More Money Podcast - 134 Building a Successful Freelance Business - Jesse Gernigin, Blogger at LiveGoldRich

Episode Date: November 30, 2017

I talk with Jesse Gernigin from LiveGoldRich about how we went from comedic hypnotist to freelance copywriter, how he learned to ask for his worth and how he budgets with a variable income. Long description: For this episode, I chat with Jesse Gernigin from LiveGoldRich and the founder of the Freelancer Success Summit. He has a really interesting perspective on freelancing because he calls himself a bit of a serial entrepreneur. He started out as an entertainer, a comedic hypnotist to be specific, and then started a few other businesses after that, and eventually became a full-time freelance copywriter which now earns him a comfortable living. In my experience, I’ve found that when people think of freelancers, they think of people who are always trying to drum up business, are undercutting other freelancers to win clients, and are always struggling a bit financially. I have no idea where this perception comes from, but it’s something I used to believe before I started my side hustle and eventually became self-employed. Well, after talking to Jesse, that doesn’t have to be the case. Sure, it may start out that way at the beginning of your freelance career, but you can build upon your experience and eventually reach a level where you can ask for higher rates and pick and choose which clients you want to work for. And that’s a message Jesse really wants to share, which is why he created the Freelancer Success Summit. To interview and share the stories of other freelancers from all experience levels and disciplines. You can save your seat and sign up to watch the presentations in the summit for free right now too! Click here to sign up » Learn More About Jesse Check out his website LiveGoldRich.com Download his free Ultimate Guide to Booking Your Schedule Full Save your seat for the Freelancer Success Summit For full episode show notes, visit https://jessicamoorhouse.com/134 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to episode 134 of the Mo Money Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Morehouse. Thanks so much for joining me for another episode. We have just a few more episodes. We've got this one, I've got two more next week, and then I'm out. I am taking a break for December because I am tired putting out two episodes a week for how many months? I don't know. And also, I've got some I need some time to prep for season six that will launch in January 2018. And I've already got some amazing guests, super, super excited, maybe even some famous people. I don't know. I don't know. But super excited for that. So I'm gonna use December to prep for next season, take a little bit of a

breather, work on some cool projects to share with y'all. But in the meantime, I still have some episodes for you. And this one is with Jesse Jernigan. He is from livegoldrich.com. And he has a really interesting story. I mean, not many people can say that they're, you know, when you're like, oh, you know, where did you start from? He's like, I used to be a hypnotist. I used to be a traveling entertainer. So that is like the start of his story. Very unique, awesome, cool guy. Now he's a copywriter living a life that he on his terms as a freelancer, owning his own business and being paid his worth. So we talk a lot about all of those things. And another thing that we also talk about is he has a summit, an online summit coming up very like now, I think. So if you just want to go to like

jessicamorris.com slash freelancer success summit, that will direct you right to the landing page. You know, and like, you know, most virtual summits, it is free to watch all the interviews with his guests as they happen live. So you just have to, um, sign up for your free ticket and then you get access to that. But if you want to, uh, watch it after the fact, uh, while it's all done, they just have to purchase a ticket, but a lot of cool things in there. I may also be part of the summit as one of his guests. We talk about, uh, it was actually really cool. He wanted to have me on the show or on the Summit rather, because he wanted to talk to someone who had just kind of completed their first year of self-employment to really get kind of that perspective of someone who just, who's in it, who's just done it. And from that kind of newbie perspective. So it's a

really cool, cool interview that I got to do with him for the summit. But anyways, before I get to the interview with Jesse, just a few words I want to share about this episode's sponsor. Support for this episode comes from Credit Card Genius, the only tool that compares over 50 features of 150 Canadian credit cards using math-based ratings and rankings

that respond to your needs instantly. Now you can get rewarded faster without all the headache. Visit creditcardgenius.ca to learn more. Once again, that's creditcardgenius.ca. Thank you, Jesse, for joining me on the Mo Money Podcast. I'm excited to chat with you today.

Thank you so much for having me. It's so cool to be here. I know. You've got a lot of exciting things going on, which we will talk about later on. But how did we even get in touch? I think you got in touch with me and I just liked your vibe right away. So I would love to learn a little bit more about you because you are kind of a powerhouse. You're doing a ton of stuff.

You're all about the hustle, which I love. You're a very kind of inspirational, motivational person because you're doing it all. And that's kind of what your whole thing with Living Gold Rich is all about. Live Gold Rich. Live Gold Rich. That's good. It sounds better when you say it like that. It sounds less scammy.

Because it's not a scam. It is not. Actually, if you knew how much hard work you have to do every day to actually be a success, you'd be like, that's even worse than a scam. Yeah, I know, right? If they only knew how much we actually had to work and learn every day, people would be like,

that's not funny. Literally, I swear, when I come across someone who's like, oh, you work for yourself, you're an entrepreneur. Like, that sounds fun. I'm like, I mean, like, sometimes, but like, it's actually like a lot of freaking work. Like, I'm always working, kind of. Or you always have to be linked to your phone to check your emails because there could be an opportunity that you don't want to miss. So I would love to know, how the heck did you get into this crazy world of entrepreneurship yourself so it's it's really wild i am a serial entrepreneur turned online guy by uh another online person called ramit sati do you know who ramit is uh

yeah i do everybody already knows that everybody knows who joave is. So it's not like it's a big mystery. But I was a full-time comedy stage hypnotist and magician. Excuse me? Get out of town. If you look up on YouTube, you can see hundreds of videos of me performing all over the world on cruise ships, corporate events, colleges, high schools, fundraisers.

So you actually know how to hypnotize people? Yeah. It's a real thing? It works? Yeah. It's hilarious too. You can see hundreds of hours of me performing online too. Oh my God. I'm going to check that out right away.

