are, in fact, your avatar (your perfect customer)

What you’ve put together can and will help them solve their biggest struggle

Now all that’s left to do is rinse and repeat.

Where can you find more of your avatars?

How can you start to reach them on a one-to-many level?

This might be through building an email list and campaign that introduces your marketing services, or maybe via a live training webinar you offer.

Remember, your goal is to reach at least 250 of your avatars, so always have that part of your goal in mind.

Now that you have an overview of how you might go about doing your own lead generation, let’s look at option 2: using software like LeadFuze that can help automate it.

Automating your Lead Generation

In a nutshell, LeadFuze (that’s our affiliate link) automates the heavy lifting when it comes to finding – and starting to develop a relationship with – qualified leads for your business.

But to get way more specific, let’s look at the steps you would take on your own if you were to go out and start looking for qualified leads for your business (this is assuming you’re a B2B business):

Research who those people are and start building a list of companies

Finding contacts at those companies you can reach out to

Verifying contact details

Preparing a message to send them

Send that message

Following up until you get a response

These are the steps that LeadFuze automates for you, and here’s how…

How does LeadFuze do it?

Once you know who you’re trying to reach (your avatar), you would put that information in LeadFuze. Let’s carry our example over from option 1: say you’re trying to pitch marketing services to other tech savvy business owners.

First thing you’re going to do is select the industries you’re interested in – let’s say Computer Software and Internet Technology are two that are high on your list given your avatar.

Next, you would look at the role of the person you’re trying to reach within the industries you’ve selected.

You can start typing in job titles yourself, or select from LeadFuze’s pre-built filters. You can even use “negative keywords” to exclude certain roles from showing in your search results, which will help you dial in your targeting.

Then, you’ll want to identify any other traits of your avatar you want LeadFuze to know about before it performs your search for you.

This might include something like “Employee Size” (so you can exclude companies that have more than X number of employees).

You might also think of this criteria in terms of revenue. If so, LeadFuze recommends using a simple formula for calculating estimated revenue based on the employee size: ($150,000) x (number of employees). It’s generally somewhere between $100,000 and $200,000, but as a rule of thumb the $150,000 is recommended. That said, some industries are on a whole other level, so be sure to do your due diligence before relying on this equation.

So let’s say you want to work with businesses that are doing $100 million in revenue. That equates to about 660 employees. So in LeadFuze, you’d start with 500+ employees.

Once you have all your information set, LeadFuze will perform your search, and you’ll receive a screen like this:

Based on the search criteria for those two industries, LeadFuze has found just over 16,000 leads available.

A lead is considered someone who LeadFuze has put through their double verification process, which results in single digit bounce rates. This is important since that can impact your future deliverability.

Once you assign Fuzebot, he’ll do all the work of building your list for you. No more researching companies, finding contact details, and verifying information – the prospecting is all done for you.

As we covered in option 1, the next step is to reach out to them and connect, and LeadFuze automates that, too! (Click here to get the full rundown on LeadFuze and everything it can help you do)

Conclusion

If you’re looking for different results this year than you saw last year, then different actions are necessary.

Whether you’re after personal growth, business growth, financial growth, or some other type of growth, there are simple steps you can take to get there, and oftentimes platforms available that can help.

All it takes is getting started with a SMART goal and a plan.

The post How to Get More Qualified Leads for Your Business appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

December 2017 Income At-A-Glance

Gross Income for December: $210,291

Total Expenses for December: $66,798

Total Net Profit for December: $143,493

Difference b/t December & November: -$11,103

Why We Publish An Income Report

This monthly income report is created for you, Fire Nation!

By documenting the struggles we encounter and the successes we celebrate as entrepreneurs every single month, we’re able to provide you with support – and a single resource – where we share what’s working, what’s not, and what’s possible.

There’s a lot of hard work that goes into learning and growing as an entrepreneur, especially when you’re just starting out. The most important part of the equation is that you’re able to pass on what you learn to others through teaching, which is what we aim to do here.

Let’s IGNITE!

**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below.

Josh Bauerle’s Monthly Tax Tip

What’s up Fire Nation, my name is Josh Bauerle. I’m a CPA and the Founder of CPA On Fire, where we specialize in working with entrepreneurs to minimize their tax liability while keeping them in line with the ever-changing tax laws.

I’ve been working with JLD & Kate at Entrepreneurs On Fire for years now, and they’ve included me in these monthly income reports with unlimited access to all their accounts so I can verify that what they report here is complete and accurate.

And because they believe in delivering an insane amount of value to you, my job doesn’t stop at the verification level; I also provide a new tax and accounting tip every month!

Josh’s December Tax Tip: The New US Tax Law

You may not – but should – know that the US just passed a pretty massive tax overhaul.

Depending on who you listen to, the tax changes will either make us all rich and send the economy soaring to never before seen heights, or hurt the middle class to pad the wallets of the rich and will surely put us into the next great depression.

So what’s the truth?

Is the plan good or bad overall, and for you specifically?

That’s exactly what we are going to look at here, with 3 caveats…

This is a completely non partisan look at the tax bill with no regard to political parties, including which side initiated the plan;

This will only look at how the plan will impact the average person’s – and specifically small business owner’s – taxes with no regard to larger economic impacts;

This is a short, general summary on how it impacts the average small business owner. How it impacts each of us specifically can’t possible be covered here. Definitely talk to a professional to find out your specifics.

How Entrepreneurs Are Impacted

The new tax law provides plenty of changes for the average person, from doubling the child tax credit and standard deduction, to eliminating personal exemptions and capping state and local tax deductions.

But the biggest changes come for a group near and dear to Fire Nation’s heart: entrepreneurs.

Essentially, the new tax plan is going to reduce the amount of income you pay taxes on for your business by 20%.

If you remember any of our talks re: business entities, then you know almost all small businesses are what they call “pass through entities”. And pass through entities get their name because the profits pass through to the owners, who then pay any taxes as a part of their personal return.

Under this new plan, small business owners with pass through entities (again, almost every business owner listening to this) will only pay taxes on 80% of their profits instead of the normal 100% they always have.

So let’s say your business, after all deductible expenses, profits $200,000 in 2018.

Under previous rules, you would pay taxes on all $200k.

Under this new law, you will only pay taxes on $160,000, even if you pulled out all $200k in distributions. This could easily save you $10,000+ in taxes with that move alone. And as your profits go up, obviously, those savings become greater.

Restrictions

If your profits are over $315,000 and you are married – or profits are over $157,000 and you are single – there may be a few other restrictions on the 20% rule that involve your salary or guaranteed payments.

So if you are at or approaching those levels, please speak with a CPA as soon as possible to make sure you’re in line to maximize those savings.

Conclusion

Overall, and again, looking at this only from a tax perspective – and mostly taxes for entrepreneurs – I’m very happy with this new plan. Most small business owners, between the new breaks on the individual side, and especially the 20% reduction in taxable profits, will see significant savings on their 2018 taxes.

But with these changes it is more important than ever to talk to an expert and make sure you are in the proper entity and falling within the regulations to take these savings!

As always, please feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss what would be best for YOUR business. I LOVE chatting with Fire Nation!

*Bonus* Claim your spot in Josh’s FREE Course on Business Entities!

What Went Down In December

Memoir: Audio Biographies

In 2018, I’m taking on a passion project.

This project has been banging around my head for a couple years now, and it’s finally time to unleash it to the world.

In short: I’ve always been a fan of history, and most of my favorite books are biographies of the men and women who changed the world.

These books are often GIANT works, and can take MONTHS (even years) to finish.

My idea is to create a fun audio experience that can be consumed in an hour or two and that will be both fun and educational.

Enter Memoir: Audio biographies of the men and women who changed the world.

Episode #1 will be Alexander the Great, and I have some other CLASSICS in the pipeline.

If this seems up your alley, sign up here to listen to the 1st episode: What is Memoir?, plus receive sneak peeks and special announcements!

I would LOVE your feedback on this project, so please email me with any thoughts about Memoir.

I can’t wait!

The Podcast Journal

Another exciting project we’ve been working on for a long time is The Podcast Journal: Idea to Launch in 50 Days.

The Podcast Journal is unlike any other journal we’ve created here at Entrepreneurs On Fire in that it’s essentially a step-by-step workbook that guides you through creating and launching your own podcast.

With detailed instructions for each of the 50 days, plus video tutorials, an online resource center, and check points along the way, The Podcast Journal will help you finally launch your podcast in 50 days or less.

We first came up with this idea in early 2015, and ever since we’ve been focused on other projects. But 2018 IS the year for The Podcast Journal, and our goal is to launch by the end of Q1 2018.

If you’re interested in learning more about The Podcast Journal and being the first to hear once it’s available, be sure to join our interest list!

The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz and 4 Days to Mastery

Our newest free course, 4 Days to Mastery: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus, launched in December – yay!

But the way we went about it was a little different than usual…

It started a few months ago actually, when Chanti reached out to us with a proposal: she was convinced we could be crushing it with a quiz optin on our site.

We accepted Chanti’s proposal, and within a few weeks she sent us an outline for The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz: How to Eliminate Fear and Finally Achieve Entrepreneurial Freedom.

We signed up for Interact quiz software and got to work.

The main goal of having The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz is to get more qualified leads into our free courses, including Free Goals Course, Funnel On Fire, Free Podcast Course, and Free Webinar Course.

Because we know if we can get more leads into these free courses, that means more potential for:

making a major impact in others’ journeys;

higher conversions for our ‘next level’ offers in these funnels: The Freedom Journal, ClickFunnels, Podcasters’ Paradise, and Amy Porterfield’s Webinars that Convert, respectively.

But in reviewing Chanti’s outline for the quiz, I realized she had an “outcome” that led to a funnel we hadn’t create yet: it was for The Mastery Journal.

So John and I sat down and brainstormed, and within an hour came up with the outline and name for 4 Days to Mastery: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus!

In December we not only got to launch 4 Days to Mastery, but we also got to launch The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz in several areas on our site.

The first phase is to test conversions and outcomes with the quiz to see if it’s working and of value to Fire Nation, and we’re currently doing this in 3 areas on our site:

Our welcome gate

Our hello bar area

Our sidebar

Want to check out 4 Days to Mastery and The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz?

You won’t be sorry, and we’d love to hear your feedback!

Click here for 4 Days to Mastery

Click here to take The Fire Nation Freedom Quiz

Our Business Lessons for 2017

We could’t wrap up December properly without sharing our biggest business lessons for 2017, which included:

No one cares about your business as much as you do

You’ll never know until you take action

Compare and despair

Constant improvement is key

Failures are a healthy part of business

And several more!

To check out a deep dive on each of these lessons, and to check out the rest of our business lessons learned in 2017, head over to the post!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

December 2017 Income Breakdown*

Product/Service Income: $154,111

TOTAL Journal sales: 1,161 Journals for a total of $49,593

The Freedom Journal: Accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days!

TheFreedomJournal.com: $4,572 (96 Hardcovers & 24 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $21,255 (541 Freedom Journals sold!)

Total: $25,827

The Mastery Journal: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus in 100 days!

TheMasteryJournal.com: $2,620 (64 Hardcovers & 10 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $17,975 (460 Mastery Journals sold!)

100 Days to Mastery: $3,171

Total: $23,766

Podcasters’ Paradise: The #1 Podcasting community in the world!

Recurring: $24,620 (249 monthly)

New members: $10,257 (34 new members)

Total: $34,877

Podcast Sponsorship Income: $64,250

Podcast Websites: $5,000 Your all-in-one podcast website peace of mind

Skills On Fire: $59

Podcast Launch: Audiobook: $284 | eBook: $48

Free Courses that result in the above revenue:

Free Podcast Course: A free 15-day course on Podcasting

Free Webinar Course: A free 10-day course on Webinars

Free Goals Course: A free 8-day course on Setting & Accomplishing Goals

Funnel On Fire: A free 8-day course on Creating a Funnel that Converts!

Kickstarter On Fire: A free 5-day course on going from Idea to Launch on Kickstarter!

4 Days To Mastery: A Free 4-day course on how to master Productivity, Discipline & Focus!

Affiliate Income: $56,180

*Affiliate links below

Resources for Entrepreneurs: $39,330

Audible: $251

BlueHost: $150 (Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials)

Click Funnels: $26,999

Coaching referrals: $3,315 (email me for an introduction to a mentor for overall online business or a Podcast focused mentor!)

Easy Webinar: $365

Mentorship: $7,500

ConvertKit: $171

Disclaimer Template: $40 (legal disclaimers for your website)

Fizzle: $116

LeadPages: $374

Infusionsoft: $0

SamCart: $50

Courses for Entrepreneurs: $14,006

Create Awesome Online Courses by DSG: $8,245

Webinars that convert by Amy Porterfield: $582

10k Readers by Josh Turner: $94

The Amazing Seller by Scott Voelker: $347

ASK by Ryan Levesque: $3,141

Ramit Sethi: $1,597

Resources for Podcasters: $2,262

Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player: $72

Podcasting Press: $1,125

Libsyn: $1,010 (Use promo code FIRE for the rest of this month & next free!)

UDemy Podcasting Course: $55

Other Resources: $582

Amazon Associates: $507

Other: $75

Total Gross Income in December: $210,291

Business Expenses: $60,477

Advertising: $117

Affiliate Commissions (Paradise): $3,070

Accounting: $2,529

Cost of goods sold: $4,640

Consulting: $802

Design & Branding: $1,980

Education: $74

Legal & Professional: $297

Meals & Entertainment: $1,023

Merchant / bank fees: $1,358

Amazon fees: $8,764

Shopify fees: $120

PayPal fees: $359

Office expenses: $2,063

Payroll Tax Expenses / Fees: $1,258

Paradise Refunds: $2,220

Promotional: $1,191

Total Launch Package fees: $0

Sponsorships: $11,500

Show notes: $728

The Freedom & Mastery Journal: $5,000

Travel: $700

Virtual Assistant Fees: $9,207

Website Fees: $1,477

Recurring, Subscription-based Expenses: $6,321

Adobe Creative Cloud: $100

Boomerang: $70 (team package)

Brandisty: $24

Authorize.net: $91

Cell Phone: $576

Dropbox: $99 (annual fee)

Google: $45

Internet: $631

eVoice: $10

FastSpring: $39

Infusionsoft CRM: $396

Insurance: $551

Libsyn: $400

Manychat: $65

Chatroll: $49

PureChat: $20

ScheduleOnce: $9

Shopify: $176

TaxJar: $19

MeetEdgar: $39

Taxes & Licenses: $300

Interact Quiz Software: $89

WP Engine: $2,490 (annual fee)

Zapier: $15

Zoom: $15

Total Expenses in December: $66,798

Payroll to John & Kate: $15,900

In our May 2014 Income Report and our June 2016 Income Report, Josh focuses on how to pay yourself as an entrepreneur. Check them out!

Wondering what we do with all of our net revenue? We share all in our April 2017 Income Report :)

Total Net Profit for December 2017: $143,493

Biggest Lesson Learned

Importance of Doing a Business Review

Unless we’re looking back at the strategies and tactics we’ve implemented or tested, and then taking the time to understand which ones worked and which ones didn’t – and why – we’re never going to know what to continue doing, or stop doing, moving forward.

The end of the year really brought this to the forefront for me, because it’s such a HUGE step in how I come up with goals for the year ahead.

But regardless of whether it’s the start of a new year, the middle of the year, or nearing the end of a year, a business review is always a good idea. Great news is, you can do it in only 5 steps.

  Step 1: Take note of your bigger projects

First step is to take a look back at the bigger projects you’ve worked on in your business over the past year.

This will include things like:

Creating and/or launching new products or services;

Trying out / moving into a new piece of software;

Hiring and/or firing team members;

Engaging in new business relationships / partnerships; and

Anything else that took a significant amount of your time to prepare / implement.

Step 2: What worked, and why?

Once you have your list, it’s time to review each item and make note: which were successful?

If you have a hard time determining whether one of the projects on your list worked, then that’s a business lesson in and of itself.

It should be very simple to answer whether something worked based on the SMART goal you set when you committed to doing it.

Once you’ve picked out the ones that worked, actually write out an explanation of WHY it worked.

Step 3: What didn’t work, and why?

The same way you reviewed each item and made note of which were successful, make note of those that were unsuccessful.

Once you’ve picked out the ones that didn’t worked, actually write out an explanation of WHY it didn’t work.

Step 4: Lessons learned

Based on the list you’ve just created, including the notes you’ve taken by each project re: whether it worked or not (and why), what are you biggest lessons learned?

What will you do again in the future because it worked so well?

What will you avoid doing again in the future because it didn’t work at all?

Make a list of all of your biggest takeaways

Step 5: Looking ahead

Remember: knowledge is power.

Now that you have a complete list of the projects you’ve worked on, which ones worked and which didn’t (along with why), and you have pulled out your biggest lessons learned as a result, it’s time to look ahead.

How can you leverage this knowledge to help you WIN in your business moving forward?

How will you double down on what’s working, and avoid the things that didn’t work so well for you?

Now you have a complete system for how to complete your own business review!

Next step: SCHEDULE IT!

Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!

Until next month, keep your FIRE burning!

~ Kate & John

Note: we report our income figures as accurately as possible, but in using reports from a combo of Infusionsoft & Xero to track our product and total income / expenses, they suggest the possibility of a 3 – 5% margin of error. 

Click here for all of EOFire’s Income Reports

This post was written by Kate Erickson, Content Creator and Implementer at EOFire. Follow Kate on Social:

The post Entrepreneurs On Fire: December 2017 Income Report appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

I launched Kate’s Take in August 2014 with sweat dripping down my brow and a lump in my throat. You see, at the time, I didn’t feel like I had much to share with an audience.

Around this time I was going through some major personal development stuff. I had recently wrapped up a transformational training series where I learned some pretty deep truths about myself.

Mainly, that I was walking through life invisible.

