Financial Feminist - 300. How to Take Back Your Financial Power (Tori's Interview on the Jasmine Star Show)

Episode Date: September 22, 2026

Ready to take control of your money and finally start investing? Visit ⁠⁠https://herfirst100k.com/ffpod⁠ to register for our FREE workshop, Stock Market Secrets: Debunking Common Myths for Successful Investing to learn how to avoid common mistakes and how to build wealth without fear or confusion.  Today's episode is a little different from our normal format. It's my conversation with Jasmine Star on The Jasmine Star Show, and we're sharing it here because it goes deep into something I don't usually get asked about on my own show: the actual business mechanics behind Her First $100K. We talk about the $49 coaching sessions that started it all, the money story I inherited from my parents (and had to unlearn), the exact logic I used the night before I quit my job, and why "done is better than perfect" has become my whole content philosophy. If you're building something of your own, or thinking about it, this one's for you. Jasmine’s links: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jasminestar  Website :https://jasminestar.com/  00:00   Intro & the story behind the name "Her First $100K" 02:25   Documenting the money journey publicly — and why that built accountability 04:27   Rebranding to Her First $100K, and her dad's reaction 06:30   The $49 coaching sessions that started it all 08:01   From coaching, to a $97 workshop, to a course 10:30  Tori's money story: safety, risk, and her parents' fear 14:19  Why women are conditioned to avoid risk 15:35  The night before she quit her job 18:54  "Give your dollars a job": the psychology of scaling income 24:21  Her First $100K's revenue model today 28:33  What's stayed the same (consistency) vs. what she let go of 31:58  Building an email list early, and current team structure 33:53  What Tori loves doing vs. what she's delegated 42:04  The "chin video" strategy: why imperfect content wins 44:54  "Done is better than perfect": hiring, imperfection, 2026 content trends 50:05  Owning success without performing false humility Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you have built something of your realm, whether that's a business, a side hustle, or a following, but you still feel like you're winging it when it comes to actually running the business and managing the money coming in? Let's talk in today's episode. A few months ago, I sat down with Jasmine Starr, who's an entrepreneur and business strategist for an episode of her show, and I thought this one was so fitting for an audience here too. We talked not just how her first 100K actually makes money, including our eight different

revenue streams. And if you've ever wondered why I don't really call myself a creator, even though I post every day or how I decide what content is actually worth making versus what's a waste of my time. We're talking about that in this episode. And if you started to consider scaling your business past just to you to bring on a team, we're also chatting about that today. But one more thing before we get into it. Investing can feel really impossible until someone explains it to you clearly and easily. And that's why I created a free investing workshop. I am teaching it live today and tomorrow, September 22nd and 23rd. It is our stock market secrets workshop. We're going deep into actually how to

start investing, how the stock market works, and the strategies I've used to build my own wealth. There is no jargon, no gatekeeping, and no pretending you need a finance degree to understand any of this. We're removing so many of the barriers that stop women from investing and growing their wealth in the first place because we know that investing is the best way to protect you, your family, and your financial future. Over 200,000 women have joined. It is free. There is no reason to not get your butt there. And there's a link to register at her first hundredk.com slash FF Pod. I'll see you there. Now, my conversation with Jasmine. But first, a word from our sponsors. I think in the year of our Lord 2026, everybody needs a website. Maybe you're a business owner, maybe you're a

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of a website or domain. There's so much content out there. It's hard to know where to turn to get real information. I know you're listening to this podcast because you love to learn. I'm the same way. and that's one of the reasons why I and my team have used Masterclass for the past couple of years. Unlike other learning platforms, Masterclass puts you in the room with the people who defined their fields. So they aren't just experts, but they're the best in the world. There's over 200 classes across 13 different categories. So you can watch a business class at one moment, but then like a class about cooking and then a class about wellness. With plans just starting at 10 bucks a month billed annually, it's a really, really easy way to fit your learning into any schedule.

and there's no risk because every new membership comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Masterclass keeps adding new classes, so there's never been a better time to get in. Right now, as a listener of this show, you get at least 15% off any annual membership at masterclass.com slash ffpod. That's 15% off at masterclass.com slash ff pod. Head to masterclass.com slash ff pod to see the latest offer. Let's talk about money and other taboo things. Entrepreneurs like to say we talk about and keep a lot of the things behind. the scene. Not today. We are talking with the financial feminist, her first 100K, a person who I have

watched from a distance and expand beyond entrepreneurship, beyond personal finance, and really stepped up as a voice for people to be represented in the financial markets. I couldn't be more excited to have on the podcast, Ms. Porry Dunlap. So excited to be here. Thanks for having me. I am happy you're here. I am so heavy you here. Okay. So right before we started, I had said, I see the podcast happening into acts. But oftentimes on the podcast, it takes its own. Okay. So in the beginning, I really want to talk about personal finance. Great. People who are watching and listening, entrepreneurship, we want to talk about money. And one of the things that initially struck me was her first 100K. That is your Instagram handle. And I heard a story about how you set out to document you getting your first 100K.

