Financial Savvy for Business Growth with Expert Advice

Unlock financial mastery and entrepreneurial empowerment with the guidance of Danielle Hayden, CEO of Kickstart Accounting, in our latest episode. We peel back the layers of budgeting bliss and financial finesse, inviting you to a candid discussion on the journey to monetary freedom. Danielle, a reformed CFO with a heart for coaching female entrepreneurs, shares her insights on the interplay between mindset and money, emphasizing the value of consistency and the liberating effect of financial transparency. It's an honest exploration of the financial discipline required to thrive in an online business and how embracing your numbers can forge the path to enduring success.

Ever felt overwhelmed with the nitty-gritty of bookkeeping or unsure when to make that crucial hire to bolster your business? We've got you covered with practical strategies for resource management and growth tactics that illuminate the road to delegating effectively. The conversation dives into the hiring process, from leaning on experts to engaging contractors and full-time employees, pinpointing the perfect moment each decision should unfold to protect and propel your venture. I open up about my own battle with financial shame, underlining the strength found in seeking help and the vital role it plays in cultivating a flourishing business.

As we wrap up, we leave you with wisdom on healthy spending habits and the significance of intentional investment in advertising and marketing. The narrative culminates with a gift from Kickstart Accounting—practical tools to guide you through tax deductions and intelligent hiring practices. This episode isn't just a lesson in numbers; it's an invitation to step confidently into mastering your business finances, joining a community where every question is welcomed and every financial step is celebrated.

How to Start a Podcast Guide: The Complete Guide
Learn how to plan, record, and launch your podcast with this illustrated guide.
Make More with Matt Heslin
Explore strategies to thrive financially, build legacy, and enhance life experiences.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Money. Let's talk about money today and I hope your ears just parked up because this is one of my favorite topics. I don't tend to talk about it a ton here on the podcast, but you bet your bottom dollar like off-screen, off-camera. I love to talk about money. I really do. I'm actually a huge budgeting nerd and I love to dive into finances. I love to talk about saving money or really optimizing for what you can do with the money that you're making in your business to get the most out of it, whether it's saving or an investing or it's something that you're doing to give you back time. There's just so many different ways that you can do this as an online business owner and as a creator, because there's so many tools out there. So many people ask me like ah, how do you balance spinning enough to help you be really productive, but don't overspend on things that you really don't need? Which is why I really wanted to bring back today's recurring guest, danielle Hayden. So Danielle came on the show a few years ago and we talked about finances for an online business owner and I really wanted to have her back because she has a new take on how we just do things as online business owners. We talked a lot about mindset and some of the things that we can shame ourselves on, like we get a little into the psychology of being a business owner and how we should give ourselves more grace and really be honest with ourselves about our finances. But let me tell you a little bit more about Danielle, because she's a Reformed CFO who's on a mission to help rule-breaking female entrepreneurs understand their numbers so they can gain the confidence needed to create sustainable profits. So, after spending 10 years in the boardroom as a CFO, danielle is now in her sweet spot as the CEO of Kickstart Accounting, where she helps business owners with bookkeeping, financial analysis and education as the author of the Profit Planner Book series. When Danielle isn't in her money mindset, you can find her hiking or spending time with her family, and this was just such a fun conversation, so enjoy my talk with Danielle.

Speaker 1: 2:32

Let's get right to it. Welcome to the Profit Podcast, where we teach you how to start, launch and market your content with confidence. I'm your host, crystal Prophet, and I'm so excited that you're here. Thanks for hanging out with me today, because if you've been trying to figure out the world of content creation, this is the show that will help be your time saving shortcut. So let's get right to it, shall we All right? Profit Podcast listeners. We have a returning guest on the show today, so welcome back, danielle. How are you doing today?

Speaker 2: 3:07

I am doing so fantastic. Thank you so much for having me here.

Speaker 1: 3:10

Yes, it's gonna be so much fun. We were just chatting before we started recording about how fun it is like as a podcaster that your journey just keeps evolving, and even as a business owner, with your accounting and all the different things that you're doing. It's never this like one size fits all approach or you're only gonna go down like this one path and just continue down that journey and nothing's ever gonna pivot or veer off to the side. So is there anything that has really happened for you and your business since the last time you were on the show that you wanna share?

Speaker 2: 3:43

So I have a really unsexy, uninteresting thing to say here. So it's good. So we have a Kickstarter account at Inc. I'm a CEO and the founder of the company and I get really excited as a quick start and I want to do all the things. I wanna launch all these new products and podcasts and courses I mean, you name it and my team is really good about saying but what are we really good at and who are we and what is the basics for what we do?