That is amazing. And I can't believe I didn't know that. That's amazing. Yeah. So I've always had some type of business. But as in college, I started a music magazine with a couple of my friends that we actually made into a real business that we sold. I started a bar with a friend that I sold. I am currently, behind me, you can see I'm actually in a coin and gold shop

that I own with my father and I sold that. So December 1st, I'll officially be out of that as well. I've moved completely online. Wow. And I've done a lot of other things too. That's kind of just like the start. But in the way I was able to go from having real jobs and being in the real world, brick and mortar even to full-time online, I bought a course by Ramit Sethi called ZTL, Zero to Launch. And I had this idea like, oh my God, I'm going to sell information online. And I immediately found out that I was not ready for it. And so I took everything in the course and became a copywriter. And in 14 months, I've replaced a six figure income entirely working

online. Wow. And so really quick. It isn't, it isn't like, I want to make the point that two things really helped when I had a lot of those skills in place, like I marketed my own business. So I've actually did direct like response marketing for years. So it wasn't like I was just getting into it. And I actually, and this is, I hate to promote courses, but if you follow the courses you buy step-by-step, you'll actually get results. Yeah. I mean, that's kind of, you're going to mess up all the time and then you mess up, you learn, you go forward. And ZTL, I just use the principles in that to create a copywriting business and it just took off. But I don't think it would work for necessarily other things. If you're a content writer instead of a content marketer or if you're a virtual assistant,

you are limited in the amount of money that you can make. So it means you have to work more. And the more you have to work, the less opportunity you have to get work. So you kind of get stuck in the spiral. As a copywriter, you can charge per project. You can take on multiple projects. It's different. So it's easier to make six figures doing certain things than other things.

Absolutely. Yeah, especially with, it seems like there's kind of the school of thought where it's all about delegating or creating things that are kind of evergreen and can just like churn out money or whatever. That's kind of the dream, like having that constant passive income.

And then there's also the things where like, the typical kind of freelancer that you think about where they are selling a service for money, but there's only so many hours in the day. So you are kind of limited in that respect. Yeah. And I teach a lot of people at my blog, how to focus yourself away from charging per hour and start charging per project, which I feel anybody needs to do. You don't have to be a freelancer. You can be a business service provider, consultant, whatever. That's really the only path forward. But one thing that was interesting was I made the leap online because I saw the ZTL launch a year before when I was on tour. But it was like the second year that I was booked full.

So the second year I made up more than 100K performing. And I was like, this is crazy. I want to do this, but I'm not going to step away from this career that I finally got where I wanted. I'm so excited. And the next year I was on a 60 city tour. Whoa. Yeah. I would do, I usually, I would do two big long tours of like 60 to a hundred days. And then the rest of the year I would just do weekends because those were the really busy seasons. And I got sick on day like 28 and I was just, I was awful. I had the flu. I was throwing up everywhere.

And so I had a buddy of mine who was a doctor. This is really illegal, so I can't use this name. He would call ahead to the cities I'd be in. He knew doctors in those cities and says, this guy's going to show up. Give him these shots. They allowed me to keep going for the day. I got a special type of niacin, a type of B12,

a type of steroid. I'm deathly ill this whole time. I'm bottoming in the car to the show. Then I would take this injection right this whole time. I'm bottoming in the car to the show. And then I would take this injection right before the show and I'd be able to do the show. And then I'd drive three or four hours to the next hotel, crash for the night. And I did this. And the whole time I'm like, I can't do this anymore. I can't have a family. I can't have a wife. I can't have kids if I'm going to live like this. And so that's why I decided to make that transition away from performing. Yeah, no, definitely. Isn't that funny? Because most people, their goal in life is to be,

I know it's lots of people's dreams to be that musician, that actress, that performer and stuff like that. But I think lots of people don't realize that how harsh it can be on your life and your body. When I think, lots of people are like, oh, I'd love to be a celebrity or Rihanna or whatever. I'm like, hell no. She's got a heart. Yeah, she gets paid a lot of money. She's famous. She's very privileged. But she probably has a really tough life.

I couldn't work on a schedule like she does. Or I just – what comes to mind is – I don't know if you've seen it, but it's on Netflix. Lady Gaga has a documentary about it, and it's a little glimpse into her life. It's really interesting to see. And I'm like, wow, that looks awful. I would never like that life. She's just scheduled. Everything is scheduled. She would be getting her makeup done

while she's getting shots at the doctor because she has to go on stage. Just kind of like your situation. I'm like, that just sounds terrible. So I totally get where you're coming from. It was nice probably for part of your life, but yeah, it's not really sustainable if you do want to have a different lifestyle

where it's a little bit more settled, you have more time, you can have a family, all that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's really hard after a while when you're trying to build a professional business and have a professional life outside of it. And it just doesn't work. At a certain point, the things don't line up.

Yeah, exactly. So how did you, I guess, yeah, make that transition? You know, I guess you took the course and everything like that, but was it like you said that you had kind of success within, you know, very short period of time? Like, I would love to know, like, what did that block of time look like? What did you really do? And how did it, you know, kind of ended up working out for you? Well, I'll make a couple of things. First off, it definitely wasn't a short period of time. Like 14 months, it was work, right? Now, a lot of people probably couldn't do what I did in 14 months,

but a lot of people couldn't bring the skills I had. Like I said before, I was already skilled. Yeah, you weren't starting from ground zero. You know, I was starting, I'd say like 50%. And then that course gave me an accelerator. So I wasn't just starting at halfway. I was starting with somebody's help, which is really important. Like, and that's what I go back to all the times. Like, if you really want to get the next step, you got to get somebody help.