And I want to tear apart a little bit of those details. So let's start with the beginning and then I like to dig in for the story elements. Yeah. So in 2016, I graduated. to college with degrees in communication and theater. So I did not study finance. I did not study business. And I thought, okay, I'm going to work my way up the corporate ladder in marketing. That was the dream. So I was going to stomp the pavement and have my little like briefcase and my pencil skirt. And that's how I know it's a fantasies. I've never worn a pencil skirt. And my gosh, dang long. Have you, have you carried a briefcase though? I don't think so. No, I don't know if anybody does that anymore. But that was the vision. Like I was going to girl boss my way up to

VP of marketing by 30. Graduated college got into jobs and realized very quickly, especially with my first job, that I was in a very misogynistic work environment. Like, I was in a environment of just a lot of toxic culture where there was open bars at every office. And like just, I was watching other friends of mine who were women get passed over for opportunities. And like, male superiors were saying just weird, you know, sexually harassment stuff to me. And I was like, this is not what I dreamt of doing for 35 years because I was 22 and I was like, what am I going to do with the rest of my life? And also a lot of things are happening politically at that time. And so I just kind of started asking, what kind of person do I want to be? What do I want to build both for myself and that also makes an

impact? And I was a friend, all of my friends were coming to for advice and guidance around money. Because? Because I had a great financial education for my parents. So my parents were really diligent because they both didn't grow up with a lot to make sure that I knew, here's how to not overspend on credit cards, here's how to save money. And I just took that for granted because that was all I had known. I thought, oh, everybody knows how to do this until I realized, of course that's not the case.

But I was also becoming obsessed with learning everything I could about personal finance because when that job got even more toxic, I couldn't quit because I needed the money. I had to stay. And I think that's most people is, I want to leave a situation or I want to do this, or I want to take this opportunity, but I can't. And the reason I can't is because I can't afford it. And so I realized that maybe that was the impact I could start making, both in my own life, but also in the women around me and talking more about money.

So her first 100K was my journey to save $100,000 at age 25, but it had nothing to do with the money, really. Like, yeah, it was cool seeing $100,000 in my bank account, but it was about, freedom. And it was about options and it was about choices. And that's what I really am committed to with our work at her first 100K is the money, learning how debt works, learning how investing works, all of that is of course crucial and important. But our Y here is so much bigger than cash in a bank. It is about options. And so I saved my 100K at 25. I was able to quit my job to run her first 100K. So what did the documentation process look like? If you're like, I'm going to save 100K,000, perform 25,

What are you saying? What are you putting out? Talk to me about that beginning journey. There's a lot of people who have a mission or an impression of purpose on their heart and they want to do something big. And then they stop themselves or they keep small. What was your approach? Well, I'll tell you a funny story. So when I decided, A, I'm going to try to do this big thing that I didn't even know I could do. It was like, I'm sure you're the same way. I was like, I'm going to set a goal that feels a little scary because that's the only way that we actually grow. Yes. So I set this goal in probably 2017. 2018, I switched jobs, ended up being even more toxic, had to quit after 10 weeks without another job lined up. So then I spent three months unemployed, but I had an emergency fund at that time. So I was able to leave, able to live off of that. But I remember not saving any money because I wasn't making any money. And then spending the money I had saved and being like, oh, can I do this? And I had not announced it publicly at that point. But what that taught me was, one, of course, that money meant freedom, but also two, there is something to the documentation of it that makes you accountable to that thing. And I think that scares people, of course, sometimes of like, oh, what, whatever? if it doesn't happen. So 2019, I rebranded my business to her first 100K. And my dad called me up. When you say your business, though, we lily padded. Yes. So talk to me about the start of your business. Sure. So I was doing like blog. This was like peak tumbler era. Do you remember this in like 20 10? Yes. So I was like, oh, I want to do, I want to, I want to be a blog for 20 something women. And I had already talked in college about doing this and just kept kicking it down the can. And it was like, no, now's the time. So 2016,

it was like December 27th, 2016, I like literally put $20 towards a domain and $20 towards like a Squarespace subscription. And I was like, okay, I've launched this blog with like three blog posts. And then I was starting to grow it over time. And I would talk about like travel or I'd talk about career or I'd talk about, you know, my own struggles or challenges trying to progress in my career. But all of it ended up being about money and all of my conversations with other friends and with other people in the space were about, what are you making? How are you negotiating?

Oh, you got that flight deal. How did you get it? So when we rebranded to her first 100K, it was much more clear, A, this is about money, but B, this is for a specific group of people, women, obviously, and not your first million,

not your first hundred million, right? This is for the people just getting started. So you get the domain, you get the Squarespace, you put the three blog posts out. When do you start making money? Took me about two and a half years.

So you were blogging, and creating for two and a half years. And then when did somebody pay you and what was it for? Yeah. I mean, I was doing social media in my nine to five. I had like freelance social media clients where I was making money through that kind of business. But the first time I really made money teaching people about money was coaching, which I

think is how a lot of us get started. It was me literally for $49. I would sit down with you. And a lot of times it was local in Seattle. It was like, go to our store. Starbucks sit down for $49. We create a budget together. I explain what a Roth IRA is.

We look at like where your leaks are in your budget, where you're spending money. And, you know, we might meet once. We might meet three times. But I think that was the first thousand or so dollars I made in the business was just... $49. $49. And when you got that first client, what did you think? What do you feel?

Because I think that people can look at your business now. I mean... Oh, it's, yeah, it's very different. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it felt obviously very euphoric, but it was also, it was very quickly not scalable. Right. And I think that is the trap that a lot of people get in is if you're able to start a business.

And it's usually for women, it's a lot of teaching. Like, we're good teachers. And so the coaching was fun. And then I remember when the first time I sold a 10 coaching package, like a 10 slot package. And that was like, a couple thousand dollars. And I was like, oh, this is so much money. I was like, I still remember that so vividly. And that was like early 2019. And I was starting to make more money than I was making in my 9 to 5 job. So what I said was, okay, this coaching is no longer scalable or really sustainable long term. So then I took most of what was happening in coaching sessions and created a workshop out of it. Because 90% of the conversations were very similar. It was, how do I control my spending? How do I mindfully spend money on things I actually like. What is the game plan? What do I do in which order?

So then that became a $97 workshop. So I could teach it one time to, you know, dozens of people. Eventually probably doing that for a year. That no longer became sustainable. So that became a course. So now we're talking like two, three years in this, right? Okay, but hang on. Yeah. I want to am I going too fast. I'm not going too fast. Are you kidding me? Like, no, no, people think that you talk to you fast, they just listen slow. So what I want to do now, though, is I want to dovetail what's happening here because when people hear $49, $97 workshop, multiple workshops, digital course, there's a lot of lily padding. And for the vast majority of people who are either getting similar results or not, the money beliefs behind it are parling.