Speaker 2: 4:18

And I think the most exciting thing that we've done is we've stuck very consistent to the point that we use bookkeeping as a vehicle to help business owners. And then you insert your own, your own goal right, we, we help them use their numbers to grow their business, to make better business decisions, to hire, to leave a legacy, show their kids entrepreneurship is possible, right, like it gets me so excited that through this very, very simple tool of bookkeeping that we get to empower so many business owners to hit their goals and to make a bigger impact on the economy. So it is not this like crazy sexy thing that we want to do stuff, and we're just being really consistent, showing up every day and helping our amazing clients and showing up on our podcast and just being a resource.

Speaker 1: 5:17

Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, I was just thinking about, you know, our last conversation.

Speaker 1: 5:21

Between then and now, how many businesses have just given up? You know, I think you know we're sitting here talking about like it's not super sexy talk about consistency, but at the same time, it's one of those things that you have to have in order to just stay in the game and continue going, whether it is your content in your podcast or just your business in general. So I let's just give ourselves, like we're gonna give ourselves a pat on the back for a second, just say I'm so excited to have another, like continuous conversation before the fact that we are still here and we're still fighting the fight and Helping so many people. I mean, daniel, what I love about your business and what you do is you focus so much on empowering female businesses and women entrepreneurship, and I don't remember that we really touched on this too much last time. But I would just love to know, like, what is it about that that really just drives you forward? Like why is that such a focus for what you do in your content and in your business? You know?

Speaker 2: 6:22

it's interesting when I left corporate, I knew that I was leaving because I was making the rich rich right like. I was a CFO. So my job was to Take the numbers and to help my CEO and the investors and the board of directors management team use the numbers so that they can make really great businesses Decisions. So when I left corporate, I knew that there was a shift into entrepreneurship, but I had no idea until I started talking to more and more especially women business owners that we really needed help from the ground up. You, I'm over here trying to talk about strategy and budgets and Growth strategies and I'm like hold on, we can't actually talk about anything until we have bookkeeping in place. Like right, like we have to start at the basics In order to be able to make every single other decision that in our business and it was that humbling decision, make this humbling to say hold on, we have to start at the foundation and build up. That got me really passionate because all of a sudden I realized that women traditionally Didn't have access to this resource. Women would go to their tax account in a male dominated industry accounting is very male dominated and they would be talk to your little business or your side hobby or not, giving that full attention and I'll never forget. So I went to.

Speaker 2: 7:58

It was my first year in business and I actually didn't do a great job. My first year in business, even though I was a CFO, I wasn't great at doing the bookkeeping and I went to go see Joe, my family tax account. So this is the tax account my parents had used for years and I'll never forget the day that I went into his office. It was a summer day, hot, sticky, gross. I naturally curly hair, so my hair is just like huge. I'm a single mom of two young kids. At the time. My car is sticky. It's awful. I walk into his office and he's got that old paneling on the walls. You know what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2: 8:33

Oh yeah, it was like his carpet hadn't been every time since I was a kid and I sat down and Joe shook his head at me. He shook his head, no, and he talked down to me and here I am. This is like I've had an amazing career. I've sat at the table with the best of them and this man is shaking his head at me. And when I left his office that day, I said no other woman will ever have to feel the way that Joe made me feel that day, because there's a seat at the table for you, you have access to the resource, you can ask whatever questions you have and it's not a stupid question Like women need that resource and you don't have to do it yourself.

Speaker 1: 9:55

Oh man, I mean I feel this. I feel this so deeply because I think that I mean I've been in those conversations, I've been in those rooms where it's that like feeling we all know it right where your face gets a little hot, maybe your palms get sweaty and you're getting a little nervous and you're like I really want to ask the question because I don't know what anybody is talking about, but I know I need to know what they're talking about because it's really important. But I also don't want to look stupid and I don't want to be embarrassed. I mean I have been exactly like where Joe's office is, like maybe we know the same Joe Okay, we all know the same Joe because it's happened to all of us. So I just want to like throw that out there. It's like it's not just Danielle that's. You know, felt this or you listener Like it's happened to all of us.

Speaker 1: 10:44

And I think that having you know resources, like what you're talking about, is the answer to one, helping us educate ourselves in a way that we just know like oh, danielle's in my earbuds, like we're going to talk about her podcast in a second because it's incredible, but she's there having conversations telling stories about how you can make this possible for yourself without spending a dime anywhere. I think that that's the piece too, you know, and why I appreciate everything that you're doing at your organization, because it's not this like oh, we have all the secrets and I wish that you could have them, but you got to hand over your credit card and make it happen Like you give so freely with your resources, and I appreciate that as someone who is like I mean, let's just be honest, okay, like I barely passed accounting and finance was like right.

Speaker 1: 11:33

I think I'm glad to see in financing.

Speaker 2: 11:37

But you know what people?

Speaker 2: 11:38

who even passed accounting. So we have people who become clients who say, danielle, I have an accounting degree or I studied finance. But this, this quick books thing, it's totally different. And as a business owner, is that the best use of your time? Like no matter what right, like I shouldn't be in Canva, like I should never be allowed to ever touch Canva, like I don't even know why my team gave me the log in. I should not be allowed to? And we feel that way about our clients. Like it's not the best use of space and time as a business owner to be in quick books.