I walked away from that training with a major declaration: I would never walk through life invisible again.

I also had some big goals lined up for myself in 2015, including speaking on stage 5 times. Now that was a pretty lofty goal for me because at the time I had spoken on exactly zero stages.

As you can imagine, launching a podcast and setting a goal of speaking on stage 5 times were both WAY OUTSIDE of my comfort zone.

The beginning of a new journey

But I knew I had a message to share, and I knew that if I was that scared about launching my podcast, chances were I wasn’t alone.

What if me launching my podcast inspired someone else to launch theirs?

What if through sharing my story of walking through life invisible encouraged someone else to make the same declaration I did: that they’d never walk through life invisible again?

And so I launched – scared to death, but ready for a change.

The evolution of a podcast

Kate’s Take has evolved a lot since launch. Not only has my content evolved, (and improved in my humble opinion), but things like my format and frequency have shifted as well.

I started out publishing episodes two times per week.

And I continued with that publishing schedule for nearly one and a half years.

When I wasn’t able to reach my goal in 2015 of hitting 30,000 downloads per month on the podcast, I decided to change things up.

I wasn’t ready to let the podcast go, but I knew I needed to shift – something wasn’t working.

So I started publishing in Seasons on the podcast.

The idea was that I would be able to create multiple pieces of content all related to the same topic – in sequential order – and collectively that would make them easier to find and consume.

I launched Season 1 of Kate’s Take in January 2016, and since I’ve published a total of 7 Seasons: 1 each quarter up until October 2017.

In October of 2017, I noticed something happening: not only was Season 7 my least downloaded Season out of all of them, but my call to action for my listeners to help me decide on a topic for Season 8 fell flat.

Sticking to my guns (I told my audience I would only go ahead with Season 8 if I got a certain number of people to reach out to me with their feedback for a topic), I stopped recording in Seasons.

But I still wasn’t ready to let the podcast go…

So I went to a once per week publishing schedule

In November 2017 I published an episode letting my audience know that I was going to commit to a once per week show: every Monday I will publish an episode that systems-focused and that will show you behind the scenes of a 7-figure business.

Hopefully you can see from this that a podcast isn’t a set thing that works out exactly how you had envisioned from the very beginning.

I’ve learned over and over that being flexible, and your ability to pivot as an entrepreneur, is critical to your success.

The best of Kate’s Take

I’ve learned more than I ever could have imagined through producing this podcast, and I’m so happy and grateful for every one of those lessons.

Kate’s Take has…

Helped me create an amazing one-on-one connection with my listeners.

Allowed me to have a better understanding of what our audience wants and needs.

Helped me become more confident and a better speaker (I did land those 5 stages back in 2015, by the way); and it has

Helped me become a better – and more intentional – creator.

And so while the best of Kate’s Take may not be determined by massive downloads or huge revenue streams, this podcast has changed my life, and I hope that through tuning in it’s helping you change yours, too.

Top 5 episodes from Kate’s Take

Here are the top 5 episodes I’ve published to date (in no particular order).

1. How to Set and Accomplish your biggest goals

When we launched The Freedom Journal in January 2016 I had an idea: to create an entire season on the podcast around setting and accomplishing goals.

We had an entire promotional calendar filled with guest posts, guest appearances on other podcasts, press releases, our Kickstarter launch – why not also promote on Kate’s Take and add massive value in the process?

To day, this is my most downloaded episode – by thousands! And for good reason: setting and accomplishing your biggest goals isn’t easy. But there is a step-by-step process you can follow to make it happen.

In this episode, and throughout Season 1, I cover every one of these steps.

Ready to accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days? The Freedom Journal is your accountability partner to help make it happen!

2. Why creating systems in your business is so important

In January 2015 I was sitting on a balcony in Puerto Vallarta with John and our great friends Jill & Josh Stanton from Screw the Nine to Five.

We were having a little balcony mastermind session, and when it came to me I shared a struggle: I didn’t feel focused or like I was putting my best foot forward in the business.

After some brainstorming and back and forth, it was discovered – the thing that I’m best at.

Systems.

Since that day I’ve focused all of my energy in the business on putting my best foot forward. Whether it’s creating new systems, improving already existing ones, or learning about new strategies I can then share with you, it’s been all about systems for me.

Which is why when Season 2 came around on the podcast I knew exactly what I wanted to cover: How to Create Systems in Your Business.

This episode is the first in Season 2, where I talk about the importance of creating systems in your business. This episode lays the foundation for what could save you a ton of time and frustration, and what could also help you scale and grow your business.

3. Top 7 Strategies: How to grow your podcast audience

Podcasting is a pretty big topic here at Entrepreneurs On Fire. In fact, we created an entire online training and community around it in October 2013 called Podcasters’ Paradise.

Today, Paradise has over 3,200 members and is the most thriving online community I’ve ever been a part of.

It has not only helped me become a better leader, but it has taught me about some of the biggest struggles that podcasters face – especially when they’re first starting out.

One of those struggles? How to grow an audience.

So, just as we teach, I listened to that struggle come up over and over again, and then decided to create a solution for it: this post and episode.

To date it’s one of the most highly trafficked posts on our site.

4. How to Make This Your Most Productive Year Ever

Productivity is a pretty hot word in the online world today.

Everyone wants to know how to become more productive.

And I know from personal experience that when you commit to productivity, BIG things happen.

Suddenly, you feel a weight lifted off your shoulders.

When you commit to being productive, you actually get to check more off your to-do list than you put on it.

Focusing on productivity has helped me get more done before 12pm than I used to get done all day – literally.

And so I thought it a crime to not share the exact steps one can take to become more productive TODAY with our audience. I do just that in this post and episode.

5. Kate’s Take: The Audio Blog

This post was created back in 2014, right along with the launch of Kate’s Take.

Episode 0, as we like to call it, isn’t my most popular episode, nor is it anywhere near the most downloaded, but it continues to be one of the most popular “back linked” posts on our site (meaning, a lot of other people link to it on their site).

In this post I share a detailed journey of the things I did before I become an entrepreneur, and how each and every one of those things has inspired me to share my lessons here on the blog, and on the podcast.

Thank you Kate’s Take listeners!

Thank you for helping Kate’s Take become what it is today. I truly appreciate every single individual who tunes into this podcast, and as always, I’d love to hear from you!

Reach out to me any time with episode requests, to say a quick ‘hello’, or to provide feedback!

The post 173: The best of Kate’s Take: Behind the Scenes of a 7 Figure Business appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

Systems and Standard Operating Procedures may not be the sexiest things in business, but they are critical to any business’ success!

That’s why when I started working on a recent project I knew I couldn’t keep it to myself: this is the start of me sharing the exact project plan, brainstorming exercises, and implementation steps I’m taking in order to create systems and standard operating procedures throughout our entire business.

Be sure to tune into this episode for additional content not included in this post!

Starting a major project

As is the case with anything that comes to life in your business, the first step necessary is to decide that you actually want to work on a particular project.

I’ve been creating systems in our business since the beginning, but something I haven’t ever taken a step back to brainstorm and create: standard operating procedures for everything we do.

I’d been thinking about this a lot because in the past couple of years we’ve been able to launch some pretty amazing free courses, online communities, and even a second physical journal (The Mastery Journal) based on our knowledge from previous projects.

Because we’ve documented the steps we took in each case, we’re able to recreate that same success with different topics and in different areas of our business without having to start from scrath.

So now I know firsthand how much time you can save yourself – and your team – when everyone has a central place they know they can go for the exact steps to accomplish a particular task or project.

Same goes for every day tasks and projects in your business.

Once I decided I wanted to take on this project, the next thing I did was COMMIT to it.

This might sound super obvious, but when’s the last time you actually stopped and committed to yourself – out loud – that you were all-in on a project?

It can make a huge difference when it comes to holding yourself accountable.

Why do you want to do it?

Once I had decided on and committed to this project, my next step was to understand why I wanted to do it.

I know a project without a purpose behind it is going to be tough to create a plan for, and it’s also going to be tough to follow through on when the going gets tough. I need a WHY to come back.

When I asked myself WHY I wanted to do this project, here’s what I came up with…

1. I want to get a good handle on everything that’s going on in our business.

Now that we have a solid team of 4 virtual team members, plus myself and John, I wanted to have a solid, overall picture of what everyone is working on.

This is important because I know once we have that overall picture it will give us the opportunity as a team to evaluate and decide:

What we don’t need to do anymore at all;

What we can make more efficient / better;

What’s working great so we can double down.

2. I want to have a central place where we can all go to understand any process or system in our business.

Because some of the tasks and projects we work on overlap – or for some of our bigger systems, we have multiple people managing different steps of the process – it’s important that we’re all on the same page and understand what other pieces of the puzzle are necessary.

Having a central place where everything is documented will help:

Cut out the guesswork;

Make sure everyone is on the same page;

Save everyone time;

Serve us when doing new on boarding / training.

What will it look like when it’s complete?

Once you’ve decided and committed to your project, and you have a good understanding of WHY you want to do it, it’s time to brainstorm how you want it to turn out.

In other words, what will it look like when it’s complete?

You not only want to have a good understanding of the major deliverables (because that’s going to help you identify the individual steps you need to take to get there), but you also want to know HOW it’s going to help you.

So when I took a step back and thought about what our systems and standard operating procedures will look like when complete, I came up with four major deliverables.

1. A list of everything we’re working on in our business

2. Confirmation that everything is running optimally

3. System in place for each task or project

4. A central location where everything lives

    In coming up with my list of major deliverables I was able to see exactly how this project is going to help us once complete. Once we have all 4 of these things in place, the reasons why I wanted to do this project in the first place will be met.

  What’s the very first step?

Only thing left to do is START your project, which you can go about doing in several different ways.

You might start by putting together a detailed project plan, which is typically what I would recommend. But in order to get started on this particular project, all I needed to figure out is the first step.

I knew if I got too deep into putting together an entire plan in the beginning that I might get bogged down with everything I don’t know at this point. So instead, I’m starting with what I do know: the very first step.

I know that once I take the first step, the others will start to reveal themselves. Plus, as I start to identify new steps, I can start putting my project plan together as I go.

It’s easy to get held back when first starting a big project: overwhelm and not knowing where to start happens to all of us. So it’s ok if you don’t know all the steps right now.

Focus on the first step and the others will reveal themselves.

Steps for creating Standard Operating Procedures

Here are the first steps I’ve taken in creating standard operating procedures for our business.

Step 1: Create a board in Asana

I created a board in Asana for the overall project: Standard Operating Procedures for Entrepreneurs On Fire.

Then, I created a column for each team member.

Next, I reached out to all our team members and explained the project and why it’s important.

Finally, I requested their help with the first step: sending me a list of their tasks in the form of: daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly and 1-time tasks.

Once I receive that information back from each of our team members, I’ll document what everyone sent me in their respective columns.

Step 2: Match tasks that already have a system

Next, I’m going to start matching up tasks and projects on each of our team members’ lists with the systems and processes that we already have in place. That way I can identify two types of tasks and projects everyone is working on:

Tasks and projects that already have a system

Tasks and projects that don’t have a system

    Stay tuned for more steps!

This is only the beginning of this project, and I hope you can see from this that starting big projects doesn’t have to be overwhelming or scary.

All you have to do is set aside the time to talk through it and brainstorm.

Ask yourself:

What are my goals for this project?

Why do I want to do it?

What do I hope is accomplished when it’s complete?

What’s the first step I have to take to get started?

If you’re looking for a step-by-step guide that can help you with setting and accomplishing a BIG goal like the one I’ve shared here, The Freedom Journal is that guide.

The Freedom Journal is your accountability partner with daily check-in’s, 10-day sprints, and quarterly reviews to make sure you’re on track to hitting your goal.

Grab your own Freedom Journal today at TheFreedomJournal.com!

The post 172: Systems and Standard Operating Procedures for Your Business appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

One of my favorite times of the year is when I get to sit down and gather up our biggest business lessons learned from the past 12 months.

But this hasn’t always been the case…

Looking back at my first year as an entrepreneur, I now know what an incredibly valuable learning experience that was.

But the problem was: I didn’t see it as such at the time.

I was blinded by frustration and overwhelm, which caused me to jump from project to project and task to task without ever taking time out to review what was happening. As a result, there were a lot of lessons I learned years after the fact – ones that had I taken the time to uncover them back then, could have helped me make big moves in my business that first year.

Since I have started to take time out to review what’s happening, I’ve learned so much. And more importantly, I’ve learned lessons that serve me in real time instead of years after the fact.

I now know how critical frequent reviews of your business are to its success – and to your growth as an entrepreneur.  So while I get excited to do this at year-end, keep in mind doing a review like the one I’m about to share with you shouldn’t only be a once-a-year thing; it should really be happening at least once per quarter.

Knowing what’s working and what’s not

Unless we’re looking back at the strategies and tactics we’ve implemented or tested, and then taking the time to understand which ones worked and which ones didn’t – and why – we’re never going to know what to continue doing, or stop doing, moving forward.

I not only hope the business lessons I’m about to share will be valuable for you and your business, but I also hope this post and episode will inspire you to do the same type of review in your own business.

So before I dive into our biggest business lessons for 2017, I want to share the steps you can take to do a review in your own business.

How to do a Business Review

Regardless of whether it’s the start of a new year, the middle of the year, or nearing the end of a year, a business review is always a good idea.

One of my biggest lessons year over year is that no one cares about your business as much as you do, and that’s never been truer than when reviewing what’s working and what’s not working in your business, because if you’re not looking out for your time and what gives you the best ROI, who is?

The answer is NO ONE.

Step 1: Take note of your bigger projects

First step is to take a look back at the bigger projects you’ve worked on in your business over the past year.

This will include things like:

Creating and/or launching new products or services;

Trying out / moving into a new piece of software;

Hiring and/or firing team members;

Engaging in new business relationships / partnerships; and

Anything else that took a significant amount of your time to prepare / implement.

Step 2: What worked, and why?

Once you have your list, it’s time to review each item and make note: which were successful?

If you have a hard time determining whether one of the projects on your list worked, then that’s a business lesson in and of itself.

It should be very simple to answer whether something worked based on the SMART goal you set when you committed to doing it.

Once you’ve picked out the ones that worked, actually write out an explanation of WHY it worked.

Step 3: What didn’t work, and why?

The same way you reviewed each item and made note of which were successful, make note of those that were unsuccessful.

Once you’ve picked out the ones that didn’t worked, actually write out an explanation of WHY it didn’t work.

Step 4: Lessons learned

Based on the list you’ve just created, including the notes you’ve taken by each project re: whether it worked or not (and why), what are you biggest lessons learned?

What will you do again in the future because it worked so well?

What will you avoid doing again in the future because it didn’t work at all?

Make a list of all of your biggest takeaways

Step 5: Looking ahead

Remember: knowledge is power.

Now that you have a complete list of the projects you’ve worked on, which ones worked and which didn’t (along with why), and you have pulled out your biggest lessons learned as a result, it’s time to look ahead.

How can you leverage this knowledge to help you WIN in your business moving forward?

How will you double down on what’s working, and avoid the things that didn’t work so well for you?

Now that you have a complete system for how to complete your own business review, let’s dive into what I discovered after following these steps for Entrepreneurs On Fire.

Biggest Business Lessons of 2017

No one cares about your business as much as you do

This will always continue be a major business lesson for me.

In fact, I remind myself of it every day. Because no matter how many team members you hire or how much money you invest in consultants and professionals to help you build a business, none of them will ever care about your business as much as you.

I don’t share this business lesson to freak you out. I share this business lesson because I’ve learned this the hard way, several times.

Most recently, I realized that we weren’t being paid out on our American Express transactions.

Tens of thousands of dollars that we thought were being deposited into our account weren’t being deposited into our account.

None of our merchants, or gateway processors, or credit card companies alerted us of this issue, and while that made me really angry – and scared me to think that these companies, even though we pay them a hefty sum every month, weren’t looking out for us – it also helped me come to a powerful realization:

At the end of the day, it’s no one else’s responsibility.

It’s not their business. It’s mine.

So next time you rely on a company, a service, a product, or a contractor, remember that ultimately, the responsibility is yours.

This also prompted a huge overhaul of our system for tracking payments – clearly something that was NOT working in our business given the magnitude of what we were missing.

You’ll never know until you take action

Leading up to the launch of The Mastery Journal in January of this year we thought we had it all figured out.

Having just launched The Freedom Journal in January of the previous year we were feeling pretty confident about the steps we needed to take to make The Mastery Journal launch a success.

So we essentially took out our project plan and checklist and started going down the line.

While this definitely worked as a systems overview of what boxes needed to be checked, we should have known better:

As is true with everything in business, you’re never going to know what unforeseen roadblocks or challenges will present themselves until you take action and just start.

And if this was the case with a project we already knew how to prepare for, imagine a project you don’t know how to prepare for!

Prep and planning is very important, but it’s never going to outweigh the simple act of taking one step forward in order to uncover what’s next.

While our prep and planning for The Mastery Journal was spot on, nothing was going to actually happen until we started taking action.

Compare and despair

Sometimes we don’t even realize we’re comparing ourselves to other people; comparing our launch to someone else’s launch; comparing our podcast downloads to someone else’s downloads; our email list size to someone else’s list size…

All you comparing yourself to others is going to result in is despair.

If you knew you were creating energy that would lead to a lack of motivation, frustration, and feeling down about yourself and your business, then why would you create that energy?

Now you know: every time you compare yourself or your business to someone else’s, you’re creating energy that leads to a lack of motivation, frustration, and feeling down about yourself and your business.

So just don’t do it.

I’ve caught myself going down this path many times in 2017 and it has led me to second-guess a lot of actions I’ve taken. Me second-guessing my actions leads to sub-par work. Sub-par work leads to disappointment.

And so I practice. Every time I catch myself starting down that path, I immediately stop and regroup. There just no point in comparing yourself to other people, and I don’t want to do things that don’t have a point.

