Pre PS  We've currently waitlisted our Lifestyle Business School program and we'll be reopening soon. Join the waitlist here if you want to get updated on the best deal and the special VIP bonuses soon as we re-open doors.

Last episode I talked about some of the cons of having a membership site as your offer. 

Now, let's switch sides and talk about the pros of building a membership site. 

And, when you go into it with realistic expectations - there are many! 

I do think it's important to start with the cons however, because they aren't usually considered and it's the reason people become disillusioned and give up. 

Memberships can be magical - with some big ifs and buts. 

They can be magical 🪄... IF:

You are willing to do the work (because, it's WORK - and a lot of it); 

You have the mental fortitude to deal pragmatically with cancellations; 

You have a spirit of optimisation and genuinely want to improve and be of service; 

You have an understanding of numbers and a willingness to learn more advanced concepts, memberships: 

And, your offer suits it. 

If you've ticked yes to all of the above, memberships can over time become a fairly lucrative money making machine. 

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Pre PS  We've currently waitlisted our Lifestyle Business School program and we'll be reopening soon. Join the waitlist here if you want to get updated on the best deal and the special VIP bonuses soon as we re-open doors.

Should you create a membership site? 

So often, it's sold as the ultimate dream:

"Create a membership site and you too can enjoy recurring revenue - forever", they say. 

Which is kind of true.

Only, it also comes with a very, very big asterisk:

Memberships are one of the most advanced, psychologically trying, long-game, difficult leveraged business models out there. 

And, no-one is sharing THAT when they are selling the dream. 

In October 2023, I launched my very own online membership site. 

Believe me when I say that I have aged 26 Internet years in the months since (just kidding - kind of).

Here's the truth though: 

They are no joke, and this is coming from someone with six years in the online business space, experience in every leveraged business model under the sun, an advanced understanding of data and advanced marketing concepts  and serious grit and resilience. 

Cliff notes, though: I am a sucker for punishment and I actually enjoy the game of it.

But, honestly? 

I think I'd be in the minority here. It's kind of like an Ultra Marathon runner: 

It takes a special breed to want to put yourself through it, but it's worthwhile if you have what it takes, you're willing to play the long game and you're up for the task 😅. 

If you're finding yourself wondering "should I create a membership site?", I want to share with you the cold, hard truth about running a membership site based on my own personal experience. 

Take from it what you will. My hope is that it will help you go into this model with eyes wide open, because misaligned expectations is the ultimate dream killer. 

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I am taking a short break of one to two weeks from new podcast episodes. Here’s a ‘best of’ episode from the vault until I’m back!

Last year, I spent in excess of about $35,000 on a huge rebrand. 

The thought process was this —> 

I want to build a company. 

I have a team and I don’t want it to feel like it’s just about me. 

Stevie Says Social no longer aligned. 

And, at the time, all of those things were true. 

Still are, really. 

But over the subsequent months, my thoughts on how I want to position my business and personal brand shifted slightly AGAIN, and so in today’s podcast episode I want to share some of that nuance with you in case it serves you also. 

As with ALL decisions in business, there is no “universal truth” when it comes to these things, only ever what serves YOU and the goals you have. 

And here, right now, are my thoughts (and upcoming shifts) in terms of what serves ME and this small + mighty business in this moment.

In this podcast episode we discuss:
✔️ Bringing My Personal Brand Back to Life
✔️ Exit Businesses v Lifestyle Businesses
✔️ Projects v Businesses
✔️ A Personal Brand is the Most Important Superpower You Have Online
✔️ So, What’s Changing? 
✔️ And More!

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How do you create an online course that sells right now?

The truth is that times have changed, and what worked even just a few years ago no longer does. 

The online course market is maturing, and with the growth many are starting to wonder:

"Are people still buying online courses?"

Here's my two cents: 

Yes they absolutely are, but it’s uneven at the moment.

Some people are killing it and some are finding it tough. 

If you're wondering how you can create an online course that sells right now, here are seven things to keep in mind. 

1. Cultivate Trust and Authority

2. Contracts Create Friction

3. Creating an Online Course That Sells Requires Transparency

4. New Offers Require Time in the Market

5. Positioning is Everything

6. Risk Reversal is Extra Helpful

7. Trust and an Irresistible Offer Are King and Queen Right Now

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In 2007, I spent six weeks in a hostel in the middle of Guatemala just “because”.

Truly, I’d never felt so free.

The two years prior had been spent working like a donkey, with good people but in a field I hated.

The endgame? Admission to the Supreme Course of Queensland as a lawyer.

It was an accolade I spent 7 years working towards..

Only to quit, 6-weeks to the day later.

