My guest today is Todd Tresidder, a former hedge fund manager and founder of FinancialMentor.com. He is a personal finance and investing expert coach who teaches how to grow wealth and reach financial independence. He emphasizes the importance of personal development and fulfillment in attaining the goal of financial freedom. A self-made millionaire himself, Todd’s FinancialMentor.com programs provide a step-by-step blueprint for building wealth. Visit Todd at FinancialMentor.com for free resour...
Sep 12, 2016•48 min•Ep. 61
Today I’m talking with Michael Port, author of Book Yourself Solid and four other bestselling books. I came across Book Yourself Solid at a bookstore when I first started freelancing, and loved the online marketing techniques he describes. He has been running Book Yourself Solid programs around the world and training freelancers for the past 14 years. Michael describes six core self-promotion strategies that freelancers use, and more importantly goes into the backend of how to close sales and ac...
Sep 07, 2016•48 min•Ep. 60
Today my guest is Jonathan Raymond the former CEO of E-Myth, he became the CEO in 2011 when the owner wanted to modernize the brand. He decided to break out on his own in 2015. The idea behind the E-Myth is that running a business is different than being great at whatever the business does. An example would be a great dancer who opens a dance studio and discovers there is more to running a dance studio than being a fantastic dancer. Jonathan now focuses on what it takes to create a great busines...
Jun 27, 2016•36 min•Ep. 59
I’m super excited to share today’s interview with Ryan Waggoner with you. Ryan has an amazing consulting business and is pushing more than a million a year in profit. Ryan is killing it with mobile consulting, where a lot of people in that space struggle to make $100,000 plus. Ryan is an all around sharp guy, but I’m specifically bringing him on because he is really good at cash flow management. He has a great perspective on splitting up personal and business finance, and I want to capture that ...
Jun 20, 2016•41 min•Ep. 58
Hello everyone, today I am talking with Diana Huff, the President of Huff Industrial Marketing a business that helps industrial manufacturers grow and succeed. Diana just released her new book Cash Flow for Freelancers. Today we will be talking about how to manage cash flow when you have a variable income. Diana started her business in 1998 when it was known as DH Communications. She is now a marketing consultant, but when she began she was focused on freelance copywriting in the B2B market. At ...
May 30, 2016•32 min•Ep. 57
It's time to officially announce the opening of the Double Your Freelancing Academy. Get details and an insider’s scoop on the Double Your Freelancing Academy in today's episode.
May 23, 2016•24 min•Ep. 56
Today our guest is Reuven Lerner, who teaches Python, Ruby, Git and PostgreSQL to companies around the world. Today we are discussing using training as a productized offering. Reuven will also be giving an extended presentation on this topic at the Double Your Freelancing Conference that we are having June 22nd through June 25th in Stockholm, Sweden. Reuven has over 20 years of experience as a software engineer and over 15 years experience teaching in high-tech companies. He has a PhD in Learnin...
May 16, 2016•56 min•Ep. 55
Hello everyone, today I am talking to Budi Voogt. He is an awesome guy from the Netherlands. He runs a recording label consultancy. I love looking beyond the typical web designer, copywriter, marketer kind of business and seeing how other types of entrepreneurs are successfully charging more, getting better clients, and putting systems in place. Budi is in the Hague, Netherlands. He went to school for Business Administration. Then started working in artist management and booking. From 2012 to 20...
May 09, 2016•51 min•Ep. 54
Today I have an awesome interview with a long time student of mine, Eric White. When Eric started he was a typical commoditized freelancer, but he made the transition to high-value business consulting. He has a background in developing business software. He enjoyed working with people and was the guy who spoke with clients to find out what they wanted in their software products. Eric’s current consulting work is understanding what clients actually want with their software. He wants to meet them ...
May 02, 2016•58 min•Ep. 53
Today I am talking with Bryce Bladon. He is the curator of “clients from hell”. Today we talk about everything from qualifying new clients to setting expectations. He runs a website whose sole purpose is to showcase crazy clients. We both feel that sometimes we can do things a bit differently to help avoid having clients from hell. So the theme of this show is to have fewer clients from hell. Bryce has been involved with Clients from Hell, a collection of anonymously submitted tales of woe, sinc...