Speaker 2: 12:12

Now, I'm not saying that you shouldn't do anything with your numbers. You just shouldn't be the one putting together the bookkeeping. My CEO, when I worked in corporate, he didn't do the bookkeeping Right, like he was taking the time to educate himself, he was taking the time to understand the numbers. He was taking clarity breaks to ask himself what's working, what's not working, what do these numbers mean for me? What should we do more of? What should we stop doing? And that is our job as business owners, and I don't care how small you are. We start working with clients. We have a package that's under $50,000 a year in revenue. So I do not care how small you are, your job as a business owner is to take your numbers and say how can I do more of what's working, less of what's not? How do I hit my goals? How do I do this using my numbers? How do I manage my business using my numbers? And then it all takes you to the next level.

Speaker 1: 13:10

Yeah, I mean, I feel like delegating and outsourcing, like to your point of like the pieces that you're not strategically like Really hitting the mark right? We all know our strengths and we all know our weaknesses, and why don't we just take 2024 and beyond to be the time and we just get really honest with ourselves and say how long have you been spinning the whip like your wheels, trying to figure out? You're like googling, like Spreadsheets and quick book, like tips, and you're trying to do all these things and then it comes around a tax time and you're just like I Hope I did it right.

Speaker 2: 13:45

You're hitting a button like and then and then you literally are paying for that when you're not doing it right. You really literally actually paying for it. So I agree, you know, as as a business owner, you know you have the opportunity to hire people within your business. And now, if you're somebody who's a solopreneur, today what we see is our first few hires as a solopreneur are Experts. So that is usually where we hire first is other experts, who they have the Experience and the education.

Speaker 2: 14:19

You, as a business owner, you don't need to be the expert in everything, so your first few hires are normally experts in other industries that will help you get to the next level. Then we might shift to contractors, where we need to bring people in who maybe are a little bit closer to the business, who are working with us on a little bit more regular base, regular basis. You, as a business owner, want to have more input. And then eventually, employees, because employees are where. We want control of the brand, standard operating procedure, we want things done our way, we want to be able to give equipment and training and feedback. So this is just. I say that to give you permission, as a business owner Like you can hire and grow your business to several hundred thousand dollars without ever having an employee.

Speaker 1: 15:12

So you can start delegating to other experts before you really have team members who you're responsible for their scope of work yeah, I love this, like just the outlook of Thinking about it in a different model instead of because, I mean, I see it all the time it's like, oh, your business is starting to scale, you need to hire, hire, hire. And like it doesn't matter, like you just need to bring out a bunch of people, and then we saw so many people in 2020 have to let go of entire teams because it was just not this mindset of let's make it happen in this intentional, strategic way. It was just like there's just money coming at him and you know we just need to. You know, put put out fires and make it happen. So I love that you're talking about it, because I know there's people listening right now that they're not at this stage, that they're ready to hire. But I think that these are the types of conversations that you should be hearing, even if in your you're in that like beginner growth part of your business, because you'll eventually have to have these Conversations and you'll eventually have to think about this strategically.

Speaker 1: 16:12

But I want to talk real fast about something that I kind of you know. I my own personal struggle with finances was in the beginning of, like you know, having someone to help me with this. I had this. We'll call it shame, right, we'll call it. You know, I wish that my numbers were further along than they were, and I was nervous about giving someone access to my finances because I had it in my mind that someone was going to judge me because I should. I should be a seven figure Online business owner, because that's what everybody else preaches. So is this something that you see a lot happening? Am I alone in this, or other people feeling this way too, or can you give me some examples of working with other people that deal with some of the emotional parts that come with Handing over your finances to someone else?

Speaker 2: 17:01

First of all, we recognize at our firm that it's deeply personal. Right, Like money, is very deeply personal and I don't take that lightly at all, like I know and understand the extreme trust that every single one of our clients is is putting in us and that is why I Like it. Our core value, like at our heart and soul, is no judgment. We don't talk about clients. We don't talk poorly about clients. We don't talk poorly about each other as a team. It is really important that every single Client who comes to us knows that one. You can ask any question. So if you have been thinking about asking that question to anybody, you have a zoom call or you can ask anything you want. We had a client who came to us a few years ago and she said alright, you're gonna do a catch-up. The catch-up is where we take all the transactions into the system for the whole year and she says you can do this for me. I want one thing in exchange. I think anything. She's like just don't judge me for how often I go to Dunkin Donuts. She's like I literally love their coffee and I was like, oh my god, nobody cared. We do not care. We don't care how often you go to Dunkin Donuts, or how much money you spent spent in professional development, or how much money you spend on Coaching or marketing, or where you think you should, should be. This should, why do we? Should all over ourselves. We are not shooting all over you, you are shooting all over yourself.