You got to get the right language. You got to get that. But I was able to do so. Like what I do was I'd start the morning and I devote three and a half to four hours every morning to my online business. And at first it wasn't the same. Like every week was different. Some weeks I was writing, some weeks I was researching, some weeks I was learning, some weeks I was marketing. It was going to be different every week. So there's no like set schedule I can give you. And then of course I would do my marketing for my entertainment business and then I would go do shows because I would either have to travel to shows, set up at the hotel, go do the show that night. And then I'd come home, I would handle real quick

client calls. So I actually started on Upwork. Oh yeah. That's interesting. Yeah. And when I started, it wasn't Upwork. I think it was, I forget if I was on Elance or Odesk. I think it was on Odesk, but they got merged and then they merged. And while I was doing that at night, I would do my proposals because where I was in the country, that would be the most responsive time to people posting jobs. Yeah. Yeah. And so I would an hour or so before bed, I'd fire off three or four proposals. And in the morning I'd get up and I'd start it all over again. Now, the first thing I did every morning was review the proposals I wrote the night before. And this is a huge tip. When I reviewed the proposals, I was like more clear headed. I could

see, okay, I did this wrong. I wasn't clear here. I should have used this testimonial. And I just kept editing. And eventually in a course of a couple weeks, I went from getting like a couple responses every now and then to getting responses on just about every other proposal I was sending. Yeah. That's interesting. Yeah. And it was funny. It's like people crap on job boards. They hate job boards, but job boards are a great place to start. And now I've moved off job boards all at simply because the type of work I do right now isn't on job boards, but I keep about 20 to 30% of my company on there just for transparency in my

blog. So people can see that I'm actually doing what I'm saying. It's like the same thing that people like you're a hypnotist. I'm like, yeah, I just type my name into YouTube. I'll be everywhere. So they can go on my Upwork account and they can see that I am booking kids and I am getting

testimonials that I got a project role up there. Because I think one of the biggest issues we face, people like us, is not having transparency online, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so that creates a level of transparency. So if my people are like, oh, you're just saying that, I can say, no, look, like I can even screenshot entire proposals I've written that you can review with people. It's really helpful. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I think

that that's a big point is the transparency. I try my best to be transparent. I'm sure there's definitely some things I could do, some tips that you might have to help me out. But no, that's really interesting. Yeah. I feel like, yeah, with the job boards, a lot of people and myself included, which is kind of a terrible preconceived notion, but they kind of may think of them as a way that, yeah, you can get work, but everyone is kind of undercutting each other. So you're never going to get paid your worth. And it's true. It can be true. I've actually used Upwork to find my current web developer, actually. And so we did one project together and then we got off Upwork because I'm like, well, we don't need to use the platform. I like you.

You know, we could just work together. And it's worked out for him. He's made pretty penny off me, I'm sure. And I'm just one client. And we've been working together for over a year now. So that's just like one kind of example. And yeah, especially when you're just starting out. Where else are you going to start? Right? You have to, if you really don't, you know, know where to go, might as well.

So I want to make a point real quick, because that's another thing people bring up all the time with job boards is, oh, it's a great place to start. It's a great place to find jobs. If you look at my profile right now, I haven't booked a client for under $2,000. Oh, that's interesting. Now I can't tell you the names of certain clients because they're under $2,000. Oh, that's interesting. Now, I can't tell you the names of certain clients because they're under NDA, but I am currently writing copy for one of the largest energy

providers for the Saudi Arabian Kingdom. I just finished a marketing project for the very first FDA approved mimic fasting diet. I am getting hired by the number one sales speaker for building materials and sales. So there are huge jobs on this job board.

So it's not just like, that's interesting. Maybe things have just like evolved since like, I remember, you know, stuff like that. Like the better you get at looking for your specific type of work, the more, and I talk about this a lot, both on my authorship and my blog, but also in the summit is you have to find the right social cues. Yeah. And the more you do it, the more you're going to begin to identify the right social cues because what people look for in the type of language that you use is different at every

level. And that's something people experience as they scale up. Like when I started, I was charging 35 bucks an hour. Now I charge 125 bucks an hour starting January 1st, I started, I was charging $35 an hour. Now I charge $125 an hour starting January 1st. I'm going to charge $495 an hour. And I'm able to do these things because I move up the social cues. Because I know what people look for at $125 an hour, what I need to look for is really different than what I was looking for at $35 an hour. And they're really close, but they're just far enough apart that you can fly right between them

and not get any work if you're not editing yourself. Okay. Now, do you want to kind of go into more depth about what exactly do you mean by social cues? So when you go to look for a job, and this is a really interesting point. A lot of people have a hard time understanding this, but this is really important. As you move up and you start identifying the people that you can help the most, you will send a lot less proposals every day. And the reason for that is there are going to be a lot of people that you're not right for. That's okay. So how do you find the people that you're right for? There's a couple things

that I can give examples of in my community, but the social cues will be different for every type of service. So as a copywriter and marketer, I look for things that identify people who have already done something. I don't want to be the first person people work with. I am very expensive. And because of that, a lot of people want unrealistic results because they don't understand that this is an investment over the course of a couple of years and not something we're going to plug and play and be rich the next week. Right. And so if people who are already done it, they have data, they understand the changes, they understand how it works. So when I come to them and say, you know, we're going to spend two months, we'll adjust your KPIs. We're going to be able to look at your marketing and your ads and

your keywords, and we'll be able to increase conversion probably 0.3 to 2%, which should be this amount of sales based off your existing numbers. And if I've read the social cues right, they're going to go, that's perfect. Now, how can you tell if it's the right social cues? Well, like I said, the first thing is, for me, they've already done a project. They've done a launch. They've done a sale. They run a store. They have experience. I'm not teaching somebody. And that's an important aspect for my business is I never want to have to teach somebody from the beginning.