Apr 25, 2016•42 min•Ep. 52
Today I am interviewing Jane Portman. Jane is from Russia, and she used to work with me on Planscope which I just sold. She is an amazing designer who is very focused on the design and the copy. I recently redesigned Double Your Freelancing. Which is appropriate for today, because Jane’s expertise is building really great user experiences. Jane is an amazing UI designer and business consultant. Jane has been designing for over 10 years. She worked for a large agency in Russia. She is also a mom,...
Apr 18, 2016•41 min•Ep. 51
Today we are speaking with Alex Mathers. Alex is an illustrator who specializes in vector illustrations, maps, diagrams and landscapes. He is also a blogger and writer. He runs the Red Lemon Blog which helps creative entrepreneurs market and promote their businesses. He has worked for clients like Google, Sony and the BBC. He is also a speaker and does one on one coaching for select clients. He lives in London, UK, and he also runs the Ape on the Moon design blog. Alex studied geography in Londo...
Mar 14, 2016•38 min•Ep. 50
Karl Sakas is the president of Sakas & Company which is a consulting company that specializes in helping digital marketing agencies grow. I had an opportunity to chat with Karl today, and I found myself nodding my head the entire time. The meat and potatoes of the interview focused on helping businesses grow in a holistic way not just focusing on the technical aspect of what the business offers. Karl emphasizes using a SIT framework which focuses on strategy, implementation and training. Wor...
Mar 07, 2016•44 min•Ep. 49
Today I am talking with Jesse Strauss. Jesse is a New York-based lawyer who owns a firm specializing in debt collection for freelancers. When it comes to things like small claims court and debt collection, freelancers are usually on their own. Jesse discovered that there were a lot of freelancers with payment disputes while he was working on wage and hour cases. He started looking for a new solution to solve this problem. Jesse was based in New York, so he couldn’t handle cases in other jurisdic...
Feb 29, 2016•45 min•Ep. 48
Today I’m talking with a good friend of mine, Keith Perhac. Keith is the founder of the digital marketing consulting agency DelfiNet and the online course software Summit Evergreen. He has managed to build a thriving consultancy agency while working remotely in Japan. Working remotely, can be an issue for many freelancers, but Keith says he is there when his clients wake up and there again when they go to bed. He says it’s like magic when they tell him what they want, and it is done for them whe...
Jan 28, 2016•54 min•Ep. 47
Today’s show features service scalability strategist, Mandi Ellefson. Mandi helps entrepreneurs develop a system to free up time and remove themselves from their business. In today’s interview we discuss scaling your business and things to consider before going down that route. Mandi has discovered that scaling is a common issue for freelancers, and she is passionate about helping them. While researching methodologies to scale her own business, Mandi discovered that this was a common problem for...
Jan 25, 2016•42 min•Ep. 46
Today we’re joined by Bart Mroz: consultant, co-founder of Sumo Heavy, and long-time friend. Bart is an expert at experimenting new things in his business and using the discoveries to increasingly improve it and their strategy. Not only have they done this with billing models, but with trial periods, sales processes, and basically everything else. What he’s discovered is that experimentation is the only way of finding out what works best for your business specifically. You need to approach the b...
Jan 11, 2016•47 min•Ep. 45
Today’s guest is Liston Witherill. Today we got the opportunity to talk about getting into the heads of your clients. It’s important to understand your client’s mindset, the worldview of the people you work for and their values, problems and needs. It’s what separates you and allows you to position yourself as an expert consultant and reliably solve the problems of your clients. Liston’s company is called Goodfunnel . The company focuses on copywriting, and three things in particular - customer ...
Dec 07, 2015•42 min•Ep. 44
Today’s guest is Naveen Dittakavi. We had a great conversation about how his business has evolved and how important it is to overcome the belief that just because you’ve read something you’re making an improvement. In actuality, you have to act on what you’ve learned to make a difference. Naveen started his software business company in 2003 out of his dorm room at Georgia Tech and today he teaches software freelancers how to build recurring revenue. Today’s highlights include: How Naveen began f...
Nov 16, 2015•38 min•Ep. 43
Taking the time to understand yourself, and manipulating your strengths to get your message out can sometimes be all it takes to push yourself over the edge, and into full-blown success. Today we’re focusing on how to have an authentic brand and establish your brand identity, so you can do just that. Our guest today is Jeffrey Shaw. He’s a business coach, and he excels in, and focuses on how companies like ours can avoid being generalists. When you generalize your position in the market, you mak...