And so because I know you and I know a lot of your story, can we pause there? That's the lynchpin. That's what good podcasters say is like a cliffhanger. Let's go back to your childhood. Let's go back to your money stories. Let's go back to how you learned about it and the narrative that it's creating as you build a business. And we're going to come back to the business. But I want to get into money stories. Yeah. I spend so much of my work talking about this because, like I said, at the beginning, people think it is about numbers.

And it's about spreadsheets. And it's about being good at math. I majored in theater, Jasmine. Like, this is not, I'm not out here. Like, looking at spreadsheets all the time and doing intense calculations. It was all psychological. So what I learned from my parents is remarkably simple but effective, which is you're never spending more than you have. And you are thinking strategically about when and how you spend money.

So my parents were never big restaurant people. Like if we did go out to a restaurant, it was you're drinking water and there's no appetizers, right? That was like, I don't think I looked at the advertiser menu until I was in my 20s, like ever. And the reason they did that is because we took a family vacation. every year. Like, I went to Europe when I was 13. Like, I'm really lucky to have been able to do that, but because my parents were strategic, they were like, okay, we can't afford absolutely everything, but there's plenty of things that we can save strategically for. The interesting thing, though, is that when there was talks of me becoming an entrepreneur, my parents freaked out.

Because they always made the safe financial choice. They were always always, the we get the 401k, we get the stable paycheck. And I'm very thankful for it because it gave me a very stable childhood. But as soon as there was talks about me going out of my own, I think especially in my mid-20s, like my parents were like, you need to do anything you have to to keep your job, even when my business was growing. So that was the first money story that seems positive on paper, right? Like make the smart decision, how that stable paycheck, get your, commiserate raises every two years, but I wanted so much more than that. And I knew that my earning potential was pretty much infinite, but it was very controlled when I was working for

somebody that, A, I didn't respect, and B, wasn't going to respect me in the way that I wanted to. It is challenging being a business owner. I say that as someone who is trying to run a business and trying to do all of the things all at once to take care of our team and to make sure that we're tracking all of our customers correctly. You probably know NetSuite. They are a business management suite that securely connects all of your data. It's a unified suite that brings your financials, inventory, commerce, HR, and CRM all into one single source of truth.

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Okay, so your money story is good on paper. Yes. And your parents did the best they could with what they had. But the narrative that started off as the safe and secure was also something that was going to keep you safe and secure and stuck. Yes. So my earliest memories, my, we lost our home. My parents, I remember as a young child, probably four or five, they cut up their credit cards in front of somebody to help them learn how to plan my. So my dad, I'm a first generation Latina.

Yeah. So in, like, my money story is whatever you get, you hoard. Yes. Because there's not much. Very common. Very common in an immigrant story as well. Yeah. And so I think that what happened with that. And so then my parents, after cutting their credit cards, my dad would get his paycheck.

And then he would put cash in white envelopes. Yes. And whatever, if the cash was not in that envelope, then you were not going out to eat or we had to make do with the groceries that were there. Yep. And so it became as like this thing that was finite. Yeah. Like I walked with a whole perspective of there is a white.

envelope, and if there's not money in that white envelope, there's no way of getting it. We have to wait. And so as I got into building a business, it was like, hoard, hoard. And like this idea of reinvesting or taking strategic risk was so foreign to me that I had to unpack that story. So let's talk about how you're unpacking the story as you start your career. Yeah. That concept of risk is one we talk about at her first 100K a lot because we are told as women to not take risks. So even something... Why do you think that's the case? Oh, there has been so many studies. I think about the girls who code founder.

She has a great TED talk where she talks about, we teach boys to be, I think it's like brave, and we teach girls to be perfect. And so men, starting in childhood, boys, right? It's like, yeah, jump off the play set. And like, if you skin your knee, whatever, right? It's adventurous and it's taking risks. And I talk about this in my book even.

Like, the stereotypically, the toys we give boys, right, are like Legos or trucks or things to build. What do we give girls? Dolls. We give them dolls. We give them easy bake ovens. We give them bridal veils, right? From a very young age,

we are told what our value is to the society, which is take care of everybody's needs above your own. And also be perfect, which, by the way, is, of course, impossible. So we are chasing this impossible ideal. I think for my parents, in addition, I believe that they have often viewed the world as a scary place. So if we can just keep our head down and if we can make safe choices, then we will be safe.

And so as I started wanting more, that felt very risky, both to them and to me. I was on the precipice in 2019 of quitting my job. I had my 100K in the bank. I had announced my 100K goal. I had my cute little hundred balloons, you know. Well, good morning America had picked up my story. Like, I was on top of the world. It was feeling really, really great.

And the company I was at freaked out about it. Like that I was getting all of this media coverage and they weren't. It was rough. And it became very clear to me. I think now is the time to try to take this business full time. And I wanted to wait another six months after I had already told myself, Tori, if you get your 100K, you get to quit. But I was like, no, we can just wait like six more months.

because again, and my brain is going, yeah, but you don't have enough money yet, or you don't have the connections yet, or like, what if, what if this doesn't work out? No, the job that you were currently at was that social media? Yeah. Oh, so they see you getting a big social media push. Uh-huh. Yeah. Okay.

I don't talk about too much of it, but, you know, it's very interesting when you as a 24-year-old, 25-year-old woman are threatening to the men in their 40s who are on their fourth company. Very interesting. But I'm a petty bitch, by the way, Jasmine. That isn't obvious. I'm just like, mm-hmm. But I was having conversations with my parents and my well-meaning parents who had always chosen the safe option were like, again, you need to do everything you have to do to keep this job. And I was like, I don't think this is it anymore. Quit my job. Ended up being the best financial decision I ever made. And the logic I had during that time. Take me back to the day.