And so, there I found myself in a computer shop in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, on a steaming April afternoon checking my emails when my brothers friend messaged us on Facebook.

“Wanna come visit?” – he wrote, “I’m just down the road in Guatemala!”

We looked at each other.

Of course we would. It wasn’t even a QUESTION.

We were free. The world was our oyster. And we could do anything, be anyone, go anywhere!

And so it came to be that I ended up spending the best, most carefree, most FUN 6-weeks of my life living out of a backpack in a dingy hostel dorm room in Antigua.

Acutely aware that I had opted out of life for a little minute, and feeling grateful as heck for it.

Five years later, I started my online business chasing that kind of freedom again.

And on the surface, the promise of it all felt..  intoxicating.

Time freedom – to work when I wanted!

Location freedom – to go back to Central America, or London, or ANYWHERE BUT HERE!

Financial freedom – to make more than a doctors wages working on the goddamn INTERNET!

I wanted it.

The sense of adventure.

The possibility.

The wonder that came from not knowing what would come next.

The Tuesday afternoons spent outside (and not in an air-conditioned cubicle)

ALL OF IT.

🍊 Rinse and Repeat has just been added to Lifestyle Business School!  This is the ultimate collection of every live launch and promotion under the sun. Join now for $149/m. 

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🍑 Rinse and Repeat has just been added to Lifestyle Business School!  This is the ultimate collection of every live launch and promotion under the sun. Join now for $149/m. 

I’ve had 17,400 Instagram followers for YEARS now.

Sure, it tracks up a bit.

Down a bit.

But overall, it HOVERS around that number 🛸

Same with my trusty email list.

A few subscribers up.. then a few down.. and repeat.

But, what can I REALLY expect?

I HAVEN’T TAKEN AUDIENCE GROWTH SERIOUSLY SINCE 2017.

In 2023 though, I changed my business model.

I gained clarity on my founder type and ditched the big, stressful business to to intentionally go back to my creator roots.

Here’s why:

In November 2022, I turned 40.

And let me tell YOU:

There’s something about turning 40 that puts everything into perspective.

It makes you realise that you are not, in fact, immortal.

That “later in life” has actually come WAY FASTER THAN YOU THOUGHT IT WOULD.

It helped me – in the best possible way –  to define my dreams and what I REALLY wanted to do with the increasingly limited time I have left.

Here’s what I realised in the process:

That I was really, really proud of what I’d achieved in the 7 years prior since I’d started my business.

.. Even though I was a late bloomer.

.. Even though I’d spent FAR TOO MUCH of my life *ahem my twenties into my early thirties* waiting for the weekend and losing myself in happy hour.

.. And even though I’d veered a little off course in building the wrong model for me.

With every misstep, I’d had the tenacity, courage and clarity to course correct and keep chasing after my dreams.

And ALSO?

I realised that I was in NO WAY DONE YET.

That in many ways, I was just getting started.

 And if YOUR dream is to build a lifestyle business, Lifestyle Business School is the thing I have personally built to help you get there.

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I don’t care about leaving money on the table. 

I don’t care about “maximising” my revenue” or getting the “most” out of every day. 

Here’s what I do care about: 

Spend Tuesday mornings at a 10am Pilates class. Stuffing around making labels for my new spice racks just because. Googling cool new hair-dos for my little girl. Sitting on the floor with her at 2pm on a Friday, playing hairdressers.

I care about travel. I care so much about travel. I care about renting a month-long Airbnb in Norway just because. And getting a van, and traveling around the English countryside stopping at every cute pub along the way. I care about driving down the California coast. Showing my kids Hearst Castle. Visiting Old Town Ibiza, and sipping Sangria at 10pm on a hot August evening. 

I care about feeling free – really, truly free. Waking up on a Monday and relishing the week ahead. Spending the morning sitting in a cafe, writing for three hours over two half-strength cappuccinos. And never again sitting in  an air-conditioned cubicle with no natural sunlight, taking orders from a girl called Samantha and waiting for Friday. 

I care about life. 

And living it, unconventionally and messily.

And having fun. 

And being the poster girl for living free. 

And above all? 

After building a $2.5m business to the ground in the name of wild alignment, NOT sacrificing all of that at the altar of some arbitrary revenue goal that won’t even give me more of what I want. 

That’s why I have the business I (now) do. 

And the values I (now) have. 

And it’s why I’m now so passionate about sharing with others my ethos for building a simple, highly profitable one-person + a tiny team style business to the Lifestyle Business Sweet Spot ®

In this week's podcast, I'll be sharing with you the Seven Commandments of Building a Business to the Lifestyle Business Sweet Spot.