Constant improvement is key

Podcasters’ Paradise has been alive for 4+ years now. We launched in Oct 2013, and around Oct 2017 – 4 years later – we gave Paradise a major facelift.

In doing so, we found a renewed energy throughout the community. Our existing members were really excited about the upgrade, plus, it gave us something new to promote on our bi-weekly live Masterclass to potential new members.

Making sure you’re continuing to deliver value on a consistent basis is key when you’re running an online training and/or community.

Sure, a recurring membership sounds great – and it is – but it’s not a “one and done” type of thing. If you’re asking members to pay you money on a recurring basis, then there has to be constant improvements being delivered.

This upgrade worked really well for us in 2017, and it’s something we’ll be putting a lot of focus on in 2018 – for all areas of our business.

Failures are a healthy part of business

There were a few projects we scrapped or decided to majorly tweak in 2017. One of those projects: FireUP, a software tool we launched as an MVP that didn’t quite stick.

In theory, FireUP was a great idea: a software plugin for your website to help you convert your websites visitors into email subscribers, and eventually, paying customers.

The problem was the MVP couldn’t stand up to the competitors already out there, like Optin Monster and Sumo.

We ran the MVP to see if could get some initial traction – enough interest to help prove the concept – and then we would move forward with adding additional features and improving the software.

But we didn’t get that interest, and therefore decided to let FireUP go.

Proof of concept is something we’ve come back to over and over again in our business – because it works. It’s a simple way to make a black and white decision: are we doing this or not?

It wasn’t an easy decision; we had partnered up on this project, and we didn’t want to end that partnership or see the software go. But this is why it’s so critical to have measurements and tracking in place when it comes to hitting goals: it makes it that much easier to make smart business decisions (versus decisions based on emotion).

Live events and the power of community

Committing to attending live events isn’t always easy.

When you commit to attending a live event you’re not only committing your time – your most precious resource – but you’re also committing financially.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell what the ROI for an event will actually be.

Your projects come to halt while you’re preparing for – and attending – said event.

This is why it’s key to have goals in mind for the live events you’re attending – and to do as much up-front research as possible before committing.

We attended and spoke at a lot of events in 2017, and we even hosted our very own first live event here in Puerto Rico called Puerto Palooza.

Here’s what we’ve learned:

1. You can’t put an ROI on creating and nurturing relationships…

…and a great way to create and nurture relationships is to put yourself in a physical space with others who are on the same path as you. Doing this has worked really well for us in regards to building a strong community who feels connected to us.

2. You get back what you put in.

You can’t show up to an event unprepared and stand in the corner the entire time. You have to go into events knowing exactly what it is you’re hoping to walk away with, a plan to help you accomplish that, and a positive attitude you can share with others through actually communicating with them.

I’ve proven this to myself many times over, so I speak from personal experience. Don’t go to an event expecting to get something out of it if you’re not willing to put in the time and effort to show up big.

3. Actual experiences bring things to the next level.

The online world is amazing, and it gives us access to so many things we may not otherwise have access to. But experiencing things in “real life” will always bring them to the next level.

4. Hosting your own live event isn’t easy…

…but the results and the ripple effect make every second of prep and planning worth it. John and I are actually chatting now about Puerto Palooza II; if you’re interested in hearing more about our in-person mastermind here in Puerto Rico, don’t hestiate to reach out :)

Marketing

We’ve continued to double down on our marketing efforts from lessons learned in the past. For example, our closing and opening of Podcasters’ Paradise is a campaign we ran back in 2015, and that we repeated in 2017 with great success.

The basic outline is that we close the doors to the community for a set period of time in order to make improvements and upgrades within, and in doing so this gives us the opportunity to get a group of members in before the doors close (and the investment increases), and a group of members in when the doors open (based on the improvements we’ve made within).

But there are a couple of things we did in 2017 that didn’t work out so well for us, like running Facebook ads during Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

When we planned for the doors to Paradise to open on Nov 30, we didn’t consider that being right in the midst of these two “holidays”.

As a result, our ad cost and conversions weren’t where we wanted them to be.

I’m not typically one to say the time of year matters for much of anything you do in your business, but in this case, had we thought about it beforehand, we probably would have changed that opening date.

Overall, 2017 proved that marketing as a whole is a system and an idea that, at its core, doesn’t really change much. The psychology of selling and influence doesn’t change.

What does change is everything around us – the actual market – and so you have to continue coming up with new and unique ways of reaching your ideal audience.

In order to do this in 2017, we’ve picked up on a lot of new tactics, like FB Messenger Bots for email marketing.

Never stop evolving and thinking about new ways of delivering your message. This will work because it will set you apart.

Your business foundation

I’m a big fan of systems and processes; it’s my focus here at Entrepreneurs On Fire, and this year it became more relevant than ever due to some unexpected – and some expected – travel.

We’d been planning for most of the year to take a 40-day trip overseas to attend two conferences and to enjoy seeing a new part of the world we’d never been to before: New Zealand, Australia, and London.

What we didn’t plan for was a Category 5 hurricane named Maria to hit our island and community within weeks of our planned departure.

Because we chose to be off the island when Maria hit, we were inadvertently choosing to not be able to go back home before our 40-day overseas trip. So being away from our home office and out of our normal routine for nearly 3 months in a row took us a bit by surprise.

Luckily the foundation we’ve worked so hard to build over the past 5 years in business served us well, and even though we weren’t in our home office and didn’t follow our normal routine, our business continued running as if nothing had happened.

Seeing how resilient our business has become was really comforting and gave me loads of peace of mind, which is why I decided to create this post, which goes into detail about how you can make sure you’re creating a resilient business, too.

2017 in Review

To recap, make sure you’re actually taking a look back and doing some reflection around what’s gone on in your business.

This should be done quarterly at the very least.

It’s also powerful to do it at the end of each year to ensure you’re taking the time to let the lessons you’ve learned sink in, and also so you have the opportunity to double down on what’s working well for you moving forward, and remove the things that aren’t.

We hope our business lessons from 2017 will serve you on your journey moving forward!

The post 171: A Year in Review: Business Lessons from 2017 appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

When Kristin reached out to me and said “I’d love to hear tips on connecting in business: networking online, offline, building meaningful relationships, and being genuine while building a business”, I immediately started drafting this post.

Building meaningful relationships and connecting with others is critical to the success of your business, and it’s also necessary for your own sanity.

But how do you actually do it?

As an introvert, I had the exact same question when I was first starting out on my entrepreneurial journey.

Luckily, I’ve always had a thing for building relationships, but translating that to building relationships in business was tough for me for several reasons:

I didn’t have a solid purpose for building relationships;

I didn’t know where to find the right people to connect with;

A lot of times I felt slimy at networking events – the connections didn’t feel real or genuine.

That’s about the time I took on a huge challenge: I wanted to figure out the exact steps I could take in order to build meaningful relationships in business.

Understanding why relationships are important

My challenge to figure out how to build meaningful relationships in business started with me getting clear on why we as humans crave and value relationships.

What do they provide us?

What happens when we don’t have the right relationships in our lives?

I came to realize through very little research and a lot of reflection and common sense that relationships provide us with comfort through:

Connection (knowing we’re not alone)

Support (knowing we have help)

Validation (knowing others feel the same way)

Then I thought back to how many times in the past 5 years or so I had turned to an individual whom I’ve built a relationship with for one of those 3 reasons (connection, support or validation).

I counted A LOT of times.

What would have happened had I not had those relationships?

What type of place would I have been in at the time – and more importantly, right now – if I wouldn’t have had connection, support and validation available to me?

One thing is for sure: I DEFINITELY wouldn’t be where I am right now.

All of this combined proves what everyone always says: how important networking and building meaningful relationships is; plus, it helped me understand at the very base level why it’s so important (by realizing where I’d be – or where I wouldn’t be – without relationships).

Which brings me to the next step in my challenge: how do you build relationships in business?

How to build relationships in business

Something else Kristin said to me in her email is this:

So many times I think that we know networking matters, or who you know matters, but many people don’t know how to build those relationships from a place that doesn’t feel slimy.

So then I started thinking… “Is it really that we don’t know how to do it, or is it just that we’re uncomfortable doing it?”

Or maybe we’re not confident enough?

Or maybe we don’t know where to go to start?

Because everyone’s personality is different, how you build relationships as an individual might be different from how I do it. However, I do believe very strongly in the five steps I’m about to share with you.

At the very least, they will put you on a path to success – regardless of your personality or where you’re at when it comes to building meaningful relationships in business.

5 Steps to getting started

1. State your goal or intention

First step to most things in life is to understand why you want to do it.

What’s your goal or intention with building a particular relationship in business?

Some examples might be:

To have an accountability partner who I can meet with once per week;

To find someone who is where I want to be so I can learn from them;

To engage in a joint venture or affiliate relationship;

To invite people on my podcast.

These are just a few examples – there are countless more.

And it might just be that you simply want to connect with others in your industry or niche so you know you’re not alone.

2. Pick your place

Now that you know exactly why you want to build a particular relationship, it’s time to figure out where you can go to put yourself in a place where these people might be hanging out.

That might be:

A specific in-person conference or event;

An online summit;

A Facebook or LinkedIn group;

Through a mutual connection.

Conference, events and online summits are easy to find via Google. Just type in the type of event you’re interested in (conference, event, meetup, summit, etc) + the keyword or topic you’re interested in.

An example might be “Conference for speakers”.

Another example might be “Summit for online marketers”.

In regards to a Facebook or LinkedIn group, a great place to start is to search right within the platform itself. Same idea here: you want to type in the keyword or topic you’re interested in connecting around.

That might be “podcasting group”, or “gardening group”, or “self-improvement group”.

Finally, figuring out whether you can build a relationship through a mutual connection just takes you talking about what it is you’re looking for with those you already know.

Next time you’re having a chat with a friend, let them know what you’re up to – maybe that you’re interested in connecting with people who have similar interests around gaming, or around comedy, or around music.

Then, simply ask if they know anyone who is interested in those topics who might want to connect.

Picking your place takes time and research, so don’t get frustrated, and know that if you commit the time to finding the right place to connect, that you will find the right people you want to connect with.

3. Introduce yourself, and offer value

Now that you know your goal for building a particular relationship and where to go to find those you want to build relationships with, it’s time to introduce yourself and offer up some value!

Remember, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” ~ Zig Ziglar

Whether you’re at an in-person event, attending an online summit, or joining a new online group, introduce yourself and offer up some type of value that can connect you with who you want to meet.

For example, if you’re looking to connect with an accountability partner, then let people know that.

Post in the group, or include in your conversations with people, that you’ve just started an online business around helping mom’s build stronger connections with their children through one-on-one time together, and that you’re interested in having weekly chats with someone who is in the same industry or who has similar interests.

4. Be interested

This isn’t all about you; be interested in the others who are around you.

Learn about their background, listen to their story, and find out what it is they’re passionate about.

As questions like:

How did you get into what you’re working on now?

What’s something you’re really excited about right now?

Any question related to the type of business or industry you’re in.

Through asking these types of questions you’ll start a natural conversation that will lead you to learning more about their interests and what’s important to them.

Based on what you learn about them, offer up value whenever you can. This might be through a recommended resource, an introduction to someone who you know, or perhaps you have knowledge or expertise that can help them.

5. Follow up

Relationships aren’t built overnight. They take time and care to nurture and grow, so be willing to follow up, continue to engage and always take the initiative.

If you’ve met at an in-person conference or event, send them an email afterwards and follow up on whatever it is you connected over at the event.

If you’ve met on an online summit, send them an email afterwards and ask what their biggest takeaway from the summit was, and what their plan is to implement that into their own business. Perhaps there’s a way you can help support them in that?

If you’ve meet through an online group, connect outside of that group one-on-one. Maybe you could set up a quick Skype chat, or bring the conversation over to email so you can get to know more about one another and what each of you has going on.

Be natural, and don’t over-think it

Relationships are a part of human nature. The reasons why we crave and value relationships – they’re a part of us.

So just be you! Don’t over-think the process of connecting with others and building meaningful relationships in business. Just follow the 5 steps I’ve shared here and you’ll be on the right path to connecting with the right people.

I want to give a huge shout out to Kristin for emailing me with this question. It’s such a HUGE topic and holds so much importance on your journey to building a successful business.

So why not start today?

The post 170: Tips on how to connect: building meaningful relationships in business appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

How do you ensure you’re creating a resilient business?

This is a question that’s been on my mind ever since Sept 27th, when I was having a catch up convo with a friend.

She said to me: it must feel pretty amazing in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, and with all the traveling you’ve been doing, to know that your business is still running.

Very true, although this was the first time I had thought about it like that.

It begged the question: how does one create a resilient business?… so that when things do get rough or go a little crazy, you can rest assured that your business isn’t going to crumble.

Can YOUR business take a hit?

We’ve created a resilient business here at Entrepreneurs On Fire.

But have you?

You’re probably wondering how you’d even know the answer to this question, which honestly is in and of itself the problem: you can’t wait for a disaster to hit to know whether your business can handle it.

It could mean the difference between going under or surviving, and my guess is that you don’t want to take that chance.

If my assumption is correct, then I have something for you: a checklist you can use to ensure you ARE creating a resilient business.

Be proactive. Use this checklist.

Checklist: How to create a resilient business

1. Take inventory

Taking inventory is the FIRST step to organizing your time and the tasks and projects you’re working on for your business.

Here’s how to do it…

Time required: 1 week

What you’ll need: a piece of paper + pen (or your favorite note-taking system); I recommend paper + pen

What to do:

Start by writing out the day of the week at the top of your paper – the first day, and each day thereafter.

Each day, for 1 week straight, let that piece of paper + pen follow you around as you’re working on your business.

Each time you work on a certain task or project, simply write it down on your paper under the specific day you worked on it.

No task or project is too big or too small to record.

This is simply an exercise to help you understand what it is you’re spending your time on, PLUS which tasks and projects are repetitive ones.

Examples would be:

checked email

went on Facebook

helped a community member with their password

wrote sales page copy

designed an opt in page

tweaked home page of website

At the end of the week take a look back at the tasks and projects you’re spending your time on.

Now, it’s time to categorize it.

Keeping everything intact from your one week of taking inventory, start with a fresh piece of paper and create 4 columns:

DAILY

WEEKLY

MONTHLY

1-TIME

Beneath each of these categories place the tasks and projects you recorded in the appropriate column.

Which did you find yourself doing daily? Weekly? Monthly?

And there are probably a fair number of tasks or projects you’re working on that are only 1-time things (like launching a website, creating an online course, etc)

2. Identify actual dependencies

You’ve just discovered A LOT about how you’re spending your time and what tasks and projects you have going on in your business.

Whew!

Now, it’s time to go through your list and mark the tasks or projects that actually DEPEND ON YOU.

If you don’t have any employees or contractors helping you in your business, then initially, it’s going to seem as though everything depends on you.

Everything does not depend on you.

I’m willing to bet there are probably a fair number of projects or tasks you’ve written down over the past week that aren’t necessary at all.

There are also probably a fair number of projects or tasks you’ve written down over the past week that shouldn’t depend on you (i.e. you could either automate or delegate them).

Actual dependencies are projects or tasks that, if you weren’t doing them, would be detrimental to the growth of your business.

In order to legitimately determine actual dependencies, you’re going to have to know what your overall business goals are, and what projects or tasks you’re working on that are directly contributing to you accomplishing those goals.

You can sign up for our Free Goals Course if this is something you haven’t taken the time to establish (and with a new year approaching, now is a perfect time to do it!)

3. Create a system for those dependencies

Now that you have a list of the tasks and projects in your business that require YOU, it’s time to create a system for each of those dependencies.

I’m not talking about a system that will automate them or delegate them.

I’m talking about a system you can use in order to plan out one month – maybe even two months in advance – so that you’re never waiting until something is “due” to get it done.

An example might be that you are the content creator in your business.

Maybe you have a blog, or a podcast that you produce weekly and publish every Monday for your audience.

If this is the case, then instead of waiting until Sunday night every week to create and schedule your content, you could have a system in place that allows you to create and schedule your content out a full month in advance!

How great would it feel to have your content scheduled out a full month in advance?

How much time would you be able to create in your day-to-day if, instead of working on creating content 2 days a week – every week – you were working on creating content 2 days a week – one time per month?

If you’re not really sure how the whole systems thing works, then we have a step-by-step guide for you – both written and audio – right here.

4. Calendar your year

The best way to make sure no surprises come up in your business is to calendar out your year.

What major projects will you be working on?

What events do you plan to attend?

What major vacations do you have planned?

Based on the major projects, events and vacations you have planned, recognize there has to be a buffer for your dependencies.

For example, if you have a major project planned that is estimated to take up the entire month of March, then every other dependency in your business will have to be planned out and completed ahead of time so you don’t fall behind.

This is why #3 is so important; once you have systems in place for your dependencies, it’s going to be that much easier to plan ahead.

5. Review

CONGRATS! You’ve just done a ton of great preparation and planning for your business (and you’ve probably discovered a lot of things you never knew about the time you spend on certain projects and tasks)!

You’ve taken inventory, you’ve identified dependencies, you’ve created systems for those dependencies, and you’ve calendared out your year.

Now, it’s time for a big review.

What projects or tasks can you cut – or set aside – that aren’t contributing to moving your business forward right now?

How can you plan better so the dependencies you’ve identified in your business can be completed most efficiently?

What have you discovered about your projects, tasks, and the time you spend on certain things?

What have you discovered about your business as a whole?

Putting it into practice

One of the most helpful things I’ve heard since becoming an entrepreneur is something Amy Porterfield said on a podcast:

Schedule it to make it real.

I’ll leave you with a challenge

That challenge is to not only thoroughly review and implement the checklist I’ve shared above, but to actually put everything you’ve just learned into practice by scheduling time each day, each week, each month to implement it.