Nov 09, 2015•43 min•Ep. 42
Today we’re having a crazy interview, but in the best way. We’ll be talking to Julia Kelly, she’s a caricature artist, and the first one we’ve had on the show. She also has a degree in Accounting, so she loves the numbers side of things. We go through how she and her team charge hundreds of dollars an hour for caricature art, and all the ins and outs of her work and business strategy. She’s applied everything I cover on the website and podcast when it comes to value based pricing and price ancho...
Oct 21, 2015•41 min•Ep. 41
Today I have part two of my interview with the amazing Sean D’Souza. We needed to go deeper into the 7 bag framework that Sean’s developed that covers the 7 objectives that need to happen prior to a successful sale. In this interview, we dove deeper into all of this. I really wanted to get his perspectives on how to use the principles that were so foundational for my own businesses and tailor them to people like you: freelancers and consultants. More and more companies are making the same fundam...
Oct 14, 2015•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 40
Today is the first episode of a two-part edition with Sean D’Souza. Sean’s book, The Brain Audit , had a big impact on me as well as countless others. The Brain Audit is designed to give somebody the tools to understand what goes on in the brain of a customer and how to respond accordingly. It includes the Seven Red Bags which is a sequential process to move the customer through various stages. We take a look at the principles of the book and how freelancers can benefit from Sean’s information. ...
Oct 07, 2015•37 min•Ep. 39
The Double Your Freelancing Conference that took place last month In Norfolk brought a lot of great people together to share information and ideas. In this episode, 5 of the speakers from the conference join me to discuss what value they got from the conference and their overall impressions. The Panel: Mojca Mars - owner of Super Spicy Media, social media consultant Brian Casel - owner of Audience Ops, content marketing service Julie Elster - owner of Just Tell Julie, virtual accounts receivable...
Sep 30, 2015•32 min•Ep. 38
My good friend Paul Jarvis is my guest on this episode of the Business of Freelancing Podcast. Paul began as a web designer and applied what he learned in his work to writing for creative freelancers looking to better run their businesses. Today we discuss building products, especially for those freelancers who may not have a huge audience and a solid idea for a product. Paul has authored numerous wildly-popular books designed for a particular audience. Paul’s product training wheels involved a ...
Sep 14, 2015•39 min•Ep. 37
More and more freelancers have taken to becoming nomads who live and work a location- independent lifestyle. My guest, Paul Kortman, is a nomad who travels with his wife and four children and runs a digital marketing consulting business from various locations. On this episode Paul offers some thoughts on this lifestyle and how to make your business work in a non-traditional setting. Paul believes that if you want to pursue the life of a nomad there are a number of things you can do to help make ...
Sep 07, 2015•50 min•Ep. 36
Welcome to the Business of Freelancing Podcast. Today I am talking to Nick Disabato, a good friend who is the founder of Draft Revise . As well as the author of Cadence & Slang , a guide to interaction design. Draft Revise is a service that helps companies optimize their content. Nick and I are going to discuss the company he’s built, how he’s done it, and what advice he has for those wanting to get into productizing. Nick is the go-to-guy for productize consulting. Productizing Consulting i...
Aug 27, 2015•40 min•Ep. 35
Our guest will be one of the speakers at our Norfolk, VA for the Business of Freelancing Conference this September. Kai Davis is an expert in building up an audience from scratch; building up your authority and targeting the clients you want to work with. If you’re looking to build an audience on your own you will love this episode. In this episode, Kai explains the answer to the most important question any businessman asks himself. Who is my audience? And how are they related to an average free...
Aug 03, 2015•59 min•Ep. 34
Welcome to the latest episode on Business of Freelancing. One of my favorite things to do on my show is bring in niche experts, the kind of experts who are amazing at building a freelancing business and who can teach you how to get better clients. On today’s episode, I uncover what clients are thinking when they start hiring freelancers. I find out why some hire the way they hire and why they turn away certain candidates. I interview Dave Nevogt, co-founder of HubStaff.com – a team management pl...
Jul 20, 2015•40 min•Ep. 33
Welcome to Episode 31 of The Business of Freelancing Podcast. Today I’m very excited to bring on my good friend Mojca Mars. Mojca will be a speaker at the Double Your Freelancing Conference in September, and I will be working with her personally in the near future as well. Mojca had a quick start to her current consulting agency, Super Spicy Media , by getting those initial first customers via Twitter. Now she says that the majority of her customers actually still come from Twitter and the engag...
Jul 13, 2015•34 min•Ep. 32