Speaker 2: 18:30

Now here's the one thing that we do for our clients, though, that I think is really unique. We have this worksheet, called the healthy percentages worksheet, and all of our team members have access to it, and so when we send our financial statements to our clients so every single one of our clients they we do the bookkeeping, and then they get their financial statements at the end of the month and we send them something called the snapshot, and the snapshot is this easy to read PDF, and in the PDF, we talk about what they're spending, how healthy their spending is. There's a reason for this, because I actually think that part of the problem as women, we see on Instagram and movies and all these places that we're bad with money but we're not good with money, and that you know our husband needs to put us on a budget, or that we go to Target and we overspend, right, like, if you're not getting those on Instagram. You will now that your phone just heard me say that, but they're all over the price, right, that's programming that. Women aren't good with money.

Speaker 2: 19:33

So then we come to our business. Right, so it you don't compartmentalize. You just saw all that on TV, you saw that on Instagram. Now you come land in your business, but you didn't turn that off. So our clients will come on calls with us, because every single one of our clients got a monthly call and they'll say so, where should I cut back? And I'm like cut back, what are you talking about? Where do you cut back? You need to spend money right if you want to hit your goals Right. If your goal is to hit six figure and sales this, this, this year, then we need to be spending intentionally. So when you think about like where, where is everybody else? That is something that we help our clients understand. It's not created equal because it depends on where you want to be in your business this year, right now. But also we can help you understand what healthy spending looks like so you can hit your goals.

Speaker 1: 20:24

Oh, that's so good. Well, I think like someone's listening right now and they're like on the edge of their seat. They're like Danielle, what is healthy spending? Like, what does that look like? Because they feel it. They're just like, oh my gosh, like this is totally me, like what is an example of healthy spending?

Speaker 2: 20:37

So, I think advertising and marketing is the easiest one to for me to. To walk there quickly with you. So there is a report in QuickBooks called the profit and loss as A percentage of sales. It might be income statement as a percentage sales. Anyway, profit and loss and income statement are the same thing, just you can use those terms interchangeably. And it's a report in QuickBooks One.

Speaker 2: 21:01

Make sure your bookkeeping is done, make sure it's accurate, then you can run this report and I would say do it for the last 12 months, so just rolling 12, wherever you are right now. Do it for the last rolling 12. And if you are spending, let's just say, 3% of your sales and marketing and you're over here saying I Just don't know why I'm not hitting my goals, I don't know. I built it and I thought they would come. Well, we need to spend more than 3% of our sales in Advertising and marketing in order to hit our goals. Now the healthy range that we see for clients in this, under 100 or under a million dollars in revenue Is between 8 and 10 percent of sales. So we want to be reinvesting each year between 8 and 10 percent of our sales back and advertising and marketing in order to be hitting growth mode.

Speaker 1: 22:38

So make sense? Yeah, totally 100%. And I think that it's one of those things where people so this is what I've seen. And audience I'm calling you out because I see this all the time right, because, as we are as podcasters and content creators, we just keep thinking, yeah, but I'll just keep creating that content because something's bound to go viral. Right, like, I'll just get the right SEO keyword or I'll create that one thing and then all of a sudden, boom, I'm viral and I have millions of followers and tons of Subscribers, because that's how it happened for this one person in my industry, you know whenever it was, and so they're always thinking about organic and not really thinking about that that like advertising as an investment.

Speaker 1: 23:25

I think this is where it's. There's just like, well, google ads, facebook ads, instagram ads like that's just how they hear it in their mind is like something that they can do when they're successful, not as a growth Channel for them to reinvest back in their business. So I think that it's super helpful that you laid it out that way, and I don't know if there's any like specific advertising or marketing that you yourself like to use in your own business, whether it's referrals or you know, just really like putting the effort back into Investing yourselves. Is there anything that you love so?

Speaker 2: 24:00

I actually consider our podcast part of our marketing strategy. However, for us, our number one marketing strategy has been one speaking on podcasts and our referral partners. So our biggest cost and that line item for us is we pay our referral partners. So we have referral partners who they will refer our services and then we pay them a commission on that fee. So for us, that's the biggest dollars.

Speaker 2: 24:31

Now we are nine years in business, so we're out of the stage where we're spending a lot of money on redoing our website or brand consultants. However, you know, in 2023, we actually launched a set of courses. So for the business owner who is still doing their DIY bookkeeping, who wants to learn a little bit more about their numbers, we launched a set of courses. Now we had quite a bit of advertising and marketing that went into that, because it was a new strategy. We had to build out a sales page, we had to build out the email funnel, we had to build out the following and we ran some Facebook ads. So our 2023 actually was very heavy in advertising and marketing. So when we look back at our numbers for 2023, we're very cognizant of the fact that we were launching something new and that it was a scaling year for us, so we took that and we really heavily invested.