I don't mind sharing new methods, but if I have to teach them, then I have to qualify my value at every level. Whereupon somebody who's already done it understands the value I bring and doesn't really pay for it. Another social cue is they speak to exactly what they want.

And this is big. Like if you ever get to a job post and it's promising you either, you know, this is going to lead to more work or, you know, we're going to scale up really big. This is just a test. These people don't know what they're talking about. Real companies that need real help know exactly what they want and they know that they don't waste their time. Their time is more valuable than their money. And so they're not going to do things that take away from the value of their time. So if a client isn't clear on what they want or they're not concise,

you know they're not right for you. They're kicking tires to get an idea and you don't want to be a tire that they kick because it's wasting your time. Those are usually the main social cues I look for in my market, but it can be different market to market. No, and you bring up some really good points

just about, and it's hard, especially if you're a new freelancer, and I have navigated this myself, and same with my husband who's been a freelancer for 10 years now, knowing who is the right client for you. Sometimes they're not, and it's hard because you're like, am I saying no to money? I need to get paid. And also just really kind of protecting your business and or your brand if that's, you know, part of your business.

And it's hard because, yeah, you don't want to feel like a dummy and say no to money. But sometimes saying no could lead to a yes that's actually more valuable in the end. But I want to shift gears a little bit. Okay. Can talk about a little bit more because you talk more on your website and your blog about kind of the psychology of things, which I really love. But, you know, you kind of talked about a little bit about why you got into freelancing. But what, like now you've been doing it for a while. What does it really mean to you?

How has it kind of shifted your life? I know kind of we talk about funding your freedom, which I think is really cool. So I think freedom and probably, you know, a little bit of financial freedom is linked to, you know, working for yourself. I'd love to talk a little bit about that. So I'll hit it on two scales. First, I'll explain what it means to me and then to why I use it to fund my freedom and what that means for me. So freelancing has given me the freedom to live the life I want with another person. Somebody that's important to me. I finally have somebody in my life that I'm probably going to marry and I'm going to go to the next stage with.

It's so funny. Like when I say that with girls, they're like excited. They're like, yeah, I'm so happy for you. Does she know? Kind of. Kind of. Yeah. You're like, woo-hoo-hoo.

And like, after you've been with her. You're like, woo-hoo-hoo. And like, Happy Beauty is just like, I like this guy. No, but you know, before when I ran these physical businesses like a brick and mortar or entertainment company,

you can't be a good husband if you're not there. Yeah. You got to be present for sure. Yeah. You can't be a good father if you can't do things with your children.

And I realized that was the next step in my life. And freelancing has given me the opportunity to move into that. Now, will it always be perfect? No, there's going to be times where I'm going to be pulling 12 hour days, day after day for weeks at a time because of projects, but the overall impact, what I'll be able to do through the course of the entire year and the choices that we can make because of that. That's what freelancing has afforded me. And on the other end too, like I have a lot of personal goals. Like my mom got sick when I was in high school and she died and my dad did

everything he could to take care of me and my family. And so as a thank you for the last couple of years, every year I take my dad out of the country because he's never been able to go. So this last couple months ago, we went to Iceland. The year before that we went to Rome. The year before that, we went to Rome. Next year, I think we're going to go to Prague, you know? So it is affording me the ability to not only do that, but to do it at a level he's comfortable with.

So I can pay for, like, nicer private tours. I can get us in nicer parts of town. I don't have to take him essentially like a nomad backpack, right, like Ronald Potts does, you know? It's the same thing with my partner. My partner has ran all these businesses her whole life and never had the freedom to travel because her people she's been with don't have money. And so we

go to South America every year. And I just thought, you know, book it. You know, if it's going to be above this expense for a single thing, make sure to consult me. Otherwise, just let's do it. And it's given me the ability to have all these rich and amazing experiences. And that's why I love freelancing. It affords me the freedom to do what I want and amazing experiences. And that's why I love freelancing.

It affords me the freedom to do what I want. So how do you fund your freedom? What does that mean to me? So I had to identify the absolute minimum amount of money I could get by and what I would expect. And now when I say get by, I mean live the life that I want. Yeah, not survive, but live the life that I want, right? Because anybody can survive. You can go get a job and eat beans and survive. Yeah, that's true. It's not like there's anything flying, but what could I want?

So I was like, okay, if I could only travel one time a year, and it wasn't even out of country, and I had to do it by road trip, and I'd be able to make investments. So when I'm 65, I'd have a Roth IRA. And I don't know if a lot of your people are Canadian. No, there's Americans and Canadians, everybody. Okay, so they'll know where Roth IRA is. Oh, yeah.

You know, so I would have the freedom to do these things. I would never have to make a decision because it's like, if I do this, I can't have this, right? And then I started figuring out like, okay, now how can I make that every, how can I secure that? And then once I secure that, what can I do to double it, triple it? And so that's how I started funding the freedom that I wanted to live my life. And I took it step by step.

And one thing I want to go back to real quick was you talked about how, you know, it's scary to do these things and you want to say yes to every opportunity. And that's why it took 14 months to transition from a full-time entertainer to freelancing was it gave me the ability to say no to everybody that didn't increase the value of who I was. So I wasn't taking gigs to have gigs. And another thing was for the last 12 weeks, I've been launching this summit and I've been doing the interviews. I didn't take a single gig because I increased my price and what I offered and I only took bigger projects. So for the last three months, I haven't been working. I've been pitching and I've been talking

to clients, but I haven't been getting work. And I just started getting work about a week and a half ago. But because of how I built my life and my systems and everything I put in place, that didn't scare me. Yeah. You can afford it. Yeah. Yeah. That's really interesting. I'm so curious what your budget looks like. Like how do you, cause let's get into the money talk. Cause this is actually really, really interesting. And I think a lot of people want to know kind of what the backend looks like? Like, how do you, because let's get into the money talk, because this is actually really, really interesting. And I think a lot of people want to know kind of what the back end looks like. It sounds like you do have a pretty solid financial plan in that you're like, I want enough to live the life I want. I also want to make sure that I have enough money so I can invest, so I can retire at