Drop into the comments below and COMMIT to ensuring your business is resilient. It could mean the difference between going under or surviving, and my guess is that you don’t want to take that chance.

The post 169: Checklist: How to create a resilient business appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

November 2017 Income At-A-Glance

Gross Income for November: $208,971

Total Expenses for November: $54,375

Total Net Profit for November: $154,596

Difference b/t November & October: -$7,339

Why We Publish An Income Report

This monthly income report is created for you, Fire Nation!

By documenting the struggles we encounter and the successes we celebrate as entrepreneurs every single month, we’re able to provide you with support – and a single resource – where we share what’s working, what’s not, and what’s possible.

There’s a lot of hard work that goes into learning and growing as an entrepreneur, especially when you’re just starting out. The most important part of the equation is that you’re able to pass on what you learn to others through teaching, which is what we aim to do here.

Let’s IGNITE!

**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below.

Josh Bauerle’s Monthly Tax Tip

What’s up Fire Nation, my name is Josh Bauerle. I’m a CPA and the Founder of CPA On Fire, where we specialize in working with entrepreneurs to minimize their tax liability while keeping them in line with the ever-changing tax laws.

I’ve been working with JLD & Kate at Entrepreneurs On Fire for years now, and they’ve included me in these monthly income reports with unlimited access to all their accounts so I can verify that what they report here is complete and accurate.

And because they believe in delivering an insane amount of value to you, my job doesn’t stop at the verification level; I also provide a new tax and accounting tip every month!

Josh’s November Tax Tip:

One of my favorite benefits of entrepreneurship is the flexibility it offers.

And there’s no time I enjoy that flexibility more than the Holidays!

Back when I was an employee, I was extremely limited with when – and how much time – I could take off for the Holidays.

In some jobs, working at least one of the major Holidays each year was a requirement.

But now that I’m my own boss and set my own rules, I can take as much time off as I want!

Of course, if I want to be successful, the work still needs to get done, but how and when it gets done is up to me now :)

But flexibility isn’t the only benefit entrepreneurs can enjoy this time of year. There’s also the opportunity for some unique tax deductions that come up this time of year! And two of them that Kate and I were recently discussing and thought would be relevant to share with Fire Nation are:

1. Buying gifts for clients and/or colleagues, and

2. Throwing business Holiday parties

So, let’s break each of these down!

1. Gift Giving

There are actually some pretty big restrictions when it comes to gift giving.

Generally, the IRS will only allow you to deduct up to $25 per person or company you give to.

This is true whether the gift is for an employee, client or professional associate. So if you send a $50 gift basket to your favorite client (or maybe CPA?!) you will only deduct $25 of that cost on the return.

One major exception would be for actual charitable gifts, meaning they were made to a not for profit organization. The only restriction on deducting these gifts would be that the total amount given for the year can’t be more than 50 percent of your income (and if you are reaching that limit, kudos to you on your extreme generosity!)

2. Holiday Parties

Many business owners, both large and small, will throw some type of Holiday party. Whether it’s for employees, clients, or just people who help you in your business, throwing one of these parties is where you can get a little more creative on the tax deductions.

First, if you’re buying the food/drinks for everyone in attendance, you are no longer limited to the 50 percent limitation on meals and entertainment. You can take the full amount.

This is true whether you hold the event at a restaurant, bar or other outside location (or if it’s at your own home or office).

Second, where you can get really creative is with renting your home to your business to throw the Holiday party.

The general idea here is that your business would pay you rent for the privilege of using your home for the holiday party. And the best part? Because you are renting your home for less than 14 days in the given year, the rent your business pays you is not taxable.

So if your business pays you $500 to rent your home for the party, your business gets a $500 deduction – and you pay no taxes on it!

The key here is to figure out what a reasonable amount of rent is.

My suggestion here would be to call around to some local locations you would rent for something like this – a hotel conference room for example – and document what they quote you.

Then, use the average rate of the quotes you received for the amount of rent you charge your business.

The Holidays are a great time to be an entrepreneur (but really, what time isn’t?!)

We hope these holiday gift and holiday party ideas are helpful in maximizing your tax deductions this season!

As always, please feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss what would be best for YOUR business. I LOVE chatting with Fire Nation!

*Bonus* Claim your spot in Josh’s FREE Course on Business Entities!

David Lizerbram’s Legal Tip

How to Hire a Lawyer for your Business, Part I

Sooner or later, every business is going to need legal representation. A lawyer can either be an expensive line item or a huge asset for your business.

As an entrepreneur, it’s up to you to make that choice.

If you haven’t hired a business attorney before, the process can be intimidating. I know having been hired by hundreds of clients to represent them over the course of my career.

When the client (that’s you) is informed and knows what they’re looking for, there’s a much greater likelihood of having a positive result for both sides – the lawyer and the client.

Ultimately, we both want the same thing: a mutually beneficial, long-term business relationship.

To help you achieve that result, I’ve put together this list for you!

7 Keys to Choosing the Right Lawyer for Your Business

This is Part 1 – we’ll cover Part 2 in the January 2018 Income Report!

Key 1. Figure out when you need to hire a lawyer

This is going to vary for every client. Generally speaking, the sooner you establish this crucial relationship and start getting good advice, the better off your business is going to be.

However, good legal advice isn’t free. (On the other hand, bad legal advice is easy to find.)

If you’re just starting out, I’d suggest you start contacting business lawyers and asking them what their rates are for basic services like an initial consultation or a business formation.

You can put those numbers into the budget as you get the funds together to start your business – whether it’s a solo, bootstrapped operation, or one where you’re seeking investment capital.

Finally, be sure to hire a lawyer before you do something that’s going to get you into trouble. For example, if you’re forming a partnership, entering into a lease, taking money from investors, or putting a product out there that might create some liability, hiring a lawyer to protect your rights should be a high priority.

Key 2. Focus on the type of lawyer you need

Most business attorneys can handle typical formation needs. This might include creating a corporation or LLC, putting together a partnership agreement, or drafting common business contracts.

Tip: With all of these, be sure to ask if the documents are being customized to your specific needs.

It’s OK if the lawyer is starting from a template; sometimes there’s no need to re-invent the wheel.

But your lawyer should be doing more than just pressing Print and handing you a document to sign.

If you just need a trademark, or you have a question about tax law, then you can focus on an attorney who specializes in those areas.

But if you’re looking for general, long-term legal counsel for your business, find a business attorney, and he or she can put you in touch with specialists from time to time as needed – whether they’re in the same firm or outside counsel.

Think of your business lawyer like your general practice doctor: you go to him or her for checkups and your regular medical needs; if and when you need a specialist, your general practice doctor will let you know and make a referral.

Key 3. Find a lawyer who understands – or is willing to learn about – your market or niche

This is a followup to Number 2. Yes, you need a general business attorney. But if that attorney has no clue about your industry or how your business operates, there are bound to be communication challenges.

This doesn’t mean that if your company makes green left-handed back scratchers, you need an attorney who only works in the green left-handed back scratcher industry.

It does mean that your legal counsel should have a willingness to learn and understand what your company does every day and who your main customers and strategic partners are. These points should be factored into your legal strategy.

Of course, in the event you work in an industry that’s specialized and highly regulated, you’re probably going to benefit from the advice of someone who understands those regulations. If you’re opening a nuclear power plant, an attorney who is familiar with the complex web of regulations involved in that type of project is going to be the right fit for you.

For most businesses, however, a basic willingness to learn is enough to meet your needs.

Key 4. Pick a law firm of the right size

There are pros and cons to working with big firms, small firms, and solo practitioners.

If your business grows to be the next Facebook, Amazon, or Tesla, you’ll probably be engaging the services of large law firms from time to time. Of course, by that point, you’ll also have your own in-house legal department.

Sometimes – and this is by no means always the case – startups and small businesses find themselves to be a low priority for larger law firms.

If the law firm is really making its money representing Fortune 500 companies, large government entities, and the like, it can be challenging for the firm to be responsive to the needs of every individual client.

Another potential issue with working with a larger firm is the question of who you’re actually going to be working with. Are they going to assign your work to a new associate attorney fresh out of law school?

Is that associate going to be with the firm for the long-term, or will he or she be looking for a new job just when you get used to working with them?

Will your file get passed from one office to the next?

However, there can be advantages to working with larger firms if your business requires the resources the firm can bring to bear.

Very complex lawsuits, for example, may be better suited for a larger firm than a solo attorney or small firm. Sometimes, clients prefer a blended strategy – working with a solo attorney or small firm on a regular, ongoing basis, and using a big firm (typically at a higher cost) for specific, occasional projects.

If your law firm is not willing to collaborate with outside attorneys, that may be a red flag.

Tip: No matter what size the law firm, be sure to understand up front who you’ll be working with. How do you get in touch with your contact? What’s their availability should an urgent issue arise?

Most firms with multiple attorneys have different hourly rates for each attorney, so that’s an important consideration as well.

If a young associate with a low hourly rate will be handling your matter, will the file also be reviewed by a more senior partner? If so, are you going to be paying that partner’s much higher rate for that time?

Working with small firms or sole practitioners can have its advantages, too.

Typically, you’re going to receive more individual attention. And many solo practitioners establish relationships with other attorneys to act as an informal version of a traditional law firm – meaning, your needs will still be covered if that lawyer goes out of town, or if you come up with an issue that’s outside of his or her areas of specialization.

So, if you decide to go with a smaller firm, make sure it’s one that has access to resources that you’ll need as your business grows.

Which leads me to Key #5…

Be sure to tune in to January 2018’s income report to get Key’s 5 – 7!

If you have a legal question that you’d like me to cover on a future Income Report shoot me an email with your request! I’ll be sure to give you a shout-out when I join John & Kate to talk about your legal questions!

*Bonus* Download David’s FREE Checklist on Intellectual Property for Entrepreneurs!

What Went Down In November

Youpreneur Summit, London

When Chris announced his first annual Youpreneur Summit in London and asked John to keynote the event, we jumped on the opportunity to be involved.

We know that Chris and AMAZING events go together because we’ve been a part of two of his previous Tropical Think Tank events in the Philippines – in 2014 and again in 2015.

The time and care that Chris and his team put into creating an experience for those who attend never goes unnoticed.

As you can tell, we had high expectations arriving in London…

Were they met?

Absolutely.

From start to finish…

The opportunities to build new relationships – in addition to enhance already-existing ones – were plentiful;

The mastermind sessions each day provided FOCUS time for brainstorming and problem-solving;

The presentations delivered a mix of inspiration, motivation and down & dirty actionable steps; and

The nighttime get-togethers put the icing on the cake.

Top business lessons learned

The recurring theme of the entire event – something mentioned by nearly every speaker who stepped on stage – was this:

The importance of doing things that don’t scale; mainly, having one-on-one conversations with your readers, listeners, prospects and customers.

We all want to automate, scale, grow, gain back time… but we can’t do all of that from the very beginning.

We have to be willing to do things that don’t scale.

Like having one-on-one conversations with your readers, listeners, prospects and customers.

Lessons don’t come up over and over again on accident

If the same message runs through nearly every presentation at an event, then it’s time to listen up.

When’s the last time you had a one-on-one conversation with your readers, listeners, prospects or customers?

I challenge you – today – to put together a schedule that will allow you to spend an afternoon booking these one-on-one calls.

Then, set up a 2-hr block of time where you have 15-minute conversations with individuals in your audience.

You can reach out to them to schedule these conversations via email (anyone who has ever sent you a message telling you they love what you do, or that they enjoyed your last post or podcast episode – that’s a perfect place to start!)

A few other value bombs dropped from the stage?

Use #journorequest

I’m not a public relations pro by any means, but a great lesson from Janet Murray (who IS a public relations pro) is to leverage the #journorequest, which high-level journalists and PR pros use when looking for relevant news and stories to cover.

We all need to be more self-reliant

“You, where you’re headed, your idea – they are enough.”

This came straight from John Jantsch, who made several excellent, simple points about individuals needing to be more self-reliant.

In other words John said, “All the speakers on stage tell you what you could do, but not necessarily what you should do… what you should do is inside.”

Give yourself a little more credit and trust yourself!

And these are just a few of our top business lessons learned at Youpreneur Summit! To check out the rest be sure to head over to this post and episode from the Entrepreneurs On Fire blog!

A return to Puerto Rico

On Nov 17th we had a one-way plane ticket from London to Puerto Rico.

For almost the entire month of Oct – and all the way up to Nov 17th – we had spent a significant amount of time brainstorming and researching other places we could travel to prior to our return home.

Since Maria hit, we’ve had a combined 4 canceled flights, and after the 4th we were pretty much set on not returning until power and Internet were back.

Come Nov 17th, we made a tough decision: even though we knew power and Internet wasn’t back, we boarded our flight to return home for the first time post-Maria.

We arrived in Puerto Rico the afternoon of the 18th.

Up to that point everything we knew about the impact and devastation on the island was through text messages, broken-up phone calls, and through our Palmas WhatsApp group that we started with our friends here in the community.

Coming back and actually seeing everything was a whole different experience.

Our drive home and first few days here were interesting – to say the least.

Things that you wouldn’t ever consider on a day-to-day basis suddenly became our reality, and we’re very well aware of the fact that we don’t even have it that bad (some people in the mountains or on the interior of the island still don’t even have running water).

Some examples:

Nothing looks the same here; leaves have been ripped from trees (and a lot of trees are completely gone), there are downed power lines everywhere, and you see missing windows and roofs on major structures throughout the island. It’s hard to even ‘place’ yourself sometimes when you’re driving around;

No power = no traffic or street lights; we thought driving in PR was bad before…

When the sun goes down, it’s DARK; it’s crazy to realize how much light pollution happens without us even realizing it.

It’s heart-breaking to hear that many homes on the island still don’t even have running water, and while there are some restaurants and stores open, many of the places we were used to going to for basic necessities are still closed – and may not ever open again.

Returning to Puerto Rico has brought with it much responsibility:

Cleanup and starting to put our house back together is a daily focus;

Communication is minute-by-minute; sometimes we can make calls and send text messages, and other times we can’t;

Gaining Internet access has not been easy; just last week we drove 1.5 hours to San Juan to find out the co-working space we had rented just lost all power and Internet. Luckily their sister office about 30 minutes away was still up and running.

As you can see, Hurricane Maria has brought us a lot of challenges; but she’s also brought us perspective.

More on that at the end of this post, in our Biggest Lessons Learned section :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

November 2017 Income Breakdown*

Product/Service Income: $116,768

TOTAL Journal sales: 589 Journals for a total of $23,022

The Freedom Journal: Accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days!

TheFreedomJournal.com: $2,183 (46 Hardcovers & 12 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $11,505 (307 Freedom Journals sold!)

Total: $13,688

The Mastery Journal: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus in 100 days!

TheMasteryJournal.com: $1,105 (20 Hardcovers & 9 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $8,229 (216 Mastery Journals sold!)

Total: $9,334

Podcasters’ Paradise: The #1 Podcasting community in the world!

Recurring: $23,955 (240 monthly)

New members: $10,980 (50 new members)

Total: $34,935

Podcast Sponsorship Income: $53,500

Podcast Websites: $5,000 Your all-in-one podcast website peace of mind

Skills On Fire: $92

Podcast Launch: Audiobook: $168 | eBook: $51

Free Courses that result in the above revenue:

Free Podcast Course: A free 15-day course on Podcasting

Free Webinar Course: A free 10-day course on Webinars

Free Goals Course: A free 8-day course on Setting & Accomplishing Goals

Funnel On Fire: A free 8-day course on Creating a Funnel that Converts!

Kickstarter On Fire: A free 5-day course on going from Idea to Launch on Kickstarter!

Affiliate Income: $92,203

*Affiliate links below

Resources for Entrepreneurs: $59,246

Audible: $352

BlueHost: $600 (Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials)

Click Funnels: $41,371

Coaching referrals: $750 (email me for an introduction to a mentor for overall online business or a Podcast focused mentor!)

Mentorship: $15,000

ConvertKit: $133

Disclaimer Template: $198 (legal disclaimers for your website)

Fizzle: $128

LeadPages: $714

Infusionsoft: $0

Courses for Entrepreneurs: $31,203

Create Awesome Online Courses by DSG: $5,529

Webinars that convert by Amy Porterfield: $436

10k Readers by Josh Turner: $94

The Amazing Seller by Scott Voelker: $396

10k Subscribers by Bryan Harris: $98

Copywriting Academy by Ray Edwards: $1,058

Self Publishing School by Chandler Bolt: $698

Podcast Guest Mastery by Richie Norton & JLD: $20,000

ASK by Ryan Levesque: $2,894

Resources for Podcasters: $922

Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player: $49

Podcasting Press: $0

Libsyn: $800 (Use promo code FIRE for the rest of this month & next free!)

UDemy Podcasting Course: $73

Other Resources: $832

Amazon Associates: $549

Other: $283

Total Gross Income in November: $208,971

Business Expenses: $51,101

Advertising: $2,438

Affiliate Commissions (Paradise): $3,435

Accounting: $350

Cost of goods sold: $2,535

Design & Branding: $1,980

Education: $34

Legal & Professional: $630

Meals & Entertainment: $1,216

Merchant / bank fees: $5,944

Amazon fees: $5,764

Shopify fees: $49

PayPal fees: $199

Office expenses: $223

Payroll Tax Expenses / Fees: $1,581

Paradise Refunds: $5,430

Total Launch Package fees: $175

Sponsorships: $9,750

Show notes: $364

The Freedom & Mastery Journal: $0

Travel: $3,948

Virtual Assistant Fees: $3,632

Website Fees: $1,424

Recurring, Subscription-based Expenses: $3,274

Adobe Creative Cloud: $100

Boomerang: $70 (team package)

Brandisty: $24

Authorize.net: $91

Cell Phone: $173

Google: $45

Internet: $380

eVoice: $10

Infusionsoft CRM: $396

Insurance: $551

Libsyn: $400

Manychat: $65

Chatroll: $49

PureChat: $20

ScheduleOnce: $9

Skype: $3

Shopify: $176

Stripe: $5

TaxJar: $19

Workflowy: $5

MeetEdgar: $49

Taxes & Licenses: $300

Try Interact: $89

Zapier: $15

Zencastr: $215 (annual fee)

Zoom: $15

Total Expenses in November: $54,375

Payroll to John & Kate: $15,900

In our May 2014 Income Report and our June 2016 Income Report, Josh focuses on how to pay yourself as an entrepreneur. Check them out!