Speaker 2: 25:31

Now, if you're a business owner who maybe you're not launching something new, maybe you're in the early stages, your marketing is going to look very different. You might be working with marketing consultants, you might be heavily investing in subscriptions, you might be figuring out which ones work for you. You might be having a mix of strategies, but none of that works if you're not asking yourself what's working, what's not working. So that's the important piece about knowing your numbers. If you're spending 12% in advertising and marketing and you didn't ask yourself what worked and what didn't work last year, then you might be wasting money. We're not running Facebook ads again, so we asked ourselves that question and we won't run them again this year. We want to say that we won't ever run them again, but that's a strategy that didn't work for us and we know that because we look at the numbers.

Speaker 1: 26:21

It's so good. I mean, you're not alone in bad investments. I just want to throw a short personal story. I tried advertising last year for getting featured in an email newsletter that I thought, oh for sure, this is going to be a great alignment. So it wasn't. Even I couldn't blame it on the algorithm of oh, I don't understand Facebook or Instagram ads, or it changed again. No, I willingly went into this investment and I said it's the perfect match, it's going to work out perfectly and it was crickets.

Speaker 1: 26:50

But you know what? I learned so much from every single money decision I've ever made, whether it was a tool that didn't work out for me, or maybe it was a partnership that just didn't really pan out the way that I thought it would. But I think that it's just a great reminder for everybody. It's just you win some, you lose some. But to Danielle's point, it's always looking back and seeing what can you learn from your numbers, like what is the story that your numbers are telling you? And I'm sure you have, like, such a beautiful way of looking at numbers too, because it's just. I mean, it's the way that I look at metrics, and metrics used to really scare me because, to your point earlier, I had all of those. I'm a woman, I'm not good at numbers.

Speaker 2: 27:32

I'm a terrible at math.

Speaker 1: 27:35

It's all of those things. But you know, before we started recording, we started talking about this concept and I want you to elaborate on the responsibility of being a business owner and really what that looks like for someone that's listening to this, whether they're just getting started in their business or they've been doing it for a while. Like, what is the role that our numbers, our finances play into our larger responsibility of being a business owner?

Speaker 2: 28:03

So from the day you file your LLC, like talking tiny right, you're a baby business. You have the responsibility as a business owner to know your numbers so that you can make the business decisions that align with your intentions for your business. Every year, I launch a podcast on our podcast Business by the Books, and I purposely do this one every year at New Year's. Stop setting goals and set intentions for your year instead, and the reason I do that is because I want you, as a business owner, to know where you want your business to go, because you have a responsibility. Now you fill out that LLC paperwork. You are responsible to know your numbers. You're responsible to pay taxes. You're responsible as you start serving clients and signing up with vendors and coaches. You have an obligation to each of them to succeed in some way. Now how do your numbers play a part in that and what your role is in this? I'm going to share a story about one of my clients, jenna. Jenna originally came to us when she considered herself a freelancer at the time, and she came to me and she said Danielle, I want you to teach me how to run my business at a loss. I'm like I'll have to request, but I'll take it on, see what I can do. So we did what we call a catch up. We brought all her transactions into QuickBooks and I said Jenna, good news and bad news. The good news is, I don't have to teach you how to run your business at a loss, because you're not losing money. The bad news is that we're about 30 days from tax season, so we really can't do anything about it, and you owe a lot of money in taxes. Here's the awesome part about Jenna's story Is that moment when she had to fork over that cash for the tax bill because she had ignored her numbers. It was her first year in business. She had ignored her numbers and she thought, because she didn't have the cash in her account, that she was losing money. So she had paid a hefty tax bill that year. Here's the cool part.

Speaker 2: 30:07

We watched Jenna's entire mindset change. She goes I am a business owner, I am investing in this business and she spent so much money in marketing that year. We watched her build a team. We watched her invest in conferences and networking and live networking. It was amazing to watch her invest in her business and she started to see the growth in her revenue.

Speaker 2: 30:32

Her intention changed the next year and she said I really need to put down some roots and want to buy a house. I know that my mom is aging and I might need to care for her sometime in the future. Her priorities changed. She reset her intentions and in that time we were able to look at her numbers and say how do we take this profit out of your business to get you paid as a business owner and save for this house? Well, her attention changed again. Her focus that year was on profit. Her mom got sick and her priority changed. She needed to spend that time and care for her mom. Her profit went 100% to her team. She was heavily investing in her team so that her team could work in the business and she could care for her mom. We watched her celebrate owning a home caring for her mom. Her mom has since passed and she's back and evolved in her business in a big way in growth mode again. See how your numbers. They change.