65. You know, one question I have, and this actually came up to, uh, at an event that I was at recently, uh, that was, it was, uh, it was about personal finance, but also there was a lot of, um, small businesses and entrepreneurs in the audience. And, uh, at the event, me and my husband were talking to one of the other speakers on the panel with me, who's a financial planner. And he had some questions about like how, you know, we have a certain way of budgeting, but she was also a small business owner. And she really talked about the importance of separating your personal finances from your business finances. They should never kind of be together because it gets

confusing. You really want to have like your business money and your personal money. Is that sort of something that you do or what does your budget look like exactly? Okay. So I can't actually separate personal money from business money simply because like my business is my personal endeavor. Yeah. I know that's the hard thing too. I'm like, I feel like it's the same, but I kind of get that strategy as well. Now, what I try to do is I try to project every year, like what I want to do to either invest in myself or equipment. So like next year I've got $4,000 set aside for ongoing education. I have, I'm probably next year going to have've got $4,000 set aside for ongoing education. I have, I'm probably next year going to have to spend $2,000 to just update like my Mac,

get better desktop, small things like that. But what I do is I sit down every quarter and I go, okay, you know, what did we make? What do we expect to make? You know, like last quarter, I knew I was going to make this leap. So I said, okay, I'm probably not going to make any money next quarter. So let's look at my finances. Okay. I have this much setback. I should be safe. If I don't hit that mark, no big deal. Cause I can just drop back down to the original level and get clients right away. I got streamlined so I can start. So my budget, the way I set my budget is I figure out my minimum cost every month. So those are my bills. Those are my rent. That's everything. Right? And it just changed too because my partner, we finished building our house and by we, she built the house and I just moved in.

Whoa. She built her house? Yeah. So she owns an old school house, which is a business incubator. And she took one of the classrooms, tore it all out and built us a house in there. Cool. Yeah. She's so much cooler. Yeah. She is such a badass. Yeah. And actually, I want to tell you, we just hung a moose actually a couple days ago. And we were going to hang it a month ago, but we had to go get six-inch screws because it's 450 pounds.

Oh, my God. And they were the only thing that would set it into the wall far enough that it wouldn't pop out. Oh, my God. Because actually, if you research it online, you can find stories of people getting killed because their knees fall off the wall. I'm not making that up. No, that's terrible. It is true. But so we were moving in, and so she owns the whole building.

And she paid for everything outright. And I told her, I was like, look, you need to figure out how much rent you're going to want for meat every month. She's like, oh, that's not fair. I'm like, no, you don't understand. If we rented a place together or bought a house together, this would be completely normal. Just because you own this outright doesn't make me not physically responsible. Yeah, exactly.

And so we did that. We created a grocery budget and then I added that into my monthly bills. Now I have three college degrees, but I didn't pay for any of them. I got scholarships for everything. Wow. That's crazy. Yeah. Tell it to my dad who's upset that I have three college degrees now, which I use.

Oh, please. That's everybody my age. Everybody has a degree they don's upset that I have three college degrees now, which I use. Oh, please. That's everybody my age. Everybody has a degree they don't use. I have a film degree. Please. Oh, God. I have a degree. You should be happy that you didn't get into debt because of them.

That's amazing. That's a miracle. Well, you know, it's funny. You're getting to the money issue thing and kind of balancing budgets and everything. So my brother never went to college. He's a waiter at a nice restaurant in our town. He's married, has a kid. Him and his wife have a house.

They only owe $20,000 on it. They have both their cars paid off and they have no debt otherwise. Good for them. Yeah, they both save money. Then they're probably, I mean, together they'll probably never make more than 70 or $80,000 a year.

My sister and her husband, between the two of them have probably 700 to $800,000 in debt. Wow. But my sister's got a doctorate and he has a full-scale technical degree. They have two nice cars and they just bought a house and they remodeled. And my brother got really freaked out. He's like, you know, I'm never going to really be able to meet at that level. And I just, I don't know what to do. And I laughed. I'm like, you don't understand. I'm like, it's hard for you to grasp this, but you're worth more than them.

Yeah. His net worth is actually more than them. Yeah. And I told them, I go, you know, they're going to pay out in the next 20 years more than you can even imagine before they even pay down what they owe. Yeah, exactly. But, you know, cause he sees the stuff, but he doesn't understand that the stuff isn't theirs. Exactly. Oh my gosh. That's just like the biggest problem basically in the world with people. They think that people with the stuff

have the money, but actually most of them don't actually own the stuff. They're renting it. They're paying it down on their credit card. Uh-uh. I'm in an interesting position. I've done a lot of political consulting for my area area and my buddy will probably become the governor of our state in the next 15 years.

And so he's going to hire me on his strategist. And I've always had to help him because he's actually very rich. He's worth a lot of money, like enough money to make you physically ill kind of. And he's always been so upset when he sees people, he drives a pretty moderate car and he sees people he drives a pretty moderate car and he sees all these guys in mercedes and yachts and he's just like oh my god i can't believe they have that i don't have one and i'm like buddy if you got six hundred dollars for a

down payment any car dealership will be happy to hand that over to you exactly no you have no idea like that is not a social signal. That is just somebody dumb. Somebody thought it was a good idea. They should have spent $400, rented it for a day, enjoyed it, and then went back to their car. Exactly. Because at the end of the day, it's just a car. It is just a car.