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📝 Download our FREE 26 Page Expertise-Based Business Diagnostic:
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Get the complete Operating System for starting or growing an expertise-based online business to the Lifestyle Business Sweet Spot. Click here to join the waitlist today.

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In the past two years, I have gone from three full time team members..
To me, one part time contractor.
The result of scaling DOWN my team?
My business went from 40% profit margins on a good month.. To 80%, always.
I halved my revenue.. But took home WAY more profit.
And I felt lighter, happier and more fulfilled than I had in years, with my days spent working on the things that truly light me up.
Two years on, things looked so very different..
It feels like a dream.
The no-team dream.
Systems Over Team

So, what changed?
And specifically, what ENABLED me to re-build my business A One-Woman Show Working 5-Hour Days With 80% Profit Margins?

Here’s the cliff notes:
From a business model perspective, I moved to a model that felt far more aligned.
It required fewer moving parts, fewer offers and fewer resources.
And I started prioritising systems over team.

It looks like this:
✔️ A Simple Model: One of the most overlooked “secrets” to an elegant business is simplicity. More offers, more work. I worked on refining my business model and offer suite to be simple.
✔️ Increased Leverage: I built offers that leverage my time by packaging my Intellectual Property into scalable offers that were divorced from my time (and didn’t require big team to run).
✔️ And Systems BEFORE Team: Rather than hiring FIRST, I worked to systemise as much of my business as possible, so that my time is now leveraged by processes, automations and tools instead of another set of hands.

Together, those three things, once achieved, are a little thing called Operational Elegance –  and it has changed my (business) life.
Operations doesn’t sound sexy.
But truly, it is the thing that has set me free.
I want other people to experience it, and it’s why I have dedicated my entire business mission since 2022 to help others achieve the same.

If you resonate with this mission?  Lifestyle Business School is for you. 

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📝 Download our FREE 26 Page Expertise-Based Business Diagnostic:
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Get the complete Operating System for starting or growing an expertise-based online business to the Lifestyle Business Sweet Spot. Click here to join the waitlist today.

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📫 BRAND NEW! Subscribe to the NEW Lifestyle Business School newsletter here. 

In December last year I phased out my primary (only) offer in my business in the name of business model re-alignment. And, in many ways, I'm starting again. I'm in a messy creation phase right now.  So, a few days ago, I started documenting the journey of re-building my business.

This podcast shares more of that process, including behind the scenes insights. 

BRAND NEW! The Lifestyle Business School newsletter where I'll also be sharing how I do the work, test and experiment and inch forward step by step in my business.

If you want to follow me in this journey,  subscribe to my newsletter and share it with others too!

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Here's 7 things I see holding business owners back from their goal to build a leveraged business model.
This is based off seven years of experience and working with hundreds of online founders, and noticing patterns.
I hope recognising these will help you to shortcut the process.

[PS Our newsletter is live! Subscribe here].

1️⃣ Time & the Hockey Stick Effect
Building a leveraged business model takes MORE time upfront, and less time later on.
2️⃣ Misaligned Positioning
Get clear on who your offer serves, and match what you do to their problem.
3️⃣ Too Many Offers
At max, you need three offers - an audience offer, a core offer and an anchor offer. They should all complement and feed into each other.
4️⃣ Not Applying Scalable Traffic Strategies to a Scalable Business Model
The traffic strategies that work for a 1:1 or service business model won't be enough when trying to sell a leveraged offer. More units to sell means that you need more eyeballs to see your offers.
5️⃣ Not Making ROI based investment decisions
Once you have the offer sorted, learn the math involved to make ROI based decisions to invest wisely to grow.
6️⃣ Solving the Wrong Problem
Knowing the problem, and solving the right one, will cut your journey in half (or more)
7️⃣ Product-Model-Founder Misalignment
There is no right way of doing online business, only what is right for you.
You need clarity on your endgame, and the model that fits you as the founder.

In Lifestyle Business School, we focus on a structured approach to building a leveraged, expertise-based business model - actively working to avoid these pitfalls to build an aligned model with structured strategy that is right for YOU.
Join Lifestyle Business School at lifestylebusiness.school/join.

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Ever wondered EXACTLY how I create digital courses?

The nitty gritty "I do this, then this, then THIS"?

I have been creating online courses now since 2018, and have learnt a LOT about what works and what doesn't when it comes to the "creative process".

When developing my very first digital course in 2018, I went to Bali for six weeks, wrote a 50,000 word manuscript in the final week because I had no idea what else to do and then came back to spend the next six months figuring out how to make it into a course that people would buy (more on that in this episode)!

I don't recommend that approach 😉

With more than $2 million in digital course sales now under my belt, my creative process has developed over time and in today's podcast episode I break down exactly how I do it now. 

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