Wondering what we do with all of our net revenue? We share all in our April 2017 Income Report :)

Total Net Profit for November 2017: $154,596

Biggest Lesson Learned

Putting things into perspective

Life isn’t always easy.

Neither is running a business.

Things come up that you didn’t expect; you face financial challenges at the worst possible moments; relationships with your friends and family hit rocky patches.

But I’m sure you can agree: you’re pretty darn lucky to be in a position to create an opportunity out of what might seem, in the moment, like something very annoying and inconvenient.

To be able to:

accept challenges – even when you don’t expect them;

offer up your services in order to earn money – even when you’re fielding overdraft charges from your bank;

simply have relationships with your friends and family – even if they need repairing.

Last week we returned to our home in Puerto Rico for the first time post-Hurricane Maria.

Hurricane Maria has done a lot of damage.

She has destroyed entire islands;

She has left countless numbers homeless;

She has taken the island’s power;

She has also taken a lot of lives.

Something else Hurricane Maria has done:

She has put things into perspective.

You’ve probably experienced a life event at some point that really put things into perspective for you, too.

Hopefully you carry that lesson with you, and when you think about the fact that life – or running a business – isn’t easy, you’ll be thankful – you’ll feel lucky – that you’re in a position to create an opportunity.

Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!

Until next month, keep your FIRE burning!

~ Kate & John

Note: we report our income figures as accurately as possible, but in using reports from a combo of Infusionsoft & Xero to track our product and total income / expenses, they suggest the possibility of a 3 – 5% margin of error. 

Click here for all of EOFire’s Income Reports

This post was written by Kate Erickson, Content Creator and Implementer at EOFire. Follow Kate on Social:

The post Entrepreneurs On Fire: November 2017 Income Report appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

Chris Ducker and events – they just go together.

That’s why when Chris announced his first annual Youpreneur Summit in London and asked John to keynote the event, we jumped on the opportunity to be involved.

We know that Chris and events go together because we’ve been a part of two of his previous Tropical Think Tank events in the Philippines – in 2014 and again in 2015.

The time and care that Chris and his team put into creating an experience for those who attend never goes unnoticed.

As you can tell, we had high expectations arriving in London…

Were they met?

Absolutely.

From start to finish…

The opportunities to build new relationships – in addition to enhance already-existing ones – were plentiful;

The mastermind sessions each day provided FOCUS time for brainstorming and problem-solving;

The presentations delivered a mix of inspiration, motivation and down & dirty actionable steps; and

The nighttime get-togethers put the icing on the cake.

Top business lessons learned

The recurring theme of the entire event – something mentioned by nearly every speaker who stepped on stage – was this:

The importance of doing things that don’t scale; mainly, having one-on-one conversations with your readers, listeners, prospects and customers.

But before we dive too deep into our #1 business lesson learned, let’s check out the other four…

Lesson #5: Your mission statement is critical…

…and you should be able to express it in a single sentence.

Here’s the structure:

I help [this specific person] do [this specific action].

This in from the man himself, Chris Ducker!

Your mission statement is critical, and not just because you need to be able to communicate clearly and succinctly what you do – and whom you do it for – to others, but also so that YOU have a clear statement you can refer back to to remind yourself of the path you’re on.

Lesson #4: We all need to be more self-reliant

“You, where you’re headed, your idea – they are enough.”

This came straight from John Jantsch, who made several excellent, simple points about individuals needing to be more self-reliant.

In other words John said, “All the speakers on stage tell you what you could do, but not necessarily what you should do… what you should do is inside.”

Give yourself a little more credit and trust yourself!

Lesson #3: Take unusual action

I’ve seen Pat Flynn take the stage many times, but this single sentence rang truer than any other for me:

Nothing will change unless you take unusual action, but more than that, you need to go all the way and commit to entrepreneurship. Then, finally, you’ll learn to believe in yourself.

It rang so true because this has been my experience.

Just five years ago I would beat myself up. I hated making decisions because I felt like no matter what decision I made, it would end up being the wrong one.

And so I made no decisions.

I played the victim, complaining about my situation – the job I didn’t like, living the same evening over and over again – but I never took a single action to change it.

I just kept waiting… thinking that someone else might take the action for me.

Guess what?

NO ONE else is ever going to take unusual action for you.

So what are you waiting for?

Lesson #2: Your business is your funnel

Sound familiar?

That’s because this golden nugget came from our very own JLD.

John walked through the creation of your customer journey; this is what happens from the first time your avatar experiences your brand, all the way until they become a paying customer (or loyal fan).

Funnels have literally lit our business on fire, and they continue to produce recurring revenue for us on a consistent basis.

One example: Free Podcast Course

Our audience kept asking questions about how to podcast – what equipment to use, how to choose a topic, getting great guests on their show – and so we gathered those questions and answered them in a free course.

Those interested in learning more about podcasting hear about Free Podcast Course in the intro and outro of Entrepreneurs On Fire, where John gives a call to action on how people can sign up.

Once registered, that free course is delivered, and throughout the free course we introduce people to our free, Live Podcast Masterclass, which we host every other week.

On that free masterclass we drop value bombs for 1 hour, and then share our premium podcasting community with those in attendance: Podcasters’ Paradise.

So what might that funnel look like for you?

Really think about the very first touch point your avatar has with your brand, and map out a funnel that takes your avatar on a journey.

Lesson #1: The importance of doing things that don’t scale

We all want to automate, scale, grow, gain back time… but we can’t do all of that from the very beginning.

We have to be willing to do things that don’t scale.

Like having one-on-one conversations with your readers, listeners, prospects and customers.

Here’s how the speakers put it…

Pat started his presentation off by saying, It’s not about you. It’s about who you serve.

Mark Asquith started his presentation off by saying, The #1 most important thing you can do is engage in customer conversations.

John started his presentation off by saying, The most important step you can take in your business is to do things that don’t scale.

Matthew Kimberly’s first of 15 Principles of Persuasion was all about qualification: making sure that the person you’re talking to wants, needs, can afford and is allowed to consume what you’re offering and creating.

Russell James stated during his presentation, If you’re feeling like you’re struggling, then you need a reconnection with your craft, your audience.

Lessons don’t come up over and over again on accident

If the same message runs through nearly every presentation at an event, then it’s time to listen up.

When’s the last time you had a one-on-one conversation with your readers, listeners, prospects or customers?

I challenge you – today – to put together a schedule that will allow you to spend an afternoon booking these one-on-one calls.

Then, set up a 2-hr block of time where you have 15-minute conversations with individuals in your audience.

You can reach out to them to schedule these conversations via email (anyone who has ever sent you a message telling you they love what you do, or that they enjoyed your last post or podcast episode – that’s a perfect place to start!)

I’ll leave you with another powerful quote from Pat’s presentation.

He said:

“If an egg is broken from the outside, life ends. If an egg is broken from the inside, life begins.”

Remember, no one else is going to take unusual action for you. So what are you waiting for?

The post 168: 5 Business lessons from Youpreneur Summit appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

Life isn’t always easy.

Neither is running a business.

Things come up that you didn’t expect; you face financial challenges at the worst possible moments; relationships with your friends and family hit rocky patches.

But I’m sure you can agree: you’re pretty darn lucky to be in a position to create an opportunity out of what might seem, in the moment, like something very annoying and inconvenient; to be able to:

accept challenges – even when you don’t expect them;

offer up your services in order to earn money – even when you’re fielding overdraft charges from your bank;

simply have relationships with your friends and family – even if they need repairing.

Perspective

Last week we returned to our home in Puerto Rico for the first time post-Hurricane Maria.

Hurricane Maria has done a lot of damage.

She has destroyed entire islands;

She has left countless numbers homeless;

She has taken the island’s power;

She has also taken a lot of lives.

Something else Hurricane Maria has done:

She has put things into perspective.

You’ve probably experienced a life event at some point that really put things into perspective for you, too.

Hopefully you carry that lesson with you, and when you think about the fact that life – or running a business – isn’t easy, you’ll be thankful – you’ll feel lucky – that you’re in a position to create an opportunity.

The post Putting things into perspective appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

October 2017 Income At-A-Glance

Gross Income for October: $218,762

Total Expenses for October: $56,827

Total Net Profit for October: $161,935

Difference b/t October & September: -$579

Why We Publish An Income Report

This monthly income report is created for you, Fire Nation!

By documenting the struggles we encounter and the successes we celebrate as entrepreneurs every single month, we’re able to provide you with support – and a single resource – where we share what’s working, what’s not, and what’s possible.

There’s a lot of hard work that goes into learning and growing as an entrepreneur, especially when you’re just starting out. The most important part of the equation is that you’re able to pass on what you learn to others through teaching, which is what we aim to do here.

Let’s IGNITE!

**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below.

Josh Bauerle’s Monthly Tax Tip

What’s up Fire Nation, my name is Josh Bauerle. I’m a CPA and the Founder of CPA On Fire, where we specialize in working with entrepreneurs to minimize their tax liability while keeping them in line with the ever-changing tax laws.

I’ve been working with JLD & Kate at Entrepreneurs On Fire for years now, and they’ve included me in these monthly income reports with unlimited access to all their accounts so I can verify that what they report here is complete and accurate.

And because they believe in delivering an insane amount of value to you, my job doesn’t stop at the verification level; I also provide a new tax and accounting tip every month!

October’s Tax Tip: Do I need a receipt for that?

If you’re like me, your answer to the question “would you like a receipt?” from a cashier is almost always a resounding “no”!

While some people, like my Dad, continue to stuff their gigantic wallet with the receipt for every purchase they have ever made, most of us despise paper receipts.

But what about for business owners?

What receipts do you need to keep for tax purposes and how long do you need to keep them?

In a world that is becoming more and more digital every day, this is a situation that is constantly changing.

So when Kate asked me for some best practices on keeping receipts for Entrepreneurs On Fire, we thought it’d be a great opportunity to review the current IRS regulations regarding keeping actual receipts in your business and share them with YOU in this month’s income report!

Everything you need to know when it comes to keeping receipts for business expenses

1. Documentation is King

In the world of the IRS, in the unlikely event you are ever audited, documentation is your best friend. And the more documentation you can provide, the safer you are. So on top of everything said after this, whenever you are in doubt, keep the receipt.

2. Cash is the Enemy

If at all possible, always avoid paying in cash. It’s far and away the hardest way to prove an expense.

First, a purchase via a credit card, debit card, PayPal, etc. are going to offer a decent amount of proof on your statements. Even if you don’t have a receipt, you can at least show the IRS exactly when and where the money was spent.

With cash, if you don’t have a receipt, you could very well be out of luck.

So for the few instances cash is the only option, always keep the receipt and make a note on it what the purchase was for if the receipt itself doesn’t give it. But avoid paying expenses with cash any time you can.

3. Under $75 Doesn’t Require a Receipt

If the purchase you make is under $75, the IRS does not require a receipt. This means those $15 lunches are technically receipt proof.

However, keep rules number 1 and 2 in mind here; documentation is king and cash is the enemy. So if you use cash for these smaller expenses, I’d still keep the receipt.

4. Always Go Digital

For both record keeping purposes and longevity, always keep digital receipts.

For online sales this is easy, they will just email the receipt.

For in-store purchases, several places now give you the option to have the receipt emailed to you. Always choose that option.

If a paper receipt is the only option, simply take a quick picture of it on your phone. Then take these receipts and put them in an online folder. There are also tons of apps out there to help with this, including my personal favorite, Shoeboxed.

5. Proper Bookkeeping is Most Important

Far and away the biggest key to surviving an IRS audit is proper bookkeeping, meaning you are using some type of accounting software to track and reconcile all of your income and expenses during the year. With that crucial practice alone, you will be able to at the worst pinpoint any expense in question and know where and when it occurred.

Receipts may still be required, but with proper bookkeeping you will be able to locate the needed receipts much easier.

We say it almost every week, but all these great tax perks offered to entrepreneurs comes with responsibilities. And one of those responsibilities is the need to track and prove the expenses you take.

By following the rules above you will put yourself in great position to survive any questions by the IRS.

As always, please feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss what would be best for YOUR business. I LOVE chatting with Fire Nation!

*Bonus* Claim your spot in Josh’s FREE Course on Business Entities!

What Went Down In October

Thrive Las Vegas

October started off strong with John speaking at THRIVE: Make Money Matter in Las Vegas.

The event boasted several top-notch speakers and attendees, and as we often repeat, attending conferences and meeting others in person can’t be replaced.

Tune in to our income report recording to hear about John’s biggest takeaways from the event!

Closing Paradise

October was a big travel month for us, and it all started on the 12th with a flight from Houston to New Zealand.

In preparing for our travel, which will continue until November 18th, we made the decision to close the doors to Paradise while we were away.

We made this decision for a few reasons:

We weren’t 100% positive what the Internet situation would be like along the way, thus making it difficult to schedule our bi-weekly live Webinars;

We’ll never sacrifice customer service, and with the travel we had setup we wanted to ensure we didn’t overload our team; and

We have a few improvements we’re excited to be working on behind the scenes!

So on October 7th we closed the doors to Paradise in preparation for our travel and in order to implement the improvements.

How we set up the close

Our closing Webinar on October 4th was BIG. We welcomed over 250 live attendees and throughout that day welcomed 50 new members to Paradise!

We promoted the live Webinar to our podcasting list, had the opt in front and center on PodcastersParadise.com, and we also ran Facebook ads.

This isn’t our first time closing Paradise, but we did take a different approach this time around (to check out how we ran the close last time, you can visit our December 2015 Income Report).

What’d we did differently

This time around we wanted to simplify things, and so instead of doing videos and price increases every day of the close like we did last time, we stuck with the basics:

We did a Live Webinar followed by 3 days of emails announcing the close and the diminishing bonuses.

Day 1: Oct 4 – the live webinar (welcomed 50 new members)

Day 2: Oct 5 – diminishing bonuses (welcomed 6 new members)

Day 3: Oct 6 – diminishing bonuses (welcomed 8 new members)

Day 4: Oct 7 – the close (welcomed 40 new members)

Kind of crazy to see the difference between the number of new members on the first and last day versus the two days in between, right?

While the diminishing bonuses were being sent out each day, the numbers don’t lie: urgency on the live webinar (for people to receive ALL bonuses) and on the last day (to get in before the doors close) was real.

So what were those diminishing bonuses?

Oct 4: One-on-one chat w/ John (plus everything below)

Oct 5: BOTH The Freedom & Mastery Journal (plus everything below)

Oct 6: Your choice of The Freedom OR Mastery Journal (plus everything below)

Oct 7: Access to a private 1-hour hangout with John – only for those who join Podcasters’ Paradise between 10/4 and 10/7

The close was a great success and far exceeded any expectations we had for it.

Again, our main goal was to simply keep our customer service capabilities high and have time to implement some improvements within, all while traveling for most of the month.

Lesson learned: the power behind Live Webinars lives on, and urgency is still a very viable strategy when it comes to marketing your products and services to your audience.

New Zealand + Australia

As mentioned above, it all started October 12th with a flight from Houston to Queenstown, New Zealand. This flight kicked off a 40-day adventure inspired not only by the fact that neither of us have ever traveled to New Zealand or Australia, but also by We Are Podcast.

A peek into our travel diary for October

Queenstown is the first of our stops on a 40-day travel journey through NZ, AUS and the UK, and it all started when we met up with our great friends plus business & travel buddies Jill & Josh Stanton of Screw the Nine to Five.

If you’ve never visited, Queenstown is one of the cutest little village towns I’ve ever seen and has the most beautiful scenery everywhere you look! Esp from our AirBnB:

The location we picked here couldn’t be better: we’re a 10 minute walk to the docks, shops, cafes and restaurants, in addition to a walking path, a garden park and – wait for it – frisbee golf!

(I’ve never played frisbee golf in my life, but it seems like a cool thing to have nearby).

Plus, New Zealand is known as the adventure capital of the world (proven by John and Josh, who did the Nevis bungee jump a few of days ago: 143 meters – 440 ft) > yikes!

See that little house-looking thing in the background below? …that’s where they jumped from (insert wide-eyed face with a lot of fear).

And there is so much to do in Queenstown!

Every time we turn around there’s another amazing opportunity for a beautiful walk, hike, or activity.

Here’s part of the walking path down by the water near our place:

So we haven’t been wasting any time…

First things first: we rented car at the airport, dropped everything off at the AirBnB, and we were off to find a market nearby to stock up on the necessities for yummy breakfasts and delicious dinners.

On the way home from the market is when John and Josh decided they should sign up for the Nevis bungee jump – the highest in the Southern Hemisphere.

That night we made burgers on the grill and called it an early night in an attempt to normalize our internal clocks.

The following morning we slept in, John and I went on a great run, and then we quickly established our “morning routine” with Jill & Josh: 2 of us stay and make breakfast and 2 of us go out to grab coffees, which has been working out quite well (except our AirBnB smells like bacon 24/7, which John sees as a positive).

Our wifi is pretty fabulous here (a major concern after what we’d heard from others who have traveled throughout NZ and AUS). So knock on wood… the few hours each day we’ve set aside for work have been productivity-packed!

An email here and there, a couple checks in Asana, and before we knew it we were headed to the bungee bus.

After a 40 minute beautiful bus ride with the other crazies who decided this would be a good idea, the 4 of us found ourselves in a metal basket attached to a chord with our 2 jump buddies, Scott and Travis (brothers from Ontario), heading to the middle of the line for the jump.