It'll get you to point A. What helped me get really online with my finances is I, man, I hate to admit to this, but a long time ago, do you remember LimeWire? Yeah. Oh, yes, I do. We're dating ourselves. man i hate to admit to this but a long time ago do you remember limewire yeah oh yes i do we're downloading some music oh geez that's what a lot of people on here they don't have a clue what that is i know it just dates us but whatever those were like the uh napster days and stuff yeah so i downloaded a marketing promotional tapes from Tony Robbins. Yes. Yes,

you did. Two of the tapes. He had talked about the idea of like, don't confuse being able to do stuff with the need to have money. And he, and it was a really interesting idea. He's like, you know,

this guy came up, he's like, I want to buy a jet and show that I have value. And blah, blah, blah. He's like, why do you want to jet really?

He's like, well, cause they make it easier to travel. I don't like traveling. He's like, well, how often a year do you travel? He's like, well, I travel about seven times a year. He don't like traveling. He's like, well, how often a year do you travel? He's like, well, I travel about seven times a year.

He's like, okay, so for you to get a Cessna, it costs you a million dollars. To house it for a year is going to cost you $40,000. To pay somebody to fly it, he's like, so you're looking at probably half a million a year for a couple years, plus another X million for this. He's like, or seven times a year, you rent a private plane, it'll cost you $15,000 a time. You get the same experience, and you can do $15,000 a time. You get the same experience and you can do that indefinitely for 15 years, still meet the same cost of buying it. And you have all the money. And when I realized how to think like that, I was like, okay, money is very powerful. I'm actually reading, I got a galley copy of Dan O'Reilly's new book

on money that's coming out. It has this really interesting concept. I think you'll love it. It's called, I don't know if I'm going to say it right, but I think it's called figulation. Okay. So the premise is you value money incorrectly because you value money what you compare it to percentage-wise instead of what it physically is. So the example is, let's say you go to the store

to buy an $80 pair of shoes. And while you're at the store, the person goes, hey, if you walk five minutes down the street, you can get the same pair of shoes for 50% off. You're going to go get the 50% off shoes, right? Yep. Because you save 40 bucks. Yeah. Why wouldn't you? Now flip the situation. You go to a furniture store and the furniture you want is $1,040. The checkout person goes, hey, if you go five minutes down the road, you're going to save 40 bucks. You get the same deal for $1,000. You're not going to go. Yeah, because you're like 40 bucks. You're like 40 bucks. This much cares.

When in reality it's the same money. It's because you're comparing it to percentages. And then hey, ecology is what affects us. Both our finances in how we charge people. And this time I talked to Hillary Weiss and she has this amazing quote. She goes, you should never charge what you can afford because you'll never charge enough. Yes, I know. And that's actually something that I've had to work on. It's not, don't charge how much I'd be comfortable with. Charge a little bit more than that. Because yeah, I feel, and I always think that maybe it was like a woman thing that we always kind of undersell ourselves because we're just like not good at like promoting ourselves or you know i

think that's just like but that's just like a bigger issue too but i absolutely agree and yeah i i like that i like that idea i've never heard of it kind of talked about that way about their percentage thing because you know i'll you know walk by a store there's some something i need and it's like 10 off or whatever i'll be like but if it's 50 off oh but it's like but it's like 10% off or whatever, I'll be like, eh. But if it's 50% off, ooh. But it's still like 10% off. I mean, still though, I am one of those people that if I have to go to the grocery store and I have a list of things, I don't really care about the brands.

I care about what's on sale and I'll only get the things on sale. But still, and sometimes that's good because you can save money. But sometimes what's also important that i've started to do my husband actually is the one who told me how to do this is literally just like if it's like food especially look at um the cost per like gram or whatever like that um because sometimes the price will actually not be completely accurate yeah you know so yeah oh that's a whole that's a whole other conversation about groceries that i want to get into. So I'll say one thing.

Yeah, yeah. I'm not crapping on your system, but I was a food writer for two years in my city. Yeah, yeah. And one of my favorite quotes from Tools of Titans, and I can't remember the guy that said it, but he says, wine isn't a luxury, it's a grocery. But I like that idea that you're valuing things based on the experience because reality, you might save 25 or 30 bucks for a set of groceries every other week, but the experience drops so much that I feel that the $500 you save at the end of the year, it doesn't match up to the experience because if you're enjoying eating in

more, you're going to save more money by eating in more. So yeah, you might spend a little more on groceries, but you'll save so much not going out. Oh yeah. Yeah. No,

absolutely. Absolutely. But yeah, there's, yeah, that's a much not going out. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, absolutely. Absolutely. But yeah, there's a whole other conversation. Okay, so back on finances. Back to the finances. Okay, okay. So we kind of talked about it. So it seems like you kind of do, yeah, a system, totally get it.

You kind of figure out what your expenses are. It sounds like you're kind of doing the pay it yourself first, where you kind of categorize what you have to save up for so there's no surprises. You clearly have an emergency fund for when things go wrong and you're investing for your future, which is awesome. I actually have a two-level emergency fund. I love that. How is that structured exactly? I wanted a two-level emergency fund because I wanted money that I could get to if I absolutely needed it. And then I wanted a type of income I could get to that would require effort to get in case this first level didn't work.