Oh. Like you quit and then take me back to one week after you quit. You wake up. Yep. And What are you doing? What are you thinking? How does Tori view the world then? Yeah. I actually took a video my last day of work because I quit and I gave my two weeks and all of that, you know? And I remember literally staring at myself in the mirror and I was like, you can do this. As cheesy as that sounds. Literally stood tears in my eyes, looked at myself in the mirror and were like, you can do this. And the logic I had, because at that point, it was like logicking my way to feeling good about this. If I could get that much work done in my business, working about 20 hours a week on it, imagine what I could do with 40 hours or 50, especially during that first period of time. Like, imagine if I was dedicating all of my time to this. Like, I'm already getting so much done.

Imagine what happens if I go all in. And this is the one gift I was actually really generous. to get from that company. My direct boss was great. And we had a very honest conversation like the day before I quit where he was like, entrepreneur to entrepreneur, you have money in the bank, you have momentum in your business.

And like, what's the worst that can happen? You go back and you get another job. Right. And I think it's so crucial for women who are on the precipice of what feels like a big risk to ask yourself, like, what actually is the worst that can happen? The worst that could have.

happen truly is, I don't know, I spend a year of my life on this business and maybe I drain part or all of my 100K and I go back and get another job. And I have a year's worth of great entrepreneurship experience on my resume. Like that was the worst that could happen. And instead, the best happened, which is a multimillion dollar company that impacts five million women every single day that has helped them escape violent abusive marriages, that has helped them pay off their debt that has helped them start businesses, that has helped them just feel better because they're no longer stressed about money. And that's the upside. But we spend all of this time thinking about, oh my gosh, what if, what if this doesn't work out? What if I fail? Yeah. Yeah,

what if? But also, what if all of the good things happen? So one of the things that I had heard you mention is a large part of your work is not teaching people how to save $100,000, $500,000, a million, A lot of it is starting at the very beginning and uncoupling because you've worked with a lot of people who you set a budget and then they stick with it and then there's like this like spin-off. Talk to me about that because there's entrepreneurs that for the first time in their lives are making their own money and they're like great, great, great, great, great, I am going to budget.

I have more. I can do more. And then what happens? What do you see? And then how are people looking right now, entrepreneurs, we're like, okay, I think I have 65,000. I can get to 100,000. Yep.

Let me learn how to budget from Tori and then what happens. Cast a vision of the future. Yes. everything you said is true. Money is psychological, but we want to think it's numbers based. But if you are making especially more money than you've ever made in your life, and I'm not even talking millions, I'm just talking like $10,000 more money than you're used to. That's right. If you can manage $30,000, you can manage $30 million. Like that's the truth. But if you don't understand what your emotional and psychological triggers are, all of this will disappear way faster than you want it to. So what I usually

ask on my show is what is your first money memory? And you already answered it for me, which was so cool, which was I watched my dad hoard money and be very diligent about splitting it into envelopes. So that tells me a couple of things. One that tells me every dollar has a job, which I think is a great thing. Every dollar should have a job. Absolutely. This is something that I see so many people who start making a little bit more money they fail to do is they're like, okay, cool, now I don't have to look at my money as much. Because when you're not making as much, you're hypervigilant, right? But then once you start making, let's say, $100,000, $150, 200, it's like, oh, I don't have to check this all the time. And that's one of the worst traps you can get into because suddenly your money is controlling

you rather than you controlling it. So give your dollars a job. The other thing that is so common. Pause. When you say give your dollars a job, in the past, I've heard you say, this goes for utilities. This goes for investment. Give me like a nutshell version of give your dollars a job. Yes. When we're thinking about the money that comes in, you need to know where it's coming in. What are your sources of income? Whether you're a nine to five or, but especially if you're an entrepreneur, because hopefully you have multiple sources of income. So you need to know your numbers very clearly. You need to know, this is what's coming in. This is how much I get paid. These are the terms of those payments. And here's where the money is going out. So am I spending money on

things that I don't really care about or that feel mindless, right? And this is where, a lot of the misogyny and personal finance starts kicking in, where it's like, the reason you're not rich is because of the latte. No, it's systemic oppression. And also, you notice that the things that are demonized are like inherently like feminine spending. The lattes, the makeup, the blowouts at the salon, the manicures, right? It's not NFL season tickets. It's not golf clubs.

It's not video games, right? So I'm not in any way demonizing spending. But if you are spending your money on things that you don't give it about, that's your hard earned money. You worked hard for it. You need to be prioritizing your spending to what you actually value. So when we say give a dollar a job, what we mean is that no dollar is just hanging out doing nothing, right?

It's either going to our present day expenses, our past expenses, debt, right? Or our future expenses. Retirement, buying a house, buying a business, or starting a business. or starting a business, right? The things that you need to plan strategically for. Getting married, right? I call it the big stuff. So every dollar needs to have a job in that way.

Oh, so good. And I would also recommend not putting it in envelopes, which is actually something we also see like a ton. This is a larger conversation, but we have a massive under or unbanked population in the United States. Yes. Largely from immigrant communities who don't trust banks, which you can't really blame them.

Right. But, like, you need to be using the financial tools at your disposal to make more money. High yield savings accounts, which are just like everyday savings accounts, except they're offering you more money. Investing, this is something I see with women over and over again, is they don't invest their money because they want to see it all. They keep it in their checking account. They keep it in a savings account. It doesn't have the opportunity to grow because of that risk, right? They're worried about risk. They're worried about losing money. This is what you have to do if you actually want to take care of yourself in

the long term financially. Oh, so good. One of the most overwhelming parts about being a business owner is the admin. Oh my gosh. The payroll, the HR. They're the things that you don't realize you're going to have to do when you first start a business, the things that are often overlooked. But as soon as you realize you have to do them, you're like, can't somebody just make this easier?