Speaker 1: 31:38

It doesn't mean the same thing every year 100% Going back to what you were talking about throwing out. The goals of this is the resolution. These are all the things I think about the numbers and when I'm setting launch goals, strategy goals, anything like that, it's like what do I want my life to look like? That's exactly what you just laid out. We can let all those pressures from the other ads and content that's coming at us feel like we're less than because we don't have the same priorities that other people have. I think that once you can really sit in what Danielle just said her client had the freedom to choose what she wanted to do with her life because she had a handle on that. I feel like when you can really sit down with your finances and know exactly where your money is coming from, exactly where it's going and exactly what you can set aside for the future, I think that that's where that financial freedom really just kicks in. You just feel unstoppable. I don't know if that's too much, I'm just imagining.

Speaker 2: 32:43

I think that's exactly how she feels. It's unstoppable. I can do this. I'm not too small. Okay, Joe, move over. Get out of here, Joe.

Speaker 1: 32:55

Let us come redo your whole office too, because it's like making all of us sad. Oh, that's so funny.

Speaker 2: 33:03

It's so funny. But it's our responsibility as business owners. Jenna was able to do that because she looks at her numbers. We do the bookkeeping for her but she's not like it's done. My accounting team's got it. No, she shows up, she books the calls with us, she opens our emails, she looks at the numbers, she listens to the podcast and she is intentional. Because your responsibility as a business owner you can't give control to your tax accountant. You can't give control to your bookkeeper. I think that's something I hear too much of I don't pay that much attention to. I know my tax count got it. What do they got? They can't make those decisions for you. You, as a business owner, you have to make those decisions. They can have your back, they can help you make the decisions. The end of the day, you sign that return, so if it's messed up, they're not responsible.

Speaker 1: 34:01

Yeah, you are, you, yeah, yeah. Well, speaking of reviewing, like reviewing your numbers, like kind of knowing what's going on, like how often should I assess business owners, content creators, like let's imagine that there's, you know, a good chunk of my audience is they're gonna be in that category of, well, I'm not really doing a whole bunch of courses or anything like I'm maybe getting a sponsor here and there on their content and they have expenses going out related to Podcast hosting or graphic design. Like how often should they be looking at their numbers if they have someone helping them or if they're doing it all themselves? What does that look like?

Speaker 2: 34:40

So I would say quarterly at a minimum. You want to look at it. That gives you three opportunities before tax time, right, so quarterly at a minimum. When, when our clients work with us, we have a few packages we have weekly, monthly or quarterly, and we do that because you ideal situation is that you're looking at them monthly, because then that gives you 11 opportunities before tax time. But I know that that can be too much for some people. So if that's too much, at least look at them quarterly. That way you can save for taxes.

Speaker 2: 35:13

If you're if you are, you know, bring in more than you thought you would or your expenses are low this year, you need to be saving for taxes. You might be missing opportunities. Like you might be thinking to yourself like here's what I hear the most is I can't afford that. Like how do you know if you can't afford that? Like, when's the last time you looked at your numbers so you could be doing something on your own that you could have hired a graphic designer, you could have hired a coach, you could have hired somebody to do something for you and got some of your time back. Like For me, I have a podcast host, right, so I am right there with your audience.

Speaker 2: 35:54

For me, my time, like how I can show up and be the best podcast host possible is when I have more time to be creative, what I can think, what I have space and time to just think about my content, how I can best serve my audience. And I can like, really like write my outline and be intentional. And if I was spending all of my time editing and doing the design work and all those other pieces because I thought I couldn't afford it, I would have. I would have the opportunity to enjoy creating like I love creating my back. I love it. I freaking love being on this, this call with you right now and I can. And I can do that because I know my numbers and I'm not telling myself a story. I can't afford helping my business. I know I can afford the help or not and I can make that decision.

Speaker 1: 36:51

Well and I don't know if this was conscious on your part, but I mean Danielle just listed all the reasons why most podcasters quit is because they're overwhelmed with editing and trying to figure out Canva.

Speaker 1: 37:04

And they're trying to do all these other things when, at the heart of it, all they really want to do is connect with their audience and talk specifically to the problems that they know they can help them solve.

Speaker 1: 37:13

But they get so caught up and all of these other pieces that you know to your point.

Speaker 1: 37:18

I think that either freaks them out when they think about it, like, oh, if I hire someone, I have to continuously pay them forever and ever, amen, and they're not thinking about it is like, no, you could hire a project manager to come in and write all of your SOPs for your entire business and then you can hire you know, a VA to step in and do some of these things.

Speaker 1: 37:37

So I would really encourage everyone to, you know, go listen to Danielle's podcast and all the things that she's doing, because she helps you really step out of those typical boxes that so many of us get trapped. You know, maybe it was a bad coach in the beginning of your business journey or somewhere else that we just get so wrapped up and this is the only way that it can be. But I just really want to encourage you to Check out all your resources because I think that it's so important, and actually I wanted to ask you about 1099s contractors, employees and just kind of like if you could give us a high level of what those really mean as far as definition and when it's the right time to Go after that first hire in someone's business.

