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Turning 45 today. That's a lot of years of figuring things out, Through trial and error. (𝘔𝘰𝘴𝘵𝘭𝘺 𝘦𝘳𝘳𝘰𝘳.) Here are 15 of my favorite quotes about how life works...

I've been in the online business space for 11 years.  I have seen my fair share of frustrated or disappointed social media posts - of business attempts that didn't work out. Here are 7 potential pitfalls that I think any new online entrepreneur should consider ↓  1/ Secure Your Audience Beyond Social Media Platforms change rules and can suspend accounts. Building an email list is your safety net. Social media (𝕏, YouTube, Instagram) and marketplaces (Amazon, eBay, Etsy) are all other peoples sandboxes. Think of an email list like grabbing your friends' phone numbers in case you ever get kicked out of the sandbox. You are ensuring you can always get in touch with them. Takeaway: Until you connect with your followers outside of a platform, they are not your customers - they are the platform's customers. 2/ Understand the rules for the sandbox you choose to play in We all believe that a bias to action is essential to getting going in online business. But don't take this advice to mean you don't need to take the time to learn the rules of the platform that you are building on. I have seen people lose accounts on Etsy, Amazon, Instagram… pick any platform. Most were due to someone not being aware there were rules they were breaking.  Action Advice: Read terms of service, be in groups where other sellers or content creators hang out, learn the rules. 3/ Diversify your baskets Having all your eggs in one basket can be risky. Due to points 1 & 2, you need to diversify your platforms and/or income sources. Caveat: Diversifying initially is not a great idea; you'll need to focus on building something properly... but once you have built your first home on the internet, you should expand your horizons. Action Advice: Use the leverage of your 𝕏 audience to build an audience on LinkedIn or Instagram - or add a second stream of income.  4/ Know the basic laws & regulations that apply to you You are running a business. When you decide to run a business, you take on the responsibility of running a business. Action Advice: Get in a group of other online entrepreneurs (or better yet, a few groups) so you'll be aware of changes when they happen. Make sure to research requirements for [fill in the blank with your thing]. For example, make sure you are following legal requirements for your website/email provider (recent Google and Yahoo DMARC requirements as an example). Also, trademarks are a thing, don't name your business a name that someone already uses.  5/ Sales tax and income tax. [For the US] Learn enough not to get yourself in trouble. Save for estimated quarterly taxes and understand sales tax obligations. Obviously, the larger your business grows - the more you will need to know in these areas; it's not a one-and-done. Self-employment income is taxed differently than income you earn as an employee. You also pay it differently (every quarter) since it is not taken automatically out of a paycheck. Action Advice: Create a bank account for just your taxes - take the portion you will owe in taxes (as soon as you are paid) and transfer it to this account. Meet with a professional to learn how much you should set aside, but plan to save roughly 30% of what you make. (Filing status, tax bracket, etc. affect this rate). If you live in a state without income tax, I envy you! For the rest of us - remember to pay quarterly taxes to your state also. Caveat: I am not a tax professional. So it goes without saying that you should consult an accountant or tax lawyer who can look at your unique business and give you professional advice. 6/ Decent bookkeeping You don't have to become an accountant, but you can do plenty to make life a lot easier on yourself come tax time. Again, remember, you are building a business - you take on the responsibility of a business. The IRS doesn't care that you're new and didn't know.  Action Advice: Have a separate checking account and credit card for only business income and expenses. Don't buy anything for personal use out of this account, ever. Become disciplined about this early on, and you'll save yourself a lot of headaches. 7/ Start with the End in Mind: Covey's Wisdom in Business Adopt Stephen Covey's approach: envision your business's end goal. Understand different business models and their scaling potential. For example, selling handmade crafts on Etsy has a different income potential than selling digital courses. Choose a model that aligns with your aspirations: substantial wealth, supplementary side income, or somewhere in between. There are a lot of OG YouTubers currently announcing they are quitting or significantly scaling back. They built a business they didn't want. They didn't want to manage large teams; they wanted to focus on their craft. Takeaway: Businesses come in all shapes and sizes. You can take the Lego blocks and design your perfect version - you just have to do it with thought and intention, or you may end up someday wanting to tear it all down. - - - Would love your thoughts - things you think a beginner should be aware of, or if you have a question you think I might be able to offer some insight on, ask below - I'm happy to share my thoughts!

'Some of the best advice I've been given: Don't take criticism from people you would never go to for advice.' — Morgan Freeman

Use your failures as guideposts... Instead of stop signs.

Starting a business? Start after you've prepared. But before you are ready.

🎉 900 Followers! 🙌 Super happy to celebrate this one with you all! Here's to many more chats on: • Business • Money • Life Excited to keep growing & learning together!

Imagine following your own advice. For 30 days straight. What would your life look like? You don't need others advice, You already know what to do.

Entrepreneurship requires: More work up front. But that work buys you freedom later. You’re building assets, not just a job.

Celebrating 800 followers. 🙌 That's about 798 more than I expected. And I am sure a bot or two followed, Before my 1st post. It took 1 month of daily posts, To get 10 comments on one. It took 2 months of daily posts, To get my first 1K impressions. In the last week, My account had close to 80K imp. And for the month of June, My posts averaged 50+ comments. All that to say, The beginning is not the end. ━━━━━━━━━━━ Wherever you are at in your journey, Writing posts get easier. Meeting people gets more fun. Finding your niche gets more exciting. ━━━━━━━━━━━ Wherever you are at in your journey, It happens slower than you think it should. And also faster than you expect. ━━━━━━━━━━━ One of my first posts, That never saw the light of day: Trust the process with extra-ordinary patience. You'll get there. But not soon. When the temptation to give up arises... Say: Oh, I expected you... And then keep going.