Jill and I paid to be able to actually go out to the jump spot with the guys – I knew this was as close as I was willing to get to actually jumping off the thing. Although Jill and Josh told us about a tandem jump you can do off a bridge – not too far from the Nevis jump – but only 34 meters instead of 134… that’s probably more my speed ;)

Such a cool experience to be out there with them when they jumped.

Here’s a video of John’s jump!

After the jump we made our way back to our place, and John and I decided to go on a hike up the hill behind our place, which was highly recommended by a local woman we met along our morning run.

She was absolutely right about the views at the top:

We figure we survived somewhere in the ballpark of 50 mph winds at the top, and luckily the plethora of sports stores around afforded us the perfect jackets for it.

New Zealand weather is no joke – it’s been in the low 40’s each morning, getting up to maybe the mid-50’s in the afternoon. They’re just headed into Spring now.

The following day was an absolutely blast, too! We spent the morning at our place chatting, making breakfast and getting a few work hours in.

Then, at [12:30] we met up with Jill’s parents, who are also here traveling alongside them, + Jill’s sister and husband (Ali & Ken) at the bottom of the gondola.

Yet another amazing thing that’s just a 10 minute walk from our place.

Once at the top, you can have lunch + they have a luge racing course! So cool!

So we went for the whole package: gondola ride + lunch + luge racing = awesome.

After lunch and a few times around the luge track, we came back down and enjoyed a few separate activities for the afternoon: frisbee golf for John, Josh, Ali & Ken; a great run in the park for me; and some work for Jill.

Yesterday was a combination of all things amazing: a scenic drive to Wanaka, another one of the cutest towns I’ve ever been to; water sports; and breathtaking views.

The drive was really amazing, and during the 1.5 hours it took us to climb up and through the mountains we saw enough sheep to fill approximately 4,376 petting zoos.

And all the little baby sheep!!!… SO CUTE.

We stopped off at a outlook point on the way up, and WOW… once you think you’ve seen all the views, another bright green valley with unbelievable mountains in the background appears.

Upon arrival we walked around a bit and decided that with the beautiful weather and long afternoon ahead we’d make our way out to Ruby Island via Kayaks – doubles, of course.

About 35 minutes later, we arrived here:

There was nothing on the island itself – outside of the breathtaking views.

We walked around the island (yes, it was that small) and then jumped back in our kayaks to even out our 2-hour roundtrip.

Next morning we decided we’d spend our last Queenstown day in a pretty laid back manner, but two things were definitely on our list: a ThunderJet ride on the water, and another round of frisbee golf (now I HAVE officially played!)

I’ll leave my score out of it, but John and Josh gave one another a pretty good run.

After frisbee golf we made our way over to the pier to jump on a ThunderJet with our incredible driver Kylie (who happens to be a part of Fire Nation! How cool is that?!)

The ThunderJet ride was INSANE, and Kylie’s driving skills were nothing short of impressive. Seriously… there were at least 5 times I thought we were in trouble.

I so wish I had video to share, but if you follow John on Instastories, then you saw a small portion of our experience.

If you’re from New Zealand and haven’t experienced ThunderJet yet, then it’s a must-do! And if you’re not from New Zealand but find yourself in Queenstown one day, then a ride with ThunderJet will make your trip!

Next morning we were off to Auckland, where we met up with Paul Spain, podcaster and hospitality-pro extraordinaire!

Paul helped us set up a meet up for Fire Nation that evening and was generous enough to help us with our entire stay in Auckland. So from 6-9pm we gathered with about 25 local podcasters / entrepreneurs and had a great time at a local cafe!

On Friday – our first full day in Auckland – we decided to make the trip to Hamilton on our way to Hobbiton.

We had been planning for Hobbiton because we’ve heard so many great things (that’s the movie set from the movie The Hobbit), but our stop in Hamilton was due an email offer from Dave, a Fire Nation faithful who lives in the area.

Dave was born and raised in Hamilton, had never been to Hobbiton, and assured us he’d be an amazing tour guide for the day. :)

So we picked Dave up at his co-working space (about 2/3rd’s of the way to Hobbiton) and made a quick stop at the Hamilton Gardens on his request before making the rest of the trip.

And the gardens were absolutely beautiful!!

We were a bit rushed because our 1:15pm tour was not going to wait for us.

Luckily Dave has a lot more experience driving on the wrong side of the road than I do ;) He grabbed the keys and we were off on the winding road to Hobbiton.

The drive was beautiful, and Hobbiton: breathtaking.

During our 2-hr tour of the grounds we learned a lot of fun facts about the movie set, (discovered by “Sir Peter Jackson” during a helicopter ride. He was granted access by the Alexander family who still owns the land today); how The Hobbit was filmed, (none of the Hobbit holes are actually furnished inside – every scene you see inside of one of the holes was done in a studio in Wellington); and were able to see how much detail went into actually putting this set back together, (it was actually taken down after they used it to film in Lord of the Rings, and later reconstructed ‘to stay’ for The Hobbit).

After our tour we decided our 3 hour drive home was better started sooner than later.

Fittingly, we decided to make a dinner at home and watch The Hobbit :)

I must say, I’m pretty impressed by my driving skills seeing as how I’ve never driven on this side of the road before, and the following day I continued my 100% record (knock on wood) with a drive to Piha, a local beach that had been recommended by almost everyone we’ve talked to.

And for good reason:

We spent hours at the beach walking on the black sands and on the several paths carved into the hillsides around it.

About 15,000 steps later we decided to make our way to the Piha Cafe and ended up eating the best pizza EVER.

It was a big risk: it was about 4pm and we had a 7pm dinner back in Glen Eden with Paul and his wife Selina.

But we took that risk. And were really glad for it.

Our dinner with Paul and Selina was amazing. We ate at a local place called Eden (so cute!) and enjoyed lamb and falafel. Delish!

Our last full day in Auckland we made our way out to Waiheke Island via ferry boat to explore what many had said was a “can’t miss” experience.

Boy, were they right… Waiheke-woahhhhh! (Enter Kate: picks jaw up off from ground; heart shaped eyes in full effect; breath taken away…)

Even though it was drizzling and cloudy the entire day, we still managed to make the most of it.

First thing on our agenda: the coastal sea walk, which you can pick up right off the ferry. It’s part of a network of trails that run throughout the entire island – and Waiheke isn’t a small island.

It’s called the Te Ara Hura trail, and if you check out the image below you’ll see the shape of the island, which much of the trails follow.

The coastal trail wasn’t anything like I imagined. First off, the beginning of it was only passable at certain times of the day. 1.5 hours on either side of high tide would make the actual trail impassable (in other words, under water).

While it probably would have stopped me from trekking through, it wasn’t going to stand in John’s way of making this walk our reality (I’m so glad he’s such a risk-taker, cause I can’t imagine our day without this walk).

I wish I had pictures, but that would have required a hands-free go-cam attached to my head because my two hands were occupied with holding onto roots and vegetation to avoid falling down a hill.

It literally felt like you weren’t actually on a trail – the entire way.

We were walking right by what were definitely multi-million dollar estates and we couldn’t have passed more than a handful of people.

You can see how minimal the actual ‘trail’ was in the picture below (see that little strip of dirt by John’s shoes?… that’s what this path was like the entire way)

There were loads of other activities we could have signed up for upon arrival on Waiheke – wine tours, zip lining, boat rides – but we’re becoming more and more confident in our ability to let an amazing day unfold without any actual plans in place :)

15,000 steps (and 3.5 hours later) were feeling pretty good about making the most of our coastal walk.

We celebrated with an amazing late brunch at a really cute Italian cafe before heading back to our place.

After brunch we made our way back home and snuck in a laundry mat trip before our departure to Sydney the following morning.

Speaking of the following morning… it came quickly, and before we knew it we were packing our bags and saying goodbye to New Zealand.

Before prior to our airport trip we met up with one of our Puerto Palooza alumni, Travis, and his wife, Jacqueline, for breakfast.

They had just arrived in New Zealand the night before and made the trip all the way from Los Angeles to attend We Are Podcast in Brisbane, Australia (Nov 2-4… this is the same event John and I are speaking at).

It was perfect timing to meet up with them before their New Zealand adventures began – and before we took off for AUS.

A quick Google search returned a cafe we could meet up at; little did we know it was actually inside of a Home Depot (explains the background of the photo below – LOL) But it was a great breakfast, and even better company.

Our flight to Sydney was uneventful, and by that afternoon we were taking in the view from our beautiful deck in Bronte, right near the famous Bondi Beach.

We spent the rest of the evening on the patio, enjoying the beautiful, warmer weather (more like low 70’s vs. low 40’s) and a GREAT takeout dinner from a place right up the street (so many cute cafes and restaurants just a block away!)

Yesterday (Tuesday) being our only real “full day” here in the Sydney area to explore, John and I decided to attempt the impossible: see Sydney in a day.

Jill & Josh had loads of work to do, so being “on our own” for the day we made a last-minute decision to snag an all-day hop-on, hop-off bus pass to help us cover as much ground as possible.

But first, I snuck in a run to explore the beach path right below our place…

Holy cow – this coast is absolutely beautiful!!

After a quick shower John and I walked right back onto the path and followed it all the way around to Bondi Beach (about a 30 minute walk around the water).

A stop in an Internet cafe to print our bus tickets and a short 5 min wait and we were riding top deck, ready to rock!

There are 2 routes for the hop-on, hop-off bus: Bondi route and Sydney route. So we started on the Bondi route, then jumped over to the Sydney route, and here’s how the day went…

We also spent the following day here in Sydney (Wednesday), but this afternoon we’re headed to Nicole & Omar Zenhom’s place (of the $100 MBA Podcast and Webinar Ninja) for an afternoon tour of their area + dinner out :)

Once we arrived, we had an awesome couple of hours to chat at their place, and then we made our way out for a walk. While the rain stopped us from being able to walk around the park by their place (the same park where Nicole and Omar were married), it didn’t stop us from having a great night out.

The following day we were packing our bags again, this time headed to the Gold Coast in Australia with Jill & Josh.

After a 1-hr plane ride and a 10-min wait in the rental car line we were headed to our current home in a town called Surfers Paradise.

It’s definitely a fitting name: the beach stretches in either direction for miles with the softest sand I’ve ever felt between my toes. Like, literally so soft it squeaks when you walk in it.

A fun little fact I didn’t even mention from our last stop in Bronte / Sydney: it’s whale watching season here and we’ve been lucky enough to spot probably close to half a dozen whales playing in the ocean as they migrate.

Our last place had binoculars to help us enjoy the scenes, but it seems the lack of them at this place has been made up for by their proximity to the shore. Today we watched one play in the water not too far past some Jetski riders – it seemed so close!!

The weather here is incredible – it’s about 80 degrees and actually feels a lot like Puerto Rico (maybe not THAT hot and humid, but close).

Our first afternoon here (Thursday) was a little different. We got to our place around 2, and by about 4pm the clouds came rolling in and we experienced some legit thunder, lightening and quick rain.

I think travel has been catching up with all of us a bit, and that combined with the weather encouraged a couch and movie night (we watched Hall Pass – pretty funny if you like mindless comedies and Owen Wilson).

The next morning we spent time relaxing on the patio (view from our balcony pictured above), did some work, and then myself, John and Josh were off to Purling Falls – a hiking trail that Josh said was a must-do.

Jill hasn’t been so into the hiking, but I don’t blame her: she’s 6 mos pregnant and her bump is definitely not getting any smaller!

The hike down to the falls was really beautiful, and different from any of the other hikes we’ve been on for a few reasons:

It started with Josh warning us of poisonous snakes (and letting us know that it’s mating season for them, so I guess they’re all riled up AND are really good at hiding in the leaves below your feet)

It was very wood-sy (no clear-cut cement walking paths, so much more… wood-sy)

It led us down into a sub-tropical rain forest and spit us out at a beautiful waterfall, which the guys promptly got into their suits for:

The potential to see kuala bears was real, which was pretty cool (although I definitely spent the entire 2+ hours wondering if I was going to get bit by a poisonous snake).

Our reward after 10,000 steps was a stop at the fudge shop – SO YUM – followed by another relaxing evening at home.

…well, that is AFTER we played frisbee – cause how could you NOT play frisbee when you have a wide open beach like this right across the street???…

Post-frisbee we settled into the couch with the most amazing homemade tacos and fudge for dessert.

Our show of choice the past few nights has been LOST; I’m the only one who hasn’t seen it, but everyone else agreed it’d be a great show to re-watch.

Today has been another very relaxing day, which started off with a 2.5 mile walk down the beach to “Broadbeach” (the next beach over) for a great breakfast at a restaurant called Koi. The weather is holding steady and it was a perfect morning (and afternoon) to spend outside.

This afternoon John and I have been catching our breath and relaxing at home while Jill & Josh make the rounds to say goodbye to a lot of their family who they won’t see again before they leave (on Wed, Nov 1 we all head to Brisbane together, and that’s when they fly back to Canada).

For the first time on our trip the days have started to blend together…

Gold Coast has been both relaxing and nostalgic (reminds both myself and John of San Diego / Pacific Beach a lot.)

I’ll pick up where I left off last time:

We didn’t end up doing the Wildlife Sanctuary as planned the day after I sent our last email. Jill & Josh were out meeting up with friends and family, and the day sort of slipped away. Before we knew it, it was 2pm and the Sanctuary closed at 5 – not nearly enough time to do it all.

So John and I ended up spending the morning walking the beach, eating pancakes, playing putt putt golf, and getting some work done.

For the record, I won by 2 :)

That evening, after Jill & Josh were back, we took advantage of the tennis courts here and jumped in the pool for a nice swim. While swimming, we had a GREAT idea: to head down to the Hotel & Casino in Broadbeach, about 2 miles away. You know, just to check things out… ;)

A few card games and about 2 hours later we hopped in an Uber and made our way to the Casino.

We happened upon a great Asian place for dinner right in the lobby of the hotel, and before Jill and I had even finished our meals the boys were already checking out the tables in the Casino area.

We lost a bit of money, but had a really fun night out :)

The following day we decided to make it a chill morning and then me, John and Josh made our way to the Wildlife Sanctuary in Currumbin for the afternoon.

While the Sanctuary had nothing on Sea World or the San Diego Zoo, I must say it was SO COOL to see kuala bears and kangaroos IN PERSON!! Plus, 100% of proceeds go to protect local wildlife both inside and out of the sanctuary.

The “petting zoo” was quite different than what I’m used to seeing (goats, maybe a lamb here and there…)

This one was filled with kangaroos hopping (and sleeping) all over the place. We got to feed some kangaroos, stare down the alpha (he was SO HUGE!), and see a mama carrying a little joey in her front pocket.

Sheep sheering (where John made it up on stage to actually help sheer the sheep!), an impressive bird show, and a crocodile or two later we were making our last stop of the afternoon: holding a koala bear :)

I think I’d have to say that feeding and petting the kangaroos, and seeing the koala bears in person, were my highlights :)

We’ve been pretty beat come nighttime with all the running around we’ve been doing, and our Wildlife day was no different. We made our way back to the house and settled in for a homemade dinner and more episodes of LOST.

The following day we were determined to make Byron Bay happen.

Byron Bay was definitely beautiful, and it was really fun to watch the surfers ride “sideways” waves (you get to a point on the beach where it start curving around, and the way the rocks are the waves look as though they’re coming in sideways – pretty cool)

We also walked out to the most Easterly point in all of Australia, which was cool.

Last night we had 1 last hurrah before Jill & Josh packed it up to head back home bright & early this am. Our wild night out?… Korean BBQ.

It being my first time I had no idea what to expect, but was pleasantly surprised. All they had to tell me was that it’s like fondue ;)

This morning we closed down Gold Coast and made our way up to Brisbane. A quick check-in at the hotel, a great gym workout, and an awesome lunch later (we got to meet up with Michael O’Neal of the Solopreneur Hour, and reunite with Nicole & Omar – all from our SD crew – who are also here for the conference), and now we’re just settling in and getting prepped for the conference, which starts tomorrow.

Look out for future updates on the rest of our travels in next month’s income report, plus a full recap of We Are Podcast here on the blog!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

October 2017 Income Breakdown*

Product/Service Income: $148,578

TOTAL Journal sales: 644 Journals for a total of $24,423

The Freedom Journal: Accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days!

TheFreedomJournal.com: $2,744 (54 Hardcovers & 17 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $9,906 (269 Freedom Journals sold!)

Total: $12,650

The Mastery Journal: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus in 100 days!

TheMasteryJournal.com: $4,012 (103 Hardcovers & 10 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $7,761 (218 Mastery Journals sold!)

Total: $11,773

Podcasters’ Paradise: The #1 Podcasting community in the world!

Recurring: $19,089 (193 monthly)

New members: $35,325 (119 new members)

Total: $54,414

Podcast Sponsorship Income: $64,500

Podcast Websites: $5,000 Your all-in-one podcast website peace of mind

Skills On Fire: $0

Podcast Launch: Audiobook: $204 | eBook: $37

Free Courses that result in the above revenue:

Free Podcast Course: A free 15-day course on Podcasting

Free Webinar Course: A free 10-day course on Webinars

Free Goals Course: A free 8-day course on Setting & Accomplishing Goals

Funnel On Fire: A free 8-day course on Creating a Funnel that Converts!

Kickstarter On Fire: A free 5-day course on going from Idea to Launch on Kickstarter!

Affiliate Income: $70,184

*Affiliate links below

Resources for Entrepreneurs: $49,756

Audible: $608

BlueHost: $150 (Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials)

Click Funnels: $31,388

Coaching referrals: $850 (email me for an introduction to a mentor for overall online business or a Podcast focused mentor!)