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ffpod and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash ff pod. One more time, Gusto, dot com slash ff pod. Okay, so I kind of pivoted us there just to clarify where every dollar goes. No, it was so helpful. And so we used the story narrative of the frame that you had as you built your business and you took these risks and you go back to like the worst case scenario. And you said, I accept the worst case scenario.

It ended up being the best case scenario. Wildly popular New York Times bestselling book, multi-seven figure business. And so you have these things and you've worked through money stories. You've empowered other women to work through their money stories to first identify that. And then that would then be like the linchpin that will connect them to their ultimate outcome. So we kind of had a brief history of the business. So coaching one-on-one. Coaching in groups.

Coaching in a course. And then you had said that it's really important as an entrepreneur that you know your revenue streams. Yeah. So let's talk about the business of your business. Yeah. Do you want it now or back in the day? Let's go to now. Because I think that we can kind of dovetail.

like we have the starting point. Yeah. And that we go from $49 back in the day to something entirely different today. What is the today? Because there's somebody watching right now. They're like, if I can get $49 to teach somebody about this meal kind of finance. Okay, great. Yeah. But then cast a vision for what somebody who's technically unqualified, unfunded, uneducated in this to do this. Yeah. I think the $49 was so crucial for me because one, I was not ready emotionally or with the background. Like I didn't have. have the credibility yet to charge somebody $500, right? But I also needed that period of time to build my own skills. And I think this is the thing that so many want to be entrepreneurs or starter entrepreneurs don't understand is you're not just selling a product to make money. You're selling

a product to beta test, not just the material, but like your own confidence. So, you know, that was probably too cheap. But I was willing to do that because I was like, I need to grow. in my skill set to be able to know how to teach this properly. And I could see live, right, if I'm coaching you, I know when something's connected with you, or I know when it hasn't. And then I need to figure out, how do I explain it differently? So then I have five ways to explain something so that hopefully one of those is something somebody understands. And then when I get more credibility, then I can raise the price and then I can do more. And all of those coaching sessions, a lot of that course became the thesis of my book. Like so many things I was doing in 2019 that I was testing

in real time with people were the basis of my book. So I think that's one thing if you're trying to figure out how to scale the company. You're not just scaling this in 2019. When does the book drop? What year? 2020, end of 2022. So almost 2023. About three years of gestation and ideology and reps. Yes. Like you're doing the reps. We're doing the reps. Exactly. And it's, Also, again, how do I be different? Because that's the other thing I'm sure you and I hear a ton of. I know I hear it is like, oh, but a million other people are doing the kind of business I want to do, right? And it's like, the reason you're putting in your reps is so you can figure out how do I communicate this in a way where the information might not be new, but the way you communicate it is.

There weren't a lot of people talking about money in a very feminist way at that time, especially. And like that is what made me stand out is I could talk about money, but in a way that wasn't jargon heavy, that wasn't like bro-y, just felt like we're sitting down at brunch together. But also I'm going to talk about like, how do we fight the patriarchy by getting rich? Which is like one of our taglines. So now the business, I mean, it's obviously expanded. But a lot of what we started off with is also what we're still teaching. So we have eight sources of revenue at her first 100K.

some programs. So, you know, we're teaching women how to invest through our stock market school, which has $135 million invested, which I'm so proud of. We're not just like teaching concepts. We actually have women bridging wealth gaps. And I'm teaching them step by step how to invest. So that's like one of our signature programs. We have brand deals that we work with, you know, more straight influencer partnerships, but also affiliate deals where, you know, if you sign up for a link, I recommend, you, we're going to get a kickback from that. I speak on stages all over. We have our podcast that makes money that's newly independent, which we're really proud of. Thank you. The book continues to, you know, make passive revenue for us.

So there's a lot of different revenue streams, but all of it is back to, yeah, how do we educate women about money in a way that feels both accessible, but also so much bigger than personal finance and is more about true self-care, which is if I can take my financial education seriously, how can my entire life change? And so when you go back, back 2019, 2020. Yep. Because you're active on social media

and you have millions of followers. What has been the same? I'm going to ask it to you three ways. It's kind of like the keep stop. Yeah. Yeah.

Thank you. See? I'll just make it up. I just make it up. So what do you think? What's one thing that you've stayed doing since then that has continued

to prove itself? Everybody's going to hate this answer. I'm sorry. It's true. I stayed consistent. Like, I don't hate that. That's what I've been saying. Y'all, y'all.

That's what I've been saying. I post all the time. We post all the time. Everybody's different versions. I ask people every day. I post all the time and it's like twice a week. Every day. We post every day. Yeah. And sometimes multiple times a day, especially on Instagram. And one thing that we did really well then that we continue to do really well now is we find the platform that's working for us and we invest all of our time there. That is a mistake. I see so many new entrepreneurs make is it's like, remember Clubhouse? You remember that for like a second? Oh, do I? Like that's the perfect example of like what's the hot thing? Like, what's the sexy thing? And then everybody went over there. And, like, yeah, maybe that was the next TikTok or Instagram. Maybe. But as soon as you start trying to be everything to everybody in too many places at once,

you're nothing to nobody. Like, it's just so hard to do that. So I figured out where is my audience. Okay, they're women. They're largely millennials with, like, a little bit on either side. They're on Instagram. Like, that's where they're hanging out. They're, I don't know.

