Today on the podcast I'm diving into why you should treat your business like an asset.

According to Investopedia, an asset is anything of value or a resource of value that can be converted into cash. Essentially, it's anything that you can sell or something you can hold on to build wealth.

Treating your business like an asset is like raising a child. You need to put in a certain amount of time nurturing the business, just like you would a child. When your business is an infant, it needs constant care and attention. This is usually when you are running the business solely on your own. As the business grows, we often bring in more people to help us nurture it, the same way we bring in teachers and caretakers for our children. It takes a village. The end goal is to build a business that can leave the nest and flourish without us. And sure the business may need to call home to ask you to schedule their dentist appointment or drop some wisdom and you can spoil your...

Today on the podcast I'm breaking down our relationships with debt and discussing the question, "is debt really that bad?"

When it comes to relationships with debt, people tend to fall in one of three camps.

1. Debt is evil, terrible, and should never be used

2. Debt should be avoided (most the time), but makes sense in certain circumstances)

3. Debt is a tool! Use it to your advantage.

Camp #1 that feels debt is evil, terrible and should never be sued is lead by the Dave Ramseys of the world, focusing on his framework of baby steps to save for emergency funds, focusing on the snowball method of paying off debt (except your house), saving 3-6 months expenses in a full emergency fund, then focusing on saving 15% of household income for your retirement, then save for your child(ren)'s college, then pay off your home early and start building wealth. I focus on the first four since children and a house are not the realities for everyone however I struggle with step...

On today's episode of the podcast I chat with Taylor Darcy, owner of Think Legal PC, about the legalities of buying and and selling a business.

Taylor works with small businesses to help them get started the right way to help them prevent disputes, or help get them out of disputes for the least amount of money as possible (or get them the most amount of money depending on what side he's working on). Taylor works on litigation, helping businesses file complaints or defend if there is a complaint against them, all with the goal of avoiding litigation if at all possible.

When selling a business, the value comes from systems. If you are the value in the business and you leave the business, then there's no value and the buyer isn't going to want it. The value of the systems is what will bring in a higher price.

Buying a business is a great way to get into entrepreneurship because you can use the assets of the business to finance the business. On the flipside, if you...

On today's episode I chat with Amber Anderson, Owner of Refine for Wedding Planners, about business acquisition and trademarks. 

We should all run our business with a long-term perspective of "do I want to run this thing until I'm ready to retire?" or "do I potentially want to sell my business one day?" Even if you think you don't want to sell, it's good for business to run it in a systemized way that it could one day be sold. 

Amber Anderson sold her wedding planning company, Heavenly Day,  in January of 2020. She said it was easier to sell the company since it was not tied to her name directly, though the name was not trademarked. When she was ready to sell, it all came down to timing and who was ready to buy at the same time Amber was ready to sell.  As for pricing, Amber calculated based on 3-4x annual revenue. Depending on your timing and if you had a broker and how much time you have will also play a factor in the money you will get...

On today's episode I chat with Carnez Williams insurance broker at Carnez Insurance KC, about the different types of insurance policies for creative small business owners and what to look for.

An independent insurance broker works with any number of insurance carriers, whether on the personal insurance side of home and auto or on the commercial side of business owner polices, professional liability, etc. An insurance broker shops your information among carriers to find the best provider for you based on rates and your coverage needs.

One frequently asked question is "If I have an LLC and a contract, do I really need insurance?" The answer is absolutely, 100%. Insurance is necessary whether we're talking contracts, LLC or whatever business you're dealing with. You want to protect three different things 1) protect your assets and property, 2) protect you from liability and 3) protect your income. If your objection is that you don't really have any assets or have much...

On this episode of the podcast I share how I increased my credit score by 100 points in 6-8 months.

I think it's important that we as business owners get more comfortable sharing more about our personal finances. Everything from profit to saving for taxes to how much we pay ourselves and how this all relates to our personal finances like our credit scores, our savings, our emergency fund, our retirement savings, our loan repayments, our credit cards, etc. They're very taboo topics so I've found the best way to discuss them is to start sharing.

To give you my background with credit, my journey started my freshman year of college when someone offered me a credit card. I signed up thinking there were no consequences. Luckily I only used it to buy my books, so about $1,000. But I didn't have $1,000 to pay it back so my credit score immediately tanked and stayed there for about five years. When I got to law school I had a car loan my mom was co-signed on and I think I made...

Recently I was listening to Rachel Rodgers' audiobook, "We Should All Be Millionaires: A Woman's Guide to Earning More, Building Wealth, and Gaining Economic Power" and was inspired to do her $10k in 10 days challenge. This peaked my interested because I am working on a goal of $30,000 months in my business.

I encourage you to look at your financial goals - income, retirement, vacations, etc. and what does that look like per day, week, month, etc. What may seem like a lot of money per month may not be as much as you think once you subtract expenses, taxes and savings.

To break down my $10k in 10 Days Challenge, I ended with $9,741. Here's how I did it:

My first few offers were not a hit which was scary at first. Then I got the idea for a new offer: LLC in a day. An offer is anything that you are selling and I decided to sell a 1:1 session with me to get you completely set up with your LLC. I put that out there via my email list. It's $1,000 and I booked 2.

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On this episode of the podcast I announce the return of my Profit Reports and what they'll look like moving forward.

I'm launching a private podcast! This will be a second podcast exclusively for members of my free Facebook group, Braden's Besties. In the group I host a Friday Facebook Live where I answer questions I've collected throughout the week. I'll be turning this Q&A into a private podcast that will be accessible only to members of my Facebook group, so join now by clicking here or visiting www.bradensbesties.com

If you're new to the podcast in the last year you may not be familiar with my profit reports. These reports came to be in 2019 when I was reading the book Profit First by Mike Michalowicz where he walked readers through an exercise to determine the profitability of your business. I was operating at 30-40% profit at the time which was very low and I set out on a journey to operate at 70% profit. I started sharing my income and expenses with my...