Speaker 2: 38:23

So what we find is Higher experts first, so that under 100, under 150k in revenue, your first hires are experts. You're buying back your time, so usually their contractors you're paying them as a 1099. 1099 are people who they're going to pay from IRS perspective. They are paying their own payroll taxes, so you are not paying the employer taxes. The 1099 contractor is paying the employer and employee taxes. But our first hires are generally experts.

Speaker 2: 39:00

So our bookkeepers, our podcast coaches, our Content creators, our graphic designers, right like, they have the experience and the expertise. You don't need to tell them what to do. They're kind of telling you what to do, right, like here's what success looks like, here's what works in your industry. From there, that 150 to 250 range, that's when we're starting to look at contractors. So they might be more freelancers, independent people who aren't necessarily experts in in in what they're doing, but they're still taking things off of your plate and your.

Speaker 2: 39:41

You have a little bit more control of what they're doing because it's an individual person, so you're not leaning on, you have more of an input on that, you're not just looking for them from their experience. Then, finally, we have employees. Employees are going to be the people who are looking to you to set the tone, to set the brand, to set the standard operating procedures, sops, to put together the structure of what they do. When an employee, you're telling them when to come to work, when to leave work. You're controlling what they work on their equipment. You're controlling their due dates. You're giving them training and feedback. You see how that changes. You want somebody else to buy back your time with experts and tell you what works at first. Eventually, as you get more time and experience and confidence and control, you know who you are, what you do and how you do it. Then you can have employees who then you are the expert and you can give them feedback.

Speaker 1: 40:51

Yeah, no, I think it's so helpful, especially when you're thinking about the expert view versus hiring some of the other pieces further down the road. I think back to some of my first hires that went terribly wrong. Okay, we're not going to call names, we're not going to talk about any of it, except that there were so many lessons learned. I feel like this could be one of the other. This could be the title of today's episode is Business Lessons Learned from Danielle and Crystal. Ignore the Joes and walk the other direction from people that you know. At the end of the day, it wasn't a good fit.

Speaker 1: 41:27

I think that so many things pop up like that in our businesses and we can't ignore them, like our finances. I find that I meet a lot of people to your point about. They just don't know about their numbers, they don't care to know or they're just handing it off to someone that will look at it once a year. I mean, I'm just going to tell you all go hire Danielle's company to give this issue. You need to work with someone who is an expert in what they're doing and I highly encourage you go and check out everything that they're doing over at Kickstart Accounting. But actually, danielle, before we get into our next segment, I know that you had said that you have a special gift for everyone that's listening to the show. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Speaker 2: 42:12

Yeah, if you go to KickstartAccountingInccom slash gift, the two questions we get the most often is am I deducting enough on my tax return and can I afford to hire? So if you go to KickstartAccountingInccom, there are resources there for you, access to the podcast downloads to answer those two questions. So KickstartAccountingInccom slash gift and you can choose your own adventure there, perfect.

Speaker 1: 42:43

Yeah, we're going to link to that in the show notes because I want everybody to go check it out. I think that I mean those are two questions that I hear a lot. I mean it's always about taxes and always about hiring. So those are top of mind for you, like, please, please, please, go check it out. But we're going to move into our rapid fire questions and I started thinking about it. I was like I bet Danielle doesn't remember these and I bet she doesn't remember what she said on the last one.

Speaker 2: 43:07

So I purposely didn't listen because I bet you, my answers are different, so I will listen afterwards.

Speaker 1: 43:14

It's so funny? Well, because anytime I say that, everyone's like oh crap, I forgot that that was a thing. I should have done it. But I think it makes it more fun when you don't go back and listen.

Speaker 2: 43:23

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 43:24

Previously Okay. So the first question is what piece of advice would you give to a brand new podcaster and content creator?

Speaker 2: 43:32

Hire before you're ready. I think it's hire before you're ready. You do not have to be the one to do everything. It's okay, I love it.

Speaker 1: 43:43

I love it. Simple, yeah, powerful, powerful. Okay, the next question is what is the dream podcast you would love to be on and who is your dream podcast guest?

Speaker 2: 43:59

Oh gosh, I'm like I have some that are just like a fangirl that I don't necessarily like belong on their podcast.

Speaker 1: 44:04

Do it.

Speaker 2: 44:05

Do it. I always so the person who got me into listening to podcasts to begin with. So I started listening to the Rich Roll podcast forever ago. I didn't really understand what podcasting was before I found him and he is the person who helped me fall in love with this medium of sound. And so Rich Roll, I owe so much of kind of my health and wellness journey to and I said it has nothing to do with like who I am as a person, so I don't belong in a show, but I am definitely a fangirl and he made me love podcasting. And in terms of guests, we actually just made the decision this month to stop having guests on our show, so I guess it's going to be me myself and I Well, if you could interview anybody, who would it be?