They're not really on Facebook anymore. That's where they're at. So I'm going to double down on Instagram, and that's what I did. Yeah, we care a little bit about the other platforms, too, but still Instagram is our biggest revenue driver by far. Oh, by far. I agree. So what you've carried throughout the years, consistency. Yep. What were you doing in 2019 that you stopped? That's a great question. I think that one of the biggest things we stopped doing is thinking about me being a one-to-one with people in our audience. So as we scaled, it,

started to become impossible for me to be one-on-one with people, both like literally one-on-one, but thinking about individuals rather than how can I help as many people as possible. Now, we help, especially in our programs, more finite groups of people, I think, do bigger things and be able to, you know, we just dedicate more time to them there. But it's so easy as you start growing to feel like it's kind of getting out of control. Like, oh my gosh, there's so many people. And it's just like, so your frame of mind has to grow to. And the thing I tell my team all the time, like, they care so much and they want to like answer all the emails that come through like our contact at inbox. And every about six months, I have to tell them, hey, we have five million people here.

And I know that's hard to contextualize. So biggest football stadium in the United States is 100,000 people. We have 50 football stadiums of people. That's a lot of people. And we cannot continue to help as many people as we want to help if we are so laser focused on just helping a couple. And I think that was one transition that we had to make, both in order for us to scale, but also in order for our message to continue spreading throughout the world. How big is your team? I want to pause.

I want to repeat back. Yes. So the thing that you've continued to do is consistency. And what you stopped doing was what you let go. was the attention to the one-on-one, and then what you decided to do was, in order to grow, which was your growth point, we have to say, what isn't the best service of the masses? Instead of serving one football stadium, we're going to serve 50. And I'll also say one thing that we did that was really crucial at that time, learning from people like you and Jenna Coucher and Amy Porterfield.

Even though we are a social media focused business, I do not consider myself a creator. There's other people who do what I do who are like creator-first businesses. I was getting people on an email list way back in like 2018, 2019, because I was listening to all y'all who were like, this is land you do not own. So the thing I am very proud of as a business owner is although as we've continued to scale on social, we've also continued to scale on email.

And I always think about a customer journey funnel, not just like, how do I get Instagram followers? But how do I turn any top of funnel people into customers or into supporters on land I own or in places where I can be more present for them than what the algorithm is going to dictate I can be. Oh, that's so good. So how many people are on your team? We have six full-time W-2s, and then I believe we have 10 contractors.

So we're about 16, 17 people at this point. And on an average day, and I know if your days look anything like mine, they never look to see. They're never average, yeah. But like what might, like, where do you find your business? spending most of the time in the business. And I'm going to ask that in two parts. Where are you spending most of the time in the business with stuff that lights you up that is like needle mover? And then I am doing this and I can't stand it. I love it. You're business coaching me right now.

I have a theater background. So I love doing this. I feel so at home on a stage in front of 5,000 people. Like I love that. I love being on stage. I love teaching, especially to larger groups of people because it's like, ooh, I get to try out my stand-up material. And I'll So like it's just, it's so fun for me. And I love that. I also love tinkering. And by that I mean the marketing side of my brain, right? The theater part of my brain loves to perform and teach and be on stage. And the marketing part of my brain is like, ooh, what levers can I pull? Like I, my brand director Amanda thinks the same way I do. And we talk about levers all the time, which is like, if I try this one different thing, what does that lead to? If I try a different CTA on this

Instagram caption, what does that lead to? If we send out, two emails for this launch a day instead of one, what happens? And what do we learn from it? And I have gamified our business so much. And that especially is something that I encourage every entrepreneur to do, which is view money and your revenue as a game. Now, I don't mean that in a way of like, don't take it seriously because these are people's livelihoods. This is serious business. But I mean, oh, I'm 10 days away from the end of the month. And I'm at $46,000. How do I make $4,000 extra dollars to get to 50 with the remaining days I have? Like that sort of stuff I just love, which are what levers can we pull to get where we want to be?

That just is so fun for me. The stuff I don't like is a lot of the stuff I've outsourced. And like that's how we scale. So my CIO, Karina, is fantastic. We joke with more theater metaphors that if I'm on stage, she's the stage manager in the back. So while I'm here in California with you, she is holding down the first. fort in Seattle. She's doing the taxes and the ops and the financial stuff that is not fun for me that I'm actually not really great at. Like, I'm good at making money, but I don't want to figure out

what I owe Nebraska for this year in taxes. Like, it's just not fun for me, but she loves that kind of organization. I think the point or the space I'm still in that I don't love as much is sometimes people management. Like, I am, I think I could be better at that. if I had more time to dedicate to it. So one of the things we've done is that Karina and other team members are people who manage most of the rest of our team. And we did that strategically. And, you know, there's just sometimes where you wake up and you don't want to record your podcast today. Amen.

And you don't want to be on. And like I've worked now with my podcast producer like four years. This literally happened before I left in Seattle. We were batching for like two months. And I was doing the thing. that like I wasn't even conscious of. I was just asking her a bunch of questions about a bunch of shit that didn't matter.

And that was my way of stalling. Because I didn't want to do it. And she knows me well enough. And she was like, hey, Tori, we gotta get this done. And I'm like, yeah, you can call me out. That's fine. And like, you know, we just, I sucked it up buttercup and it was fine.