Mentorship: $15,000

ConvertKit: $163

Disclaimer Template: $0 (legal disclaimers for your website)

Fizzle: $195

LeadPages: $902

Infusionsoft: $500

Courses for Entrepreneurs: $16,829

Create Awesome Online Courses by DSG: $6,124

Webinars that convert by Amy Porterfield: $1,385

Bot Academy by Andrew Warner: $2,500

10k Readers by Josh Turner: $95

The Amazing Seller by Scott Voelker: $594

10k Subscribers by Bryan Harris: $98

Copywriting Academy by Ray Edwards: $0

Self Publishing School by Chandler Bolt: $3,789

ASK by Ryan Levesque: $2,244

Resources for Podcasters: $1,962

Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player: $62

Podcasting Press: $720

Libsyn: $985 (Use promo code FIRE for the rest of this month & next free!)

UDemy Podcasting Course: $195

Other Resources: $1,637

Amazon Associates: $720

Other: $917

Total Gross Income in October: $218,762

Business Expenses: $53,371

Advertising: $3,375 (FB ad spend)

Affiliate Commissions (Paradise): $1,098

Accounting: $2,080

Cost of goods sold: $3,995

Design & Branding: $1,980

Education: $71

Legal & Professional: $122

Manychat: $78

Meals & Entertainment: $1,995

Merchant / bank fees: $992

Amazon fees: $9,297

Shopify fees: $271

Stripe fees: $3

PayPal fees: $268

Office expenses: $381

Payroll Tax Expenses / Fees: $1,428

Paradise Refunds: $1,260

Total Launch Package fees: $875

Sponsorships: $10,750

Show notes (email Mallard Creative!): $364

The Freedom & Mastery Journal: $5,000

Travel: $2,306

Virtual Assistant Fees: $3,973

Website Fees: $1,409

Recurring, Subscription-based Expenses: $3,456

Adobe Creative Cloud: $100

Boomerang: $70 (team package)

Brandisty: $24

Authorize.net: $91

Carbonite: $60 (annual fee)

Cell Phone: $197

Google: $45

Internet: $300

eVoice: $10

Focus At Will: $45 (annual fee)

Infusionsoft CRM: $396

Insurance: $551

Lastpass: $105 (annual fee)

Libsyn: $400

Manychat: $64

Chatroll: $49

PureChat: $20

ScheduleOnce: $9

Skype: $3

Shopify: $176

TaxJar: $19

Workflowy: $5

WPEngine: $49

MeetEdgar: $49

Taxes & Licenses: $300

Try Interact: $89

Vimeo Pro: $200 (annual fee)

Zapier: $15

Zoom: $15

Total Expenses in October: $56,827

Payroll to John & Kate: $15,900

In our May 2014 Income Report and our June 2016 Income Report, Josh focuses on how to pay yourself as an entrepreneur. Check them out!

Wondering what we do with all of our net revenue? We share all in our April 2017 Income Report :)

Total Net Profit for October 2017: $161,935

Biggest Lesson Learned

How resilient is your business?

The definition of ‘resilient’ according to Google (in reference to a person or animal) is: able to withstand or recover quickly from difficult conditions. In reference to a substance or object: able to recoil or spring back into shape after bending, stretching, or being compressed.

When I was in Austin, TX for Screw U Live in September I was on a catch up call with my good friend Jodi Flynn of Women Taking the Lead. I was telling her about all the traveling John and I had been doing due to Hurricane Maria, and something she said really stuck with me:

It must be a great feeling to know your business is so resilient!

Which got me thinking…

Not only have we proven time and time again that our business is definitely location independent, but our travels throughout hurricane season – starting for me on Sept 5 just before Hurricane Irma passed Puerto Rico, then for John on Sept 26 just before Hurricane Maria – have also proven that our business is incredibly resilient.

Puerto Rico has taken a big hit, John and I have taken a big hit, yet the way we’ve built and set up Entrepreneurs On Fire would make it seem as though nothing has changed in our lives. The business continues to run and generate the same amount of revenue month after month, despite the drastic changes to our daily routine we’ve experienced over the past month plus.

So, I encourage you to think about this: if it came down to it, could your business survive without constant attention? If yes, for how long?

It’s important that you build a strong foundation for your business; it could mean the difference between being able to bounce back and folding should you experience a major, unexpected life event in the future.

Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!

Until next month, keep your FIRE burning!

~ Kate & John

Note: we report our income figures as accurately as possible, but in using reports from a combo of Infusionsoft & Xero to track our product and total income / expenses, they suggest the possibility of a 3 – 5% margin of error. 

Click here for all of EOFire’s Income Reports

This post was written by Kate Erickson, Content Creator and Implementer at EOFire. Follow Kate on Social:

The post Entrepreneurs On Fire: October 2017 Income Report appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

In January 2013 John and I were walking along the beach in Maine.

There was snow on the sand and a deep chill in the air, but the beautiful scenery made up for any physical discomfort.

We were talking about the podcast, which had launched just about 3 months prior. I had asked him how it was going.

At that point in time I was working my 9 to 5 at a marketing and advertising agency as an account executive, managing the agencies largest client. For years, that had been my dream job.

John seemed pretty fired up about the growth and potential of what he was creating with Entrepreneurs On Fire.

He told me about how he was starting to receive requests from some of his listeners, who were seeking one-on-one coaching from him; how his network was quickly growing with each new guest who came on the show; and how he had started testing out something that he felt had the potential to be a huge revenue stream: individual sponsorships.

The big question

After he finished describing these very different aspects of the business that were organically coming to life thanks to the audience and platform he had been building for about 6 months, he popped a question that I wasn’t expecting:

What do you think about coming on the team and helping me out with the podcast and growing the business?

Woah.

I was fired up for John, very excited about the podcast overall, and super passionate about his mission of inspiring millions.

But one thing I wasn’t: prepared to take my 2nd leap into entrepreneurship – this time with my significant other.

I wasn’t really sure how to respond, and if I remember that day accurately I sort of fumbled around with my words for a minute or two.

Honestly, the first thought that came to my mind was, “How would this affect our personal relationship?”

Admittedly, I didn’t know too much about entrepreneurship – or partnerships – at the time; but one thing I did know was that a lot of relationships had crumbled due to miscommunication and disagreements between couples that had gone into business together.

So, not knowing what working together would do to our relationship was my first block.

My second block: I didn’t understand, and I couldn’t immediately see, how I fit into the business.

The absolute last thing I wanted to happen was to become a back office assistant to my boyfriend.

Our conversation around how the podcast was doing on the beach that day ended with John saying, “Why don’t you think about it, and we can talk about it again in a couple of weeks.”

My big decision

A couple of weeks passed, and I had definitely thought about what John had asked me on the beach that day – a lot.

While my job was exciting, challenging and exactly what I had wanted for years, it was starting to wear on me.

Late nights (or early mornings, depending on how you look at it) were becoming the norm, and the pressure to please the biggest client our agency had was causing an unhealthy amount of stress in my life.

I’m not sure if John’s question – and subsequently the idea of working together being on my mind – prompted this realization, or if it was simply time for me to find a new path.

Either way, I had a big decision to make: stay in my 9 to 5 “dream job”, join John at Entrepreneurs On Fire, or give my own entrepreneurial venture another go.

I have to admit, something about John and I sharing a vision, making a huge impact in others’ lives, and learning how to navigate completely unchartered waters together was definitely appealing.

We talked about me joining the team a couple of weeks later, and a couple of weeks later, and a couple of weeks later.

It wasn’t until early March that my big decision to join John at Entrepreneurs On Fire was official.

That decision has paid off in numerous ways throughout the years, and looking back I now know why it was such a tough decision: I’ve never been so uncomfortable about taking a new path in my entire life.

How it all started

I made the decision to join John at Entrepreneurs On Fire around March 2013, two months after he had initially asked me if I was interested.

During those two months I had done a legitimate amount of brainstorming and thinking.

Here’s how it all started…

Between the first time John asked me if I’d join the Entrepreneurs On Fire team and us making the joint decision to actually make it happen, I had two major questions to answer.

1. What would happen to our personal relationship?

In order to answer this question I felt I had to come up with solutions to the things that scared me the most about us working together.

Mainly, I wondered how we would separate our working relationship and our personal relationship.

I also wondered how we would handle, and hopefully in large part prevent, major confrontations or disagreements related to the business.

Solutions to these fears:

1. Setting very strict boundaries, and both committing to holding one another accountable to those boundaries.

2. Promising that open and honest communication will never be compromised due to “feeling bad” or “not wanting to hurt the other’s feelings”.

2. How do I fit in to this business?

As I mentioned earlier, I didn’t want to risk becoming a back office assistant in the business.

But how could I ensure that wouldn’t happen?

First thing John and I did was each take a strengths assessment to find out what each of our strengths – and weaknesses – were.

This allowed us to immediately and visually see that a lot of our strengths and weaknesses were opposites, confirming that if we could successfully split our tasks so that each of us were working on the things we’re best at, we could really make some big things happen together.

On the heels of discovering our biggest strengths and weaknesses – and overall that we are very different people when it comes to what we’re best (and worst) at – I decided to write out what exactly I wanted to do in the business (what I enjoy and get excited about), and also what I’m best at (these were the skills my previous jobs hired me for).

After adding to each of these lists over several days – editing, revisiting, brainstorming – I shared it with John.

Then, he provided feedback on both parts: what I wanted to do, plus what I knew I could do well.

Knowing that what we had planned, and what actually ended up happening would vary, we both committed to each other, and to the business, that we would be all in, and all in this together.

So being able to answer these two questions has made all the difference, and anyone who is considering partnering with their significant other shouldn’t take another step until they’re both able to answer these questions.

And feel comfortable with those answers.

What’s changed over the years

One thing I’m most grateful for when it comes to working with my significant other is that it has brought us closer together than ever would have been possible otherwise.

Having a shared vision has allowed us to stay in synch.

There has rarely – if ever – been a question in either of our minds about where we’re headed with the business (even if that direction is greatly unknown to us both, we agree on it).

Also, having an incredibly deep understanding of the struggles and wins we’ve both hit along the way has allowed us to support one another, and lift one another up, countless times.

These are my favorite things about working together.

But over the years a lot has changed and evolved, including:

Our roles in the business

How we work together (and apart)

Our communication style

Our lifestyle

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Because that’s what relationships – and entrepreneurship – are all about.

We make sacrifices, we meet in the middle, we support and lift one another up, we’re willing to be flexible, and above all else, we love one another – and what we do.

Biggest lessons learned

I’ve given a background on how John and I started working together, and also shared what I believe are the two most important questions anyone considering working with their significant other should answer.

But what are some things we’ve learned along the way that we wish we would have known at the start?

Here are our top 5 lessons learned

1. Set boundaries – and stick to them

When you love what you do, it can be tough to turn it off, and when you’re working with your significant other that means business can take over quickly – sometimes without either of you realizing it.

Over the years we’ve continued to set – and reflect – on boundaries to make sure we’re both still happy with the balance we’re giving our personal relationship and our business relationship.

One example is that dinnertime has become an important boundary for us, and a turn off trigger for me.

Once I start cooking dinner, work is done for the day. And once we sit down to eat, it’s time to check out of being ‘at work’ and into being ‘at home’.

We’re also conscious of making time on the weekends to unplug and do things outside of work. Whether that be a hike, a mini road trip, or a night out, we always make time for it.

And remember: setting the boundary isn’t enough. You have to agree on whatever you’ve set and commit to holding one another accountable to it. Otherwise, getting into routines that will eventually make either – or both of you – unhappy is a slippery slope.

2. Be willing to step aside for the expert

Compromise is important in personal relationships and in business relationships. I can assure you, you won’t always agree on the same path, the same strategy or share a vision for the same outcome, and so it’s important that you’re willing to step aside.

The best way we’ve done this is by stepping aside for each other based on who has expertise in that particular area.

For example, John is much more the expert when it comes to how to podcast is produced, published and marketed. If he feels it should be done a certain way, I’m not going to try and tell him otherwise. That’s his area of expertise.

However, when it comes to managing the team who helps us with the show notes, running our social media strategy, and going back and forth with sponsors for talking points and agreements, that’s where I run point. John isn’t going to tell me how I should manage that.

This is why understanding one another’s roles and what each of you is best at is so critical to establish before diving in together. When you know who is taking the lead on what it’s much easier to avoid potential disagreements or arguments over how something should play out.

3. Nothing is set in stone

When I first joined John at Entrepreneurs On Fire, I was so nervous about making decisions or diving head first into projects.

It seemed like such a huge deal to determine how something might run, or who should handle what.

But it’s important to remember that nothing is set in stone.

Entrepreneurship happens one step at a time, so if you’re not sure who is best at something, or how a particular project should run, just test it out and see what happens.

You can make changes along the way.

4. Support one another – always

Mistakes will happen, and you’ll work on projects and tasks where neither of you have experience nor knowledge in how it should be done.

Figuring it out, and getting to where you want to go, requires support.

Sometimes that means verbal encouragement.

Sometimes that means respecting the other person’s time and bandwidth, and not involving them at all if it’s not required.

And sometimes that means stepping in to brainstorm and handle the tougher situations together.

5. Enjoy the journey

Working with your significant other is such a treat, but you’re missing out on a huge part of the experience if you can’t take time out to enjoy the journey you’re on together.

There will be tough times, happy times, down times, and up times; the fact that you have someone to share that all with is pretty special.

So be sure to take time to celebrate your wins together and reflect on lessons learned together. If you do, it’ll not only be great for your relationship, but for the business, too.

How to work with your significant other

This post barely scratches the surface of what it means to be partners in both business and in life, and I’d love to share more after hearing from you!

Post your questions about diving into business with your significant other in the comments below, and I’d love to answer them.

The post How to work with your significant other – without ruining your relationship appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.

September 2017 Income At-A-Glance

Gross Income for September: $207,349

Total Expenses for September: $44,835

Total Net Profit for September: $162,514

Difference b/t September & August: -$7,017

Why We Publish An Income Report

This monthly income report is created for you, Fire Nation!

By documenting the struggles we encounter and the successes we celebrate as entrepreneurs every single month, we’re able to provide you with support – and a single resource – where we share what’s working, what’s not, and what’s possible.

There’s a lot of hard work that goes into learning and growing as an entrepreneur, especially when you’re just starting out. The most important part of the equation is that you’re able to pass on what you learn to others through teaching, which is what we aim to do here.

Let’s IGNITE!

**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below.

Josh Bauerle’s Monthly Tax Tip

How to deduct medical related expenses

What’s up Fire Nation, my name is Josh Bauerle. I’m a CPA and the Founder of CPA On Fire, where we specialize in working with entrepreneurs to minimize their tax liability while keeping them in line with the ever-changing tax laws.

I’ve been working with JLD & Kate at Entrepreneurs On Fire for years now, and they’ve included me in these monthly income reports with unlimited access to all their accounts so I can verify that what they report here is complete and accurate.

And because they believe in delivering an insane amount of value to you, my job doesn’t stop at the verification level; I also provide a new tax and accounting tip every month!

Last month we discussed medical related expenses and I had to give a lot of bad news about just how deductible (or nondeductible) those medical expenses actually are on your taxes.

Unfortunately, for most people, medical expenses won’t be deductible at all, and for the few who can deduct them, it will likely be a small portion of the actual amounts paid.

This month, I’m going to give a bit better news. There are a few ways to make medical expenses more deductible, and these tips are even more applicable to self-employed people.

Here are two ways to drastically increase the amount of medical related expenses you can deduct on your taxes.

1. Self-Employed Health Insurance Deduction

We talk a lot about how the tax code favors entrepreneurs, and the health insurance deduction is a great example of that.

For those employed in a traditional job that have to pick up private health insurance, in order to deduct the premiums they are limited by what we discussed last month.

First, they have to itemize and second, even if they do itemize, those costs are still reduced by 10 percent of your adjusted gross income.

For those who are self-employed, the rules are much more favorable.

If you are self-employed and are not eligible for a group plan through your spouses job, you are able to deduct the entire amount of your health insurance premiums without itemizing and without the 10% income limitation.

Anyone who has had to purchase private insurance and seen the costs involved knows this is a huge advantage.

For those with a family, it could easily be a $10,000 or more tax deduction that employees in similar situations are not able to take.

And you don’t need to have the health insurance plan run through your business to count. It can just be a regular, private health insurance plan. As long as you are self-employed and don’t have any group plan available to you, you will qualify.

Leveraging HSA’s

The self-employed health insurance deduction is great for deducting the health insurance premiums, but what about actual medical expenses? Is there a way to make some of those tax deductible without the crazy itemized and ten percent of income limitations?

Believe it or not, the answer is actually yes – if you can get a health insurance plan that allows an HSA as a part of it.

A health savings account, or HSA, allows you to put up to $3,400 for an individual or $6,750 for a family into a savings account that is used specifically for medical related expenses.

The benefit?

Every dollar you put in there is a write-off on your tax return.

This is essentially a shortcut for being able to deduct between $3,400 and $6,750 of those medical expenses on your taxes without those pesky limitations the IRS likes to put on you.

One word of caution on this one: once you put the money in the HSA, do not take it out for non-medical related reasons. Doing so can subject you to similar penalties to taking out retirement income early.

It can get ugly and expensive. This deduction is solely for being able to deduct medical expenses.

As with many things tax related, there are ways to make medical expenses significantly more deductible, it just takes some planning and strategy.

I highly recommend working with both your health insurance professional and CPA to make sure you are maximizing your ability to deduct medical expenses, especially if you are self-employed!

As always, please feel free to contact me if you’d like to discuss what would be best for YOUR business. I LOVE chatting with Fire Nation!

*Bonus* Claim your spot in Josh’s FREE Course on Business Entities!

David Lizerbram’s Legal Tip

Best Practices for Online Brands

If you’re doing business online, you should take a few steps to make sure that you’re establishing ownership of your brand.

Just because your brand is based online rather than in a physical location doesn’t mean that the rules don’t apply.