If you run your own business (or want to), which term do you prefer? Why? Business Owner Self Employed Entrepreneur Solopreneur Freelancer Other?

If you have to decide between perfect or done... Always pick done.

You influence your own luck. Good or bad.

Get rich quick advice, usually leads to: Get poor quicker results.

Things worth building: • A healthy body. • A healthy mind. • Financial options. • A strong marriage. • A profitable business. • A supportive community.

Why I love business: Learn more → Earn more.

If you want to serve others well... ↳ Start by treating yourself well.

If you run your own business (or want to), which term do you prefer? Why? Business Owner Self Employed Entrepreneur Solopreneur Freelancer Other?

🎉 900 Followers! 🙌 Super happy to celebrate this one with you all! Here's to many more chats on: • Business • Money • Life Excited to keep growing & learning together!

Use your failures as guideposts... Instead of stop signs.

If you have to decide between perfect or done... Always pick done.

Celebrating 800 followers. 🙌 That's about 798 more than I expected. And I am sure a bot or two followed, Before my 1st post. It took 1 month of daily posts, To get 10 comments on one. It took 2 months of daily posts, To get my first 1K impressions. In the last week, My account had close to 80K imp. And for the month of June, My posts averaged 50+ comments. All that to say, The beginning is not the end. ━━━━━━━━━━━ Wherever you are at in your journey, Writing posts get easier. Meeting people gets more fun. Finding your niche gets more exciting. ━━━━━━━━━━━ Wherever you are at in your journey, It happens slower than you think it should. And also faster than you expect. ━━━━━━━━━━━ One of my first posts, That never saw the light of day: Trust the process with extra-ordinary patience. You'll get there. But not soon. When the temptation to give up arises... Say: Oh, I expected you... And then keep going.

Get rich quick advice, usually leads to: Get poor quicker results.

Starting a business? Start after you've prepared. But before you are ready.

Why I love business: Learn more → Earn more.

Imagine following your own advice. For 30 days straight. What would your life look like? You don't need others advice, You already know what to do.

Turning 45 today. That's a lot of years of figuring things out, Through trial and error. (𝘔𝘰𝘴𝘵𝘭𝘺 𝘦𝘳𝘳𝘰𝘳.) Here are 15 of my favorite quotes about how life works...

Things worth building: • A healthy body. • A healthy mind. • Financial options. • A strong marriage. • A profitable business. • A supportive community.

Entrepreneurship requires: More work up front. But that work buys you freedom later. You’re building assets, not just a job.

1,007 Followers. It's been a journey. Some thoughts... Maybe even some vulnerable ones... This is a bit overwhelming. And full of possibility. Building on X. ━━━━━━━━━━━ This is a lot for an introvert, And the perfect place for an introvert. It is amazing for clarifying how you think. For learning what you already know. Truth be told, This is harder than one might think. Teach what you know they say. Sometimes you are so busy doing it for so long, You don't even know what you know. My goal when starting, was just to write... Figure out what people liked. Do I know things that might be helpful? ━━━━━━━━━━━ Business and personal finance changed my life. It gave my husband and I options. It got us out from the weight of debt. I want that for anyone else who also wants that. And before our business, I was a therapist. So sometimes I think... What would life have been like, If we were all handed a book (maybe at birth)... About the human experience. What to expect. How to navigate it. Instead, we spend a lifetime figuring it out. Learning from those willing to share. So many of us, have to fight the good fight, Just to get out of our own way. ━━━━━━━━━━━ So, all that to say... Here I am... on X... In the overwhelm of social media. (Something in my personal life I have worked quite hard to opt out of.) With this strange background of experience. In the business of business. And the business of being a human. And although my husband and I have built an ecom brand that lets me be creative... That paid off our debt, And then our mortgage... What an amazing, full-circle, thing it would be to build a business that helps other people navigate building and running their own businesses (whatever one they choose). Because even choosing what business to start can be a minefield. The easiest thing for me to do I suppose, Would have been to create a product that teaches people Amazon ecom. Our sales put us somewhere in the top 1-5% of Amazon sellers. But ecom is not what I love. I love business. And people. And the things that make businesses go well, Or not... Is pretty universal. At least I think. ━━━━━━━━━━━ So... 1,007 beautiful people later, I am starting to get clearer on the business I would like to build here. To those of you who have been here... Your insights and input have been so valuable. Each of you. 🙏 And I thank you. If you have more ideas what you think we should do next, please share! I love to hear them. They always reveal a piece of the puzzle for me. ━━━━━━━━━━━ And if you're new here, Hi, I'm Adrienne. 👋 My husband Chris and I got started in online business 10+ years ago. And other businesses... before that. I am most interested in saving others from bad business advice. Understanding the strategy behind business... A little about the strategy of life... Mostly, for creating your own options. ━━━━━━━━━━━ If you are looking for amazing people to follow, Check my comment section. The best of the best are down there. Love you all. 🙏

My favorite way to think about business: The more value you create, The more valuable you become.

This has consistently been my experience: Life rewards hard work. But before it rewards you, it tests you. Maybe to see if you really want it. Has this been your experience too?

Having your own business means... Sometimes you work more. (Not less.) But the difference? You're in charge of it. A trade I'm willing to make.