But yeah, there's sometimes where, when you run a very public business, there's sometimes I love being on. And there's other times where I don't want to put on makeup today. Like, I don't want to perform. form today. And I think that is the balance sometimes of showing up so publicly. I'm trying to simplify my life. I make a lot of decisions in my everyday life. And I want to look cute without having to spend hours curating my wardrobe. And for years, Quince has been my

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getting new clients. We did our first ever website with Squarespace, and it is still the platform that we recommend. The best part about Squarespace is you can do a bunch of stuff inside of it. So yeah, it's a website tool, but you can also send emails, you can sell content, you have your analytic tools all in one so you don't have to like pay for a million different platforms. And when my partner needed a website to launch his business, this is where we turned. I literally helped him set up his Squarespace and we had his beautiful website all done in a weekend. Head on over to Squarespace.com for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code FFPod to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Talk to me about the creation cycle for how you do show up

every day. Yeah. What does that look like? Are you batching your content the way you are with your podcast or is it a lot more organic creation? It is a lot more organic. That is one thing that it is kind of a do as I say, not as I do. I do really recommend batching content when you can, especially when you're a newbie entrepreneur and you have a bunch of things you have to do and you're a team of one. our social is much more dynamic at this point because sometimes it's responding to something that happened in the news or sometimes it is, you know, I thought of an idea. Like the Instagram Carousel I posted this morning, I thought of last night, built it last night, had it prepped. So it is a lot more organic than I think I would even recommend for people. But I think it works for me because I've done

the reps, right? Because I know what works and what doesn't. And because I also know that sometimes my best ideas are the ones that only take me five minutes. If I sit down with something for an hour, it won't work as well. Like how do you know what will work in terms of like last night you had an idea, quick activator, put it out and your thesis proved right. How do you know? It's so hard. It's actually I think the hardest skill to teach sometimes what will or won't do well on social. Yeah. So that's why I'm asking me because I have not found a way to systematize the way I think about content. And if anybody heard, I mean, we were in Vegas day and a half ago with one of our content creators. And I'm like, well, when do I strategically place this real, the timeline, the story,

what goes there? And it's like, nobody thinks like that. I don't think about that. I'm like, how do I put it all? Like, how do I teach the way I think about the content that I'm putting out? I think more about social in terms of like themes. So what I mean is like, what is the theme of this content today? So this is, you know, how you hear people describe like content buckets or something.

Oh, yeah. I say content pillars. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But for me, it's even broader than that, which is like, my two things are like, what is the vibe or the tone or the theme? And then what am I trying to get them to do? So today's content that I built yesterday, I saw a post and I take a lot of inspiration from other people and then make it our own. Like stealing is great. Stealing is great. Stealing is great. Stealing is great. Here's the work I've had done because I believe transparency is important. And it was like, you know, lip filler. I've gotten. Meaning like, plastic surgery or Botox or whatever. I was day late in a dollar short. No, you're great. Got it. Like the, here's the work I've had done because I believe transparency is important. And it was like, you know, lip filler. or whatever. And I was like, one, I haven't had any work done, so I can't make this version of this post. But I'm like, I've gotten a lot of work done. I've written a book. Ooh. I have gone to therapy. I've been sure. Yeah. So the post this morning was all the work I've had done as a multimillionaire because I believe transparency is important. And then the next slide was like, I'm really proud of all

the work I've had done and I don't regret any of it. Right. So I am. Oh my God. That's so cute. I'm baiting you a little bit. Maybe we do that today. Lady. Yeah, do it today. So I'm baiting you a little bit. So I'm baiting you a little And then the third one is like, yeah, I've built this company. We've impacted five million women. I wrote a New York Times best selling book. I rang the NASDAQ opening bell. We have a great company culture of these things. And like, this is the work I'm really proud of that I've had done. That's so good. And like, it did great. And I knew it would do great. Right. I think that, again, we call it petty content sometimes. Like that is like a content theme or a content pillar. I want to embrace that. I always, I'm like, oh, it's a cringe post. I'm doing a cringe post. I'm doing a cringe post. I'm doing a cringe post. But I like the petty. Petty. There's a lot of men who do not like me and do not like the content we create. And then I use that as more content. And there's a lot of men that don't like anybody out on the internet.

No, but then I use it as content. I know. It's great. And I think also like that one, my CTA was just, okay, can we get in front of more eyeballs? But I didn't have any CTA on it. It wasn't like a many chat comment this. It was just like, you know, this will be fun. And maybe we'll even be a trend, right?

Maybe we'll do it. And maybe somebody else will do it. the other post I'm thinking about are, yeah, what is our business objective, right? Okay, so my example of, okay, we have five days left of the month and I want to make $10 more $1,000 or whatever, it's like, okay, what are the easiest levers I can pull to do that? What are your easiest sources of revenue? And how can you do a quick revenue injection? So then I'm going, okay, if it is this program, yeah, I'm creating content to be able to get people

to that program. So what do I have to do in that content that will get them to convert? So then sometimes when I'm in that situation, I'm like, okay, I want to create a piece of content that activates into financial stream. I think that the more time I have to plan and think about concepts, it's the better. But if I'm on the fly, like, how do you quickly distill, okay, what's trending? What do I want to do? How is, like, how does that come together so quickly for you? Yeah.

I mean, we don't, I take the opposite, which is like, if I've planned it, it probably doesn't actually perform that well. And maybe that's just like the, what the algorithm knows about our account. I don't know. We used to make these like beautiful graphics for stories. Like in Canva. Yeah, or like 2021, 2020. Oh, wow. Okay. Like we make these beautiful graphics for stories. They would tank every time. But literally we call them chin videos internally. I take a photo and I sometimes do it on the toilet. I take a photo of me and it's just like from here up. And if I do my CTA, it performs gangbusters. I don't know why. I'm so happy you're saying that though. Because everybody has an idea. No, no, no, no. My personal trainer.

who's so great and is trying to grow her business, our training sessions often turn into her telling me to squat and then me telling her what she needs to post on social media. And literally, it's just like everybody overthinks it. Yeah. Actually, one of the best things you can do is time yourself, literally sit down and say, okay, I have 10 minutes to think and create a post. And giving yourself those restrictions force you to, one, be productive,

but two, stop overthinking. Because it's like, if I have to have a post in the next 10 minutes and also it has to be out, then I can't, I can't think about what's the perfect thing. I mean, hooks are really important. Everybody's told anybody on social media that. Think about the way you consume content, right? Even if it is the most thoughtful or most valuable post in the world, right? Tree falls in the middle of the forest, nobody's around.