So I have a cash balance and then I have gold and silver. Oh, wow. And I wouldn't say, now here's the thing, I'm not pitching gold and silver. Don't buy gold and silver because honestly, it's a bad valuation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For me, since I'm in a coin and gold shop, I get it at cost. So it made sense for me. The reason I did it was if I absolutely need that money, I will go get it. I will exchange it at a melter. I'll get the check and I'll deposit the check. I'll do the labor. But if I absolutely don't need it, it's too much work to justify. So I've created just enough of a psychological barrier that if I do need it i can overcome it

but i'm not just falling back on it because it's easy that's interesting that's really interesting um i want to shift a little bit more because you mentioned briefly the summit and yeah uh we're getting to almost time so i definitely want to talk about the summit it is coming up i am so excited for it because i'm part of it but also because it's awesome uh what what is the summit. It is coming up. I am so excited for it because I'm part of it. But also because it's awesome. What is the summit? How did you get the idea to start it? And what should people know about it? So the summit is the Freelancer Success Summit. You can find it at freelancersuccesssummit.com. And it's one thing. It's going to teach you how to get started in the conversation economy. So my entire thing is, whether it's on my blog or if you're talking with me, if you're one of my coaching students, I don't believe we're

in a gig economy. I believe we are in a conversation economy. I believe that people that learn to master, start, and hold the best conversations are going to attract the most premium clients. Because here's the thing, we don't live in a transactional nature anymore. The world has moved on and it's moved into the level of conversation. So I wanted to create a summit that brought together people who are freelancing at all different scales to show people who want to get started or people that are ready to go to the next level, the soft skills they need to master to get hard results. And that's really important because earlier we were talking about social cues. That's massive. You could spend hours every day

sending hundreds of proposals out and never get a response or get all the wrong responses simply because you did not know the right things to look for. So if you start identifying the right things using the systems we teach in the summit, you're sending less proposals, you're booking more work, and you have more time. And the entire summit focuses around that type of thinking where you're learning skills like that. One thing that I love, like we just talked about with Hilary Weiss, we learned a great mindset. You're going to learn how to price yourself properly. You're going to learn the difference between thought leadership and branding. You're going to learn if you're a beginner, how to write proposals that get you booked. If you're intermediate and you want to start adding more money to your bottom line,

you're going to learn how to go from per hour to per project. You're going to learn how to 2x, 3x, 4x your rates. And you're going to learn the exact steps you need to take to not only do it, but to do it and keep getting booked too. Or if you're making money, you know, if you're like where you're at, where you're probably making five figures, you're doing really well, but you want to go to six figures and you want to go to a secure six figures.

So it's not six figures maybe every year. We have all different places where you can go and create referral system, create endless streams, create backends where you're getting paid for gigs that you didn't do by farming them out to other freelancers. There's a lot of different systems in there

and there's stuff at every level, but it goes back to the idea of mastering the art of how you hold a conversation. Wow. You didn't do by farming them out to other freelancers. There's a lot of different systems in there and there's stuff at every level, but it goes back to the idea of mastering the art of how you hold a conversation. Wow. I like how you put that. That's awesome. Yeah. I totally like that.

I'm like, yeah, that makes sense. That's one thing that I'd love about the summit. And like, so every single speaker in the summit, we had a question list for, and you got it too,

but almost nobody stayed on the list because once you start talking, like you've internalized so many things as you become successful that you don't realize you didn't know it before you started. Yeah. And so when we talk about it and I'm like, stop, stop, stop, get into that. And I like clarify for people. And if you're listening to this, if you think about it, this is the most valuable thing on the summit is that you get a peek inside the internalized systems that actually get

people results. And this is huge because unless you can read all the blog posts you want, you can watch all the videos you want until somebody is being asked questions to force something out of them that they don't even realize they've internalized. You're not getting it. You're always getting 5% less. It's like making a recipe where it never turns out exactly right. You don't know why it's because, Oh, you didn't realize you needed to bring the meat to room temperature before you cooked it. That wasn't in the cookbook. The cook assumed you knew that, but you didn't. why it's because, Oh, you didn't realize you needed to bring the meat to room temperature before you cooked it. That wasn't in the cookbook. The cook assumed you knew that,

but you didn't. And it's creating this massive difference. And that's the type of stuff. There's this type of details in the summit. They're going to make you get big. So as you can tell, I'm like really pumped about it. Yeah.

You're a passionate guy. So awesome. So that's, it's happening December 1st and it'll be live or available for two weeks. Is that how it works? Yeah. So we're going to launch for two weeks. You have two weeks starting on December 1st to go in and get early bird access.

So you guys just go have a link for you. You go in and you can lock in early bird access. Now here's the cool thing. You don't got the money. Guess what? You can attend it for free for one week. You can see every talk. Now you can only see the talks on their schedule.

So if you miss it, you can't go back and get it. You'll have to buy access. But if you can set aside time to just see the people you're interested in and you don't have the energy or income to invest, it's there for you. I've got that set up so I can meet your needs. If you're the type of person

that wants to go to the next level and is ready to make that investment, which is a very small investment, you can go and you can purchase access for an entire year. And one thing that I'm doing that's really cool is I have an upsell where if you join the course for a hundred bucks, you can actually have me personally review three of your proposals and give you targeted feedback on what you're doing wrong and how to get booked rewriting them. Ooh, that's valuable. And actually like it actually really is.

Yeah. And I say that every, I make is. Yeah, and I say that every, and I make this point, like, when I started years ago, I was having such a hard time getting it to work and getting my proposals noticed. I paid Danny Mergiles to review my stuff. And the next week I booked a $6,000 gig as the most expensive and least qualified freelancer because they were the best proposal.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, like, I don't have exactly that story, but, like, I did a few years back when I was still working my nine to five in the corporate world. But I was looking for another job. I literally sent out hundreds of resumes and cover letters. And I still wasn't getting any good leads. I'm like, what is going on? I'm totally overqualified.

Or if not, completely qualified for these jobs. I am a huge fan of Alison Green from Ask a Manager. She is amazing. And she did this great writer, great advice. And she just like knows exactly, like especially when you're working the corporate world. And so she had this thing where she's like, hey, I'm doing this for a limited time.

I'll look over your resume. And it was a, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks or a hundred bucks or something like that. Totally worth it. So bought it, did it was a, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks or a hundred bucks or something like that. Totally worth it. So bought it, did it and literally, yeah, changed everything. Like she had some really great tips and I used them and I had a way better, like, well, I got a better job after that.