Speaker 2: 44:56

If I could interview anybody, it would be the founder of. I'm in a business group it's EO Network and if I could thank one person for literally changing the trajectory of my business, it would be the founder of EO Network. Or John Warlow, who also changed my life with the book Built to Sell Although I got to meet him recently and at least chat with him. But if I was to, he would also be somebody I would love to interview on the podcast. Awesome.

Speaker 1: 45:30

Awesome, yeah, and you could just pick their brain and just dive deeper. I think it's great.

Speaker 2: 45:37

I just think of people who are so meaningful to my journey.

Speaker 1: 45:40

Yes, yes for sure. And then my last question is do you consider yourself a perfectionist?

Speaker 2: 45:48

I actually am not. So I think one of the best things that I did is that and I even tell my team this often B minus work is better than A plus and never done. And so I tell my son, if you want to get straight, c's your whole life. I really could care less. The idea is that you show up, you try your hardest and you get things done and don't wait to turn it in. He told me. My son told me that he didn't turn it in a paper because he didn't have a chance to reread it. And am I saying you got zero points instead of half the point? Okay, yeah. So I am not a perfectionist, I want things done, yeah.

Speaker 1: 46:27

Done is better than perfect. I love that For sure, for sure. Well, danielle, we mentioned it so many times that you have your own podcast, so can you tell us about your show and the different types of content that you're creating and where people can find you?

Speaker 2: 46:43

So we are rebranding. It is Business by the Books is the new show title. It was Entrepreneur Money Stories for a Long Time. Business by the Books. We help entrepreneurs understand their numbers and how to run their business with their numbers. So if you are looking for that next level of like they keep on telling me know my numbers, what does that mean? We dive into all that Perfect.

Speaker 1: 47:11

So we're going to have links to everything, including the gift that Danielle talked about earlier in the show notes, because, like I said, y'all need to go listen to her podcast. You need to go check out her resources because, from my perspective, like I said, as someone who barely passed accounting and barely passed finance it's just conversations and like stories and different resources I wish I would have had back when I started my business in 2018. Like back when I was trying to figure out quick books and understand these financial statements and just look at all this information that was so foreign to me and I was just kind of sitting in this like loneliness, shame spiral of like you're supposed to understand what all of this is. You're a business owner now and Danielle helps you walk through all of those pieces and I know her team will be fantastic to work with. So, thank you so much. Come out of the shame spiral. Yes, come out of the shame spiral. We got you. Yes, yes. Thank you so much for coming on the show today, danielle. Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1: 48:15

Gosh, I felt like I could have just asked her 50 more questions that I hear all the time in this community about revenue, about expenses, about just evaluating your numbers on a regular basis, but I think, at the end of the day, one of the things that I really loved about this conversation was the honest, authentic pieces of so many of us have the same questions or so many of us have the same feelings or so many of us have the same mindset, and just letting you know, like you're not alone. Like if you struggle with money stuff, then just know you're not alone. And if you didn't learn these things whether it was when you were growing up or in school or wherever like that's okay. I still remember when I listened to the book You're a Badass and Making Money by Jensen Cheros so she wrote the You're a Badass series and it was the one about you know making money that really opened my eyes to. Oh, I didn't learn any of these things. This was before I even had a podcast. This was in like 2017, when I first listened to that audio book, and I just remember thinking like, oh, I have money, mindset issues, this is something that I need to work on.

Speaker 1: 49:36

And ever since then, I feel like I've been exploring how to be better with money and working with and, you know, getting introduced to people like Danielle, who are out to help people. She is here to help you, right, like she doesn't want you staying stuck in this like shame spiral of oh yeah, you didn't learn these things, so good luck. No, she's here to educate and to help entrepreneurs and business owners, just like you, feel more comfortable about your finances and be able to make smart money decisions that will impact your journey not just today, but five, 10 years from now, and help you to have sustainable profits. So make sure you're following Danielle, go and check out her podcast and go check out all the fun things that she has, because she is someone that I just I love her voice. She's got like such a great radio voice and she has this cool gift.

Speaker 1: 50:34

So, again, go to kickstartaccountinginkcom forward slash gift to check it out. I'm going to have this linked in the show notes for today's episode, but this was just such a fun, fun thing and I can't wait to hear what Danielle is up to next. Hopefully she comes back on the show and we can talk more about money and nerd out and more, because it was just so much fun. So go check her out, follow Danielle and kickstart accounting and all the things that they're doing and reach out to them, like if this is something that you're trying to figure out, you know well how do. This is so overwhelming, I don't know what I'm doing Like reach out to them and see if her and her team can help you, but that's all I have for you today. So make sure you hit that subscribe or follow button wherever you are listening and, as always, remember, keep it up. We all have to start somewhere.