Like, it doesn't matter if the hook isn't there, if you are not hooking somebody into getting them to care for this reason. So my post example yesterday of, like, the work I've had done, we're all, we're all, all voyeurs. We all want to know, right? It's like, oh, somebody's going to be transparent. It's like, and then I, of course, have flipped that on its head to keep people engaged. So that's a perfect opportunity of like, what content do you consume and even just watching yourself on social media go, why did I click on that? Or why did I do that thing? And then how can I replicate that for my business? That's so good. So what we've done is we started off with origin story. Yep. Money, beliefs, money stories. We talked about your business. And then we've done. We started

we kind of went as a little bit of a sideline. Because I love to geek out. Yeah. I love to geek out with other people who are creating and then differently. I like to get into the psychology. And I think that at this point in my career and life, I really do want to create and systematize a team, a team to help do this. And I don't know how to verbalize what is I see and what I know.

And so I was asking you a lot of those questions. It is sometimes very hard. We have often struggled to hire people for marketing. The marketing is actually sometimes the hardest thing to hire for because, I think people often get in their own way. There's so much content to create. And that's where you are forced to not dwell on things for too long because it's like, yeah, I have to get this out.

Done is better than perfect is like my biggest rule as an entrepreneur. It's just like it will never be perfect. And I could spend, I mean, if I believed that I needed to be perfect, my book would not ever have seen the light a day. I would not be sitting here talking to you. And that's back to the original thing we were talking about is like we teach women to be perfect. It's the same with like social, especially when we have to put ourselves out there. It's like, oh, this post has to be perfect and it has to be the perfect videos and it hasn't be the perfect photos.

And right now, especially in 2026 on social media, it is the imperfect content that is doing so well. Preach. Again, my chin videos are like just carousels that aren't perfectly posed and professional photos. Yes. I build my carousels in Instagram. Like, I use Instagram's tools. It doesn't have to be more complicated than that. So what we've seen is the journey up through present day.

Yeah. And then like Babe Ruth in the batters box, and you point out to far, far, far left field. I love that you're comparing me to Babe Ruth. That's really kind. Well, if we see, look what you've, but look at what a girl from Seattle who thought she was in wear a pencil skirt and carry a briefcase can do and then blew her own mind before,

anybody else's and decided I'm going to be and create a five million woman entourage to change their lives and reclaim power and ownership by way of their own personal finances. What's next? Well, Jasmine, I have to tell you a secret. Can I tell you a secret? Yes. I knew I could do this. I think as women, we are told, anytime you just said really kind things, which thank you, by the way, we go, oh, this was beyond my wildest dreams. I never thought I had. I was. I never thought I this was possible. I never thought I was capable. I just feel so lucky, right? And it is the thing from the Barbie movie where I was like, I worked hard for this. Thank you for this award. I deserve it. And there's a ton of privilege in my story and we acknowledge that so much. And also I refuse

to come on this or any other interview and be like, oh, yeah, it's crazy. I never thought. I 100% thought this. Like, I 100% thought I could do this. Well, because you said, you stood in front of the mirror, which tears in your eyes and said, you can do this. So that before this question ever came, you had already said your truth. It's not you putting on anything other than your dang truth. And I feel like very spoken to right now. It's so important. And when you start growing a business, you cannot be the person that's like, oh my God, I can't believe this is happening to me. You have to be the person that is like, nope, we are going to do these things. And it's either going to work out or I'm going to

to learn and pivot. But if no one, if you're not going to hype yourself up, nobody will. I say that I'll say. And so you have to say, yeah, I have big dreams and I know I'm capable of them. Okay. So what's next? So you're rewined and we're going to say, so you knew that this was going to happen from day one. What's the next thing you know is going to happen? Yeah. And of course, I didn't know it was going to happen in this way. Right. Like, but I knew I was capable of something like this. I am so excited for us to continue investing in our programs. Like, that's for me, one of my favorite things is we've seen so much success with our stock market school program. And now we're thinking more strategically about how do we continue to serve people in a more

intentional way. So we're kind of doing the, like, hybrid of, okay, it was one-on-one in 2019. We went really big in 2025. How do we, like, get in the middle in 20, 26. Like how do we serve a maybe smaller group, but in a more intentional way as we continue to grow? That's awesome. I also, as important as true financial education is, which is like, what is rough IRAs and how do we use them and how do we think strategically about debt and budgeting? This to me is so much bigger than personal finance and so much of our content moving forward will, yes, be practical, valuable advice. but it's also going to be about how this moment in history right now is the most crucial moment for women to take their financial education seriously. This is the most important work I will ever do in my life is making sure that women have money

and not because they want to be greedy with it and not because they want to hoard, but because women are so generous and create such beautiful things when they are. are well funded. And it is every woman listening to job right now to get as rich as possible in the most, you know, hopefully equitable, equal way, ethical way. But we need more money in more women's hands. Because when that happens, the entire world starts to change. Ladies and gentlemen, Tori Dunlap, one of the things that Tori has said that I repeat again and again is nothing that happens when more women have more money. It's true.

So on that note, if you would like to have a personalized financial plan, Tori generously, her first 100K.com forward slash quiz. Take a quiz and you will get a personalized money plan. Free, gratis, her gift to you. And you can find her on Instagram at her first 100K. Tori, thank you for being here. Thank you. And thank you for watching and listening to The Jasmine Star Show.

Thank you for listening to Financial Feminist, produced by Her First 100K. If you love this show and want to keep supporting feminist media, please subscribe. or follow us on your preferred podcasting platform or on YouTube. Your support helps us continue to bring this content to you for free. If you're looking for resources, tools, and education, including all of the resources mentioned in this episode, head to herfirst00k.com slash sF pod.