That like literally increased my income by like 20 grand. So that crazy thing. And like so many people have a hard time paying that 300 bucks. Oh my God, 300 bucks. He's just going to send me some tips. It's like, if you make 20 extra grand, what do you care? Yeah. It's like, if it actually like does get you the results and hopefully it will, because

most, and I think that's the thing too. It's like, I like bring people on the show that, you know, work in the online space that have like, do have the, you know, evidence to back it up. I don't want to, you know, like, yeah, I can actually really, really change the game for you. So cool. I'm excited for the summit, man. I'm excited to be part of it.

Excited to watch all the other interviews, all the other participants. That'll be super exciting. Can we talk about your interview for like two minutes real quick? Yes. So you did this amazing interview and I brought you on because, so we met through Steph O'Connell and I met Steph O'Connell because she's doing ZTL. And I think you kind of helped me get Steph to be a speaker on the summit too. Oh did I? Cool. She's awesome. Yeah, she was great. It's super cool. And we're

actually both entertainers. I guest posted for her before about entertainment. Anyway, I got you on because you had just transitioned. You were right at your first freelancing full-time. I was like, this is awesome because everybody wants to do it, and you just had the freshest perspective. I really did. They're like, whatever. We've been doing it for years. What do you want to know?

And then you're like, hell, you know, I had to do this, this, and this. Oh, my God, this is perfect because most people don't remember that experience. So you gave a play-by-play of what to actually expect, how to it what you put into place before you do it so it was really important it was really powerful there's gonna be a lot of people i got it situated in the second module people are gonna love it because it's the information they're looking for that they can't find because people don't realize yeah and it's true it's like i don't really know well i number one i didn't know what to expect before i did it so uh, if anyone is ever thinking of this, yeah, I think they'll like my thing

because it goes in depth. And I feel like I haven't had that opportunity to really talk about those things in depth. And you're very good at getting it. You're like, wait a minute, stop. Let's talk about that. I love how you did that. Because yeah, I think there's definitely some moments like,

oh, I never thought about that. Whoa, getting deep. And you're like, I'm so much smarter than I realized. Who knew? Yeah, I know. Who knew? Oh, my gosh. Well, Jesse, it was a pleasure chatting with you, as always.

Excited for the summit. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you for joining me. And hopefully, I'll have you on the show again because you're awesome. Yeah, that'd be great. Cool. Well, hey, thank you so much. Have a good afternoon.

And that was episode 134 of the Mo Money Podcast with Jesse Jernigan. Of course, make sure to check him out at livegoldrich.com. And like we mentioned, he is doing a summit, a virtual summit called the Freelancer Success Summit. I will include more details on how you can access a free ticket in the show notes. But if you want to just go to jessicamorehouse.com slash freelancer success summit, you will be able to, you know, get directed right to the page and find out how to get a free ticket. A few more things I want to mention before I let you go, but before that, I've got a few words about this episode's sponsor. A big thank you to Credit Card Genius for supporting the Mo Money podcast. If you're not aware, they are the only tool that compares over 50 features of 150 canadian credit

cards by using math-based ratings and rankings that respond to your needs instantly now you can get rewarded faster without all the headache if you want to find the best credit card for you make sure to check out creditcardgenius.ca to learn more once again visit creditcardgenius.ca to learn more all right so we are down to the wire we only have two more episodes in season five in 2017 next week i've got an episode with michelle jackson from michelle's money hungry uh also a very good friend of mine because she uh picked me up from the train station when i was in denver doing the crazy money 2020 payments race. And in case you have no idea

what the hell I'm talking about, because I think I only mentioned that particular race in a few episodes, I did this basically the amazing race for money nerds. And I blogged my whole journey. It's on my YouTube channel. Just go to jessicamorhouse.com slash YouTube. You should also check it out

just because I'm trying to build my YouTube, doing a lot more videos, putting a lot more energy into that. And I've been told that I'm funny. I don't know. I don't know. I've been told I'm funny. But I vlogged my whole journey on this race. Basically, it had me traveling from alone from Toronto to Las Vegas with checkpoints in between. I went to Cincinnati, Denver, the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, a bunch of other places.

It was a long seven days. Seven days of my life in just panic survival mode, basically. And it was for this thing called the Money 2020 Payments Race. I was racing against four other, three other people. Oh my gosh. It was just like such a, it was a really testing time, but super fun and awesome. But yeah, a crazy, crazy race. And kind of the caveat was, you know, we got challenges that we had to do. We had checkpoints we had to go at, but we also had the restriction of only using one payment method. So someone had gold. Someone had a contact list.

Someone had a Bitcoin. Someone had cash. But cash was like $1 bills. It was, yeah, hilarious. I had chip and pin credit card, which no one accepts in America. So it was a struggle. So you'll definitely want to check out some of those vlogs because it was a pretty crazy adventure. Yeah.

So anyways, I got two more episodes for you next week. So make sure if you haven't already, subscribe on iTunes and YouTube and Stitcher and wherever you're listening. Also, for next week, I will be, my last episode, my solo episode, I will be revealing who all of the winners are for my contest that I've been running. And in case you have no idea what I'm talking about in terms of that, well, I've been running a contest this whole season. Super easy. Info's in the show notes, but you just have to basically leave me a review and then submit your review to me and your contact details so I can contact you if you're the winner. And yeah, it literally will take you two minutes and you may be able to win an Amazon gift card

at the value of $25, which may come in handy because it's a holiday season. So yeah. Anyways, that's enough yabbering for me. I can go on for ages, can't I? I'll see you back here next Wednesday. Yeah, sound good? Okay, okay. Okay.

This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.