Start by recognizing that your brand name is legally considered a “trademark.” So the rules and advice for trademarks also apply to your online brand.

Do Your Due Diligence

Under U.S. law, if a competitor is using the same (or a similar) brand, or trademark, and they started before you did, then they’re considered the “Senior User” and their rights are superior. This means that you should carefully search to be sure that the brand name is unique and nobody else is using it for similar services or products.

Just searching the U.S. Trademark website is not enough – although it’s a good start.

A more thorough search is a better idea. Some people have the resources to do this due diligence on their own, while others hire a trademark lawyer to do the search for them.

Protect Your Brand

OK, you’ve found that your new brand is unique and nobody else has a legal claim on it.

What now?

There are four steps you should take:

1. Get your brand out there!

Since trademark rights are acquired through use in commerce, the sooner and more publicly you start using it, the faster you will acquire those rights.

Lots of people think the opposite is true – that they have to keep their brand name a secret. If you get that advice, ignore it. As long as you’ve determined that your preferred brand is available, it’s usually best to publicize it as soon as possible.

2. File to register your brand with the trademark office.

Again, this is something that some people do on their own, or through some online services, but studies show that trademark applications that are filed by attorneys are more likely to go through and become registered trademarks.

Do your research, talk to multiple attorneys, and find the one who’s the best fit for you and your business.

3. Secure your brand name for all the different social media accounts that you might want to use.

When a new social media services debuts, act quickly and grab your brand name before somebody else does!

4. Get as many domain names as you can.

Think of how someone might misspell your brand, and get those domain names, too – you can just redirect them to your site.

In my experience, lots of entrepreneurs skip this last step. They get MyBrand.com but not variations on the words in their brand name. Then someone else comes along, grabs a domain name with a slightly different spelling, and starts causing trouble.

The cost to get the domain name back can turn into thousands of dollars, when the entrepreneur could have gotten the alternate domain names for next to nothing if they’d been proactive about it!

So, to summarize, always do your due diligence and follow the few simple steps above to protect your online brand. If you do, you’ll be well on your way to creating valuable intellectual property that you can own and benefit from for years to come.

If you have a legal question that you’d like me to cover on a future Income Report shoot me an email with your request! I’ll be sure to give you a shout-out when I join John & Kate to talk about your legal questions!

*Bonus* Download David’s FREE Checklist on Intellectual Property for Entrepreneurs!

What Went Down In September

Entrepreneurs On Fire Celebrates 5 Years!

For four years straight we’ve been celebrating Entrepreneurs On Fire’s birthday in Maine, but year five brought a new kind of party – this time, in Puerto Rico.

We’ve talked about our community in Puerto Rico many times on these income reports since settling in. We’ve made some amazing friends and truly created a community in Palmas Del Mar. We even refer to ourselves as the Palmas Power Couples :)

As is common with most weekends in Palmas, someone hosts some type of get together – a brunch, a Friday night couple’s game night, a Sunday bbq… We’re never at a loss for things to do!

The weekend of September 2nd was really no different: Mark and Krista, Founders of American Posture Institute, were hosting a BBQ at their place on Saturday afternoon at [12:30].

Because a lot of people in Puerto Rico are, well… on “Puerto Rico time”, John and I didn’t really think twice about leaving our place around [12:45] and showing up at 1pm.

As we drove into the gate and up to Mark and Krista’s house, we saw Mark standing outside.

John and I both thought to ourselves that this was a little strange: Mark greeting us outside?

But maybe he was just waiting for someone who didn’t know exactly where they lived…

So we get out of the car and start sun-screening up, and Mark was being a little pushy – like “come on guys, let’s do this!”

Again, didn’t really think too much of it; Mark is an excitable guy ;)

So we follow Mark inside, and walking through their living room we notice a huge picture of John on their TV – you know, the one with his hair and arms on fire.

Hhmmmm… okay, that’s definitely odd. We know our Palmas crew are fans of the show, but this was definitely a little out of place.

So we continue to follow Mark out back where the pool and BBQ area is, and we walk outside and notice a few streamers and some pictures hanging all around their awnings. Now Krista is super creative and loves to decorate, so again, we just thought “oh cute – Krista really did an awesome job with the decorations!”

As we continued walking out and into the BBQ area, we suddenly saw 20 of our closest friends from our Palmas crew standing there, decked out head to toe in orange, yelling out “Surprise! Happy 5-year anniversary!”

John and I were both SO SHOCKED!

The crew did such an amazing job of hiding it; we had NO IDEA!

We are so incredibly grateful for the friends we’ve met since moving to Palmas Del Mar; they’re thoughtful, giving, and they keep us on our toes! And they’re A LOT of fun to be around :)

A huge shout out to the Palmas Power Couples for bringing the heat and helping us celebrate 5 years with Entrepreneurs On Fire!

Hurricane Irma misses; Maria hits Puerto Rico

It was actually at the BBQ we all started talking about and tracking Hurricane Irma, which was about 3-4 days off the East coast of Puerto Rico.

With a few Puerto Rico veterans in the house feeling pretty confident that Irma wasn’t going to hit PR, everyone had full intention of staying put. And stay put they did.

However, that same night I was faced with a really tough decision.

It was September 2, and on September 8 I had a flight out of PR to San Diego to visit my family before heading to Austin to speak at an event.

That would be just 2 days post-Irma, and I was pretty nervous about my flight on the 8th getting canceled – and potentially being stuck in PR – if I didn’t get out of there ahead of Irma.

So I booked one of the last flights that would leave PR before Irma hit: Tuesday afternoon, Sept 5th.

With a worry in my gut that I’ve never felt before, I boarded a plane to FL where I’d connect to San Diego. All I could think about was John being there by himself.

Luckily, the Palmas crew had other plans for Wednesday, September 6th: a Hurricane Party at Ted and Arleen’s place :)

I found a lot of comfort in the fact that John would be with everyone, and Irma came and went without too much damage done in our community. A couple of fallen street signs and some downed trees, but nowhere near the type of damage that could have been had Irma hit PR head on.

  Judging from the first image below, you can see Puerto Rico wasn’t directly in Irma’s path, but you can see in the second image that PR certainly didn’t go untouched either.

There was a lot of damage done to the capital, San Juan, and sure enough, the same day I few out of PR, my flight on September 8th was canceled.

As Irma passed, the island of Puerto Rico let out a huge sigh of relief. There was of a course major concern for the islands behind us that had just been massively impacted, and a lot of thoughts and prayers being sent ahead to FL and the East Coast.

Within days members of our Palmas crew were at Sam’s Club and Costco purchasing food, water and supplies to ship out to the islands around us. With a little loving help from a neighboring island, PR was doing what it could to restore some type of normalcy around it.

But right on the heels of Irma we caught wind of another hurricane that could be danger for PR: Hurricane Jose.

Luckily, within a couple of days, the threat of Jose hitting PR didn’t exist.

But it wasn’t 48 hours later we heard about Hurricane Maria.

Not only had Maria picked up speed incredibly quickly – going from a Cat 1 to a Cat 5 within a day – but she was tracking further South than Irma, a fact that didn’t bode well for PR.

The response to the news of Hurricane Maria was drastically different from that of Irma. Veteran Puerto Ricans were rushing to the store and stocking up on supplies, and unlike Irma, over half of our crew was scrambling to find a flight off the island.

While John was seriously considering staying in PR, the path of Maria only got scarier. By Sunday, September 17th there were zero flights off the island that weren’t already full.

Hurricane Maria was starting to get VERY real.

And on Monday morning, I got a call from John. Our friends Ginni and Tony had sent their two kids in a chartered jet with another family from Palmas, leaving 1 plane ticket available for whoever wanted it.

By Monday evening, after a lot of phone time with Jet Blue and some very close calls, John had a ticket for a flight Tuesday evening, September 19th, at 5:30pm.

Just about 3pm that day I heard the airport would be closing at 7pm.

John was literally one of the last flights off the island ahead of Maria.

As you can see from the images below, there was absolutely no doubt that Maria would hit PR. It was just a matter of where.

In the last image below, that star represents our community.

Hurricane Maria hit within 10 miles of Palmas Del Mar.

The next 72 hours were terrible.

We knew exactly who had stayed in Palmas, and we hadn’t heard from any of them.

It wasn’t until Friday afternoon – more than 50 hours after Maria hit – that we finally got a phone call from Ted & Arleen confirming they were safe, but that Palmas was in very bad shape.

It was a breathe of fresh air to hear from them, but in a very strange way. The news they were sharing, the experience, and their surroundings didn’t sound real.

Even once we saw pictures of our community and home from those who were actually there on the ground (not the news, or CNN, or the Internet), it was still hard to come to terms with what Puerto Rico is going through right now.

This is an image looking down our street. The last time we saw it, it was lined with beautiful, fluffy green trees.

Below is an image of one of our favorite restaurants, not a quarter mile from our house, La Pescaderia. Luckily the main part of the restaurant was boarded up, but the entire property still sustained terrible damage.

Our favorite beach bar, Beach Bohio, was completely washed away.

Photo credit, Travis Chappell

We’re very blessed that everyone in the community made it through Maria without injury, and we continue to send our thoughts and love down to the island every day.

My flight back to Puerto Rico has been canceled twice now, leaving us unaware of when we’ll even be able to make it back to our home.

Most of Puerto Rico, including our community of Palmas Del Mar, continues to be without power, without water, without access to gas and diesel, and without the supply chain that can help breathe life back into a devastated area.

Thankfully we finally have more regular contact with our friends in Palmas. While they have to drive 40-50 minutes for service to call, they’ve been incredibly awesome about doing so.

We’re also incredibly grateful to everyone who has reached out and offered to help. Thank you!

The relief efforts are underway, but unfortunately the infrastructure isn’t present to support those efforts. We wish we had a better way to help, but right now what Puerto Rico needs is trucks with gas, clear roads, and drivers who can haul supplies throughout the island.

If Maria has done one thing for us, it’s put everything in perspective.

Screw U Live 2017

Amidst Maria I was prepping for a weekend in Austin for our great friends Jill & Josh Stanton’s live event: Screw U Live.

The event is put on for their community, Screw U, and this year it brought together nearly 100 incredible entrepreneurs who are working towards – or who recently have – screwed their 9 to 5.

Because of Hurricane Maria, John was able to join us, which was a great treat!

The 2-day event featured seven speakers, including Jill & Josh, and to say value was dropped would be an understatement!

Perhaps the biggest takeaway of the weekend was the power of community and knowing you’re not alone.

The opening keynote following Jill & Josh’s talk was James Wedmore, who took the group through some incredible exercises to help determine what their business will look like when it’s done being built.

He also asked a very critical question to help attendees breakthrough the doubts and the imposter syndrome that gets all of us at one time or another:

How does a company like that look and act?

If you take the time to sit down and really map out what your business looks like when it’s done being built, and then ask yourself how a company like that looks and acts, you’ll be surprised at what you come up with.

The final step James covered: now that you know, ACT like it.

I took a few notes throughout the event, and I’m excited to share some of those right here in our income report, including the 4 biggest lessons Jill & Josh shared from their 4 years in business.

4 Lessons in 4 Years

1. Surround yourself with people who get it

Because let’s be real: the people you surround yourself with lift you up, encourage creativity, and affect your behavior.

2. Invest in yourself

Invest in yourself and others will invest in you.

Investing in yourself builds confidence, increases competence, and helps you build connections.

3. Comparison is a killer

Compare yourself to others and they will compare you.

When you compare yourself to others who are “ahead of you” in business, you end up copying and copying ends in bad results.

Be unique.

4. Momentum is the lifeblood of entrepreneurs

Momentum breeds invention!

A huge shout out to Jill & Josh Stanton of Screw the 9 to 5 for bringing the heat, creating a space for entrepreneurs to connect and thrive together, and for hosting one hell of an event!

If you’re looking for a supportive, upbeat community to help support you on your journey to screwin’ the 9 to 5 and building the business of your dreams, check out Screw U!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

September 2017 Income Breakdown*

Product/Service Income: $121,907

TOTAL Journal sales: 696 Journals for a total of $26,365

The Freedom Journal: Accomplish your #1 goal in 100 days!

TheFreedomJournal.com: $3,418 (77 Hardcovers & 19 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $10,452 (275 Freedom Journals sold!)

Total: $13,870

The Mastery Journal: Master Productivity, Discipline and Focus in 100 days!

TheMasteryJournal.com: $4,656 (106 Hardcovers & 11 Digital Packs sold!)

Amazon: $7,839 (208 Mastery Journals sold!)

Total: $12,495

Podcasters’ Paradise: The #1 Podcasting community in the world!

Recurring: $18,593 (193 monthly)

New members: $7,575 (38 new members)

Total: $26,168

Podcast Sponsorship Income: $64,000

Podcast Websites: $5,000 Your all-in-one podcast website peace of mind

Skills On Fire: $62

Podcast Launch: Audiobook: $268 | eBook: $44

Free Courses that result in the above revenue:

Free Podcast Course: A free 15-day course on Podcasting

Free Webinar Course: A free 10-day course on Webinars

Free Goals Course: A free 8-day course on Setting & Accomplishing Goals

Funnel On Fire: A free 8-day course on Creating a Funnel that Converts!

Kickstarter On Fire: A free 5-day course on going from Idea to Launch on Kickstarter!

Affiliate Income: $85,442

*Affiliate links below

Resources for Entrepreneurs: $57,041

Audible: $449

BlueHost: $1,200 (Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials)

Click Funnels: $38,774

Coaching referrals: $0 (email me for an introduction to a mentor for overall online business or a Podcast focused mentor!)

Mentorship: $15,000

ConvertKit: $142

Disclaimer Template: $198 (legal disclaimers for your website)

Fizzle: $186

LeadPages: $824

SamCart: $0

Thinkific: $268

Virtual Staff Finder: $0

Courses for Entrepreneurs: $25,672

Create Awesome Online Courses by DSG: $13,990

Webinars that convert by Amy Porterfield: $4,123

Zero to Launch by Ramit Sethi: $0

10k Readers by : $94

The Amazing Seller by Scott Voelker: $742

10k Subscribers by Bryan Harris: $98

Copywriting Academy by Ray Edwards: $884

Podcast Guest Mastery by Richie Norton: $0

ASK by Ryan Levesque: $5,741

Resources for Podcasters: $1,965

Pat Flynn’s Smart Podcast Player: $115

Podcasting Press: $20

Libsyn: $1,690 (Use promo code FIRE for the rest of this month & next free!)

UDemy Podcasting Course: $109

Show Notes Creation by Mallard Creative: $31

Other Resources: $764

Amazon Associates: $674

Other: $90

Total Gross Income in September: $207,349

Business Expenses: $40,461

Advertising: $997

Affiliate Commissions (Paradise): $1,643

Accounting: $350

Cost of goods sold: $3,715

Design & Branding: $2,155

Education: $149

Legal & Professional: $0

Marketing: $20

Meals & Entertainment: $1,428

Merchant / bank fees: $1,526

Amazon fees: $6,512

Shopify fees: $91

Stripe fees: $3

PayPal fees: $409

Office expenses: $275

Payroll Tax Expenses / Fees: $1,454

Paradise Refunds: $1,545

Total Launch Package fees: $0

Promotional: $36

Sponsorships: $9,000

Show notes (email Mallard Creative!): $480

The Freedom & Mastery Journal: $0

Travel: $1,814

Virtual Assistant Fees: $5,293

Website Fees: $1,566

Recurring, Subscription-based Expenses: $4,374

Adobe Creative Cloud: $100

Boomerang: $70 (team package)

Brandisty: $24

Authorize.net: $91

Cell Phone: $165 (Thank you, ShrinkABill!)

eCamm Call Recorder: $39 (1-time download)

Google: $45

Internet: $300

eVoice: $10

Infusionsoft CRM: $396

Insurance: $551

Libsyn: $271

Manychat: $64

Chatroll: $49

PureChat: $20

ScheduleOnce: $9

Screenflow: $39 (1-time upgrade)

Skype: $3

Shopify: $176

TaxJar: $19

Workflowy: $5

WPEngine: $49

MeetEdgar: $49

Taxes & Licenses: $300

Quiz Funnel: $1,500 (1-time setup)

Zapier: $15

Zoom: $15

Total Expenses in September: $44,835

Payroll to John & Kate: $15,900

In our May 2014 Income Report and our June 2016 Income Report, Josh focuses on how to pay yourself as an entrepreneur. Check them out!

Wondering what we do with all of our net revenue? We share all in our April 2017 Income Report :)

Total Net Profit for September 2017: $162,514

Biggest Lesson Learned

This too shall pass

As I sit here on my friends couch in NYC, I’m reflecting upon this quote.

When things in life are going INCREDIBLE, it’s important to remember This Too Shall Pass, and enjoy the moment.

When things are going TERRIBLE, it’s important to remember This Too Shall Pass, and not dwell on the negative.

Currently, much of our home in Puerto Rico is destroyed courtesy of hurricane Maria, and I could dwell on that reality.

Instead, I choose the mindset of This Too Shall Pass, and I know there will be a day where our place in PR is beautiful once again.

What is going great in your life Fire Nation?

ENJOY that.

What is going poorly?

Don’t DWELL on that.

Below is one picture of the devastation hurricane Maria wreaked upon my home…

I look forward to posting another photo months from now when our home is whole once again.

Remember, This Too Shall Pass.

Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!

Until next month, keep your FIRE burning!

~ Kate & John

Note: we report our income figures as accurately as possible, but in using reports from a combo of Infusionsoft & Xero to track our product and total income / expenses, they suggest the possibility of a 3 – 5% margin of error. 

Click here for all of EOFire’s Income Reports

This post was written by Kate Erickson, Content Creator and Implementer at EOFire. Follow Kate on Social:

The post Entrepreneurs On Fire: September 2017 Income Report appeared first on Entrepreneurs on Fire with John Lee Dumas.