AI transcript
0:00:02 Here’s an oldie but a goodie from the archives,
0:00:05 from the Side Hustle Show, greatest hits collection.
0:00:10 How a free challenge turned into a $500,000 a year business.
0:00:13 Welcome to the Side Hustle Show.
0:00:15 We’re aspiring part-time entrepreneurs
0:00:18 learn how to turn their side hustle dreams into reality.
0:00:21 Because your nine to five may make you a living,
0:00:23 but your five to nine makes you alive.
0:00:26 And now your host, Nick Loper.
0:00:30 (upbeat music)
0:00:32 – What’s up, what’s up, Nick Loper here.
0:00:33 Welcome to the Side Hustle Show,
0:00:36 live from beautiful Livermore, California.
0:00:39 Got an awesome, inspiring, actionable show for you today.
0:00:43 My guest is Tiffany, the budget Nista Aliche.
0:00:45 She’s a former preschool teacher who’s built up a business
0:00:47 that’s on track to do half a million dollars
0:00:48 in revenue this year.
0:00:49 And the cool thing is,
0:00:52 it all started with a completely free challenge.
0:00:54 She runs the Live Richard Challenge
0:00:56 at LiveRichardChallenge.com,
0:00:58 which has helped more than 160,000 participants
0:01:01 save a collective $17 million
0:01:04 and pay off one and a half million dollars in debt.
0:01:06 In this episode, you’re gonna hear
0:01:09 how Tiffany came up with the challenge idea,
0:01:10 how she got people to join.
0:01:12 And now the four or five revenue streams
0:01:16 she’s using to turn this thing into a super successful business.
0:01:18 Notes and links to all the resources mentioned
0:01:22 are at sidehustlenation.com/liverichard.
0:01:23 And I know Tiffany’s challenge in marketing
0:01:26 have evolved in the years since this was recorded.
0:01:28 It may not exist in the same form that we talked about,
0:01:32 but my challenge to you is to think of how you could apply
0:01:34 a similar strategy in your own niche.
0:01:37 What kind of cool value-packed challenge could you offer
0:01:41 to reach new people and turn them into raving fans?
0:01:42 Ready?
0:01:43 Let’s do it.
0:01:45 (upbeat music)
0:01:47 – I was a preschool teacher for 10 years
0:01:48 and I was doing well.
0:01:52 I mean, I was making like between $65,000 and $70,000 a year
0:01:54 because I used to tutor on the side
0:01:57 and babysitting stuff on the side and everything seemed great.
0:01:59 A group in the house where money was talked about
0:02:03 all the time, my father was a CFO and an accountant.
0:02:04 So I just learned about money at home.
0:02:08 And then when I lost my job, everything fell apart.
0:02:10 Like I lost my savings.
0:02:12 I took all the money out of my retirement account.
0:02:13 Like they tell you not to.
0:02:15 I ran up my credit card debt.
0:02:16 My house went into foreclosure.
0:02:18 I was like, sheesh.
0:02:19 Like just everything fell apart.
0:02:23 And it was in the rebuilding that I realized,
0:02:25 okay, all the lessons I kind of learned at home
0:02:26 ’cause my dad was like serious
0:02:28 about like learning about money.
0:02:31 Like he took us to like money classes and stuff.
0:02:34 So I used, you know, everything that I learned.
0:02:35 – Well, that’s a great influence.
0:02:36 – No, it was honestly.
0:02:40 And so when I was rebuilding, people would ask me,
0:02:41 well, how are you doing it?
0:02:42 Because I’m in the same position.
0:02:45 So I just started showing family and friends
0:02:46 and that’s how it started.
0:02:47 – Family and friends are asking,
0:02:48 hey, what are you, what’s going on?
0:02:50 So did you end up getting a new job at that point?
0:02:51 Another teaching job?
0:02:53 – I knew I didn’t want to teach in the classroom anymore
0:02:55 just because I felt like I’d outgrown that.
0:02:58 So I was volunteering at all these different places
0:03:00 like the Boys and Girls Club, the United Way
0:03:02 and trying to figure out what I wanted to do,
0:03:04 thinking I wanted to be a party planner.
0:03:05 Don’t ask me where that came from.
0:03:06 But I was like, that’s what I totally want to do.
0:03:08 – That’s like everybody’s dream to be like a wedding
0:03:09 coordinator or something like that.
0:03:10 – I know.
0:03:13 And so, but in that, I found that as I was volunteering
0:03:15 for these different organizations,
0:03:17 I found myself sneaking into their classrooms
0:03:19 and watching their like presenters teach
0:03:21 and being like, that’s not how you do it.
0:03:23 And like teaching and showing them
0:03:26 and then as I was helping people
0:03:28 at the organization with their finances,
0:03:30 people started asking me more and more
0:03:31 and I would sit down with folks and they were like,
0:03:34 well, can you write us like a curriculum
0:03:35 since you’re a teacher?
0:03:36 And at the time I had my master’s
0:03:38 and I still do an education.
0:03:40 So I thought I was gonna become a principal one day,
0:03:41 but I didn’t.
0:03:44 And so I started writing curriculum and lesson plans
0:03:46 for these organizations where I was volunteering.
0:03:48 And so those lesson plans and curriculum
0:03:51 eventually became the literature challenge.
0:03:53 – Okay, listening to what people are asking you
0:03:56 for help with already, I like that.
0:03:59 What was like the first step in getting this challenge
0:03:59 off the ground?
0:04:02 I mean, did you take me about the early days?
0:04:04 Like I could, I could start like the side hustle challenge.
0:04:06 Like how am I getting my first participants?
0:04:09 – I started, I started a post at the end of 2014.
0:04:13 Like, hey, I’m gonna be doing a literature challenge.
0:04:14 It’s gonna be a free resource
0:04:16 to help you get on financial track.
0:04:18 If you’re interested, let me know below.
0:04:19 It was just a Facebook post.
0:04:21 – Just on your personal Facebook page.
0:04:22 – Mm-hmm.
0:04:24 And a ton of people were like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.
0:04:26 ‘Cause by then I was already like three years
0:04:27 into being the budget nieces.
0:04:29 So around the city where I live,
0:04:30 people knew me to be like,
0:04:32 oh, that’s the financial education lady.
0:04:34 Because I had taught volunteering
0:04:35 does something great for you.
0:04:37 You get your face in front of so many people.
0:04:38 So people knew me.
0:04:40 So when I posted it, it wasn’t a huge surprise
0:04:44 because by then I was hosting free community classes.
0:04:45 They were sponsored by the United Way.
0:04:47 They would pay me and I would host classes
0:04:49 for the whole community to come to for free
0:04:51 and teaching financial education.
0:04:54 So when I said, hey, I’m gonna be doing it online,
0:04:57 the same stuff we do in class, people just showed interest.
0:04:58 And I did it on purpose
0:05:00 so I could start to collect interested parties.
0:05:03 And then I think I put up like an event-bright link
0:05:06 just so people can say that to add themselves to like a list.
0:05:08 And I didn’t, I wasn’t even using like, you know,
0:05:10 like Aweber or like Infusionsoft or anything like that.
0:05:12 It was just post-interest.
0:05:15 Here’s an easy free link to sign up
0:05:17 so I can collect the emails.
0:05:19 – Okay, so when somebody signs up for your event-bright thing,
0:05:20 which was it free?
0:05:21 – Yeah, it was free.
0:05:25 – Okay, so a free event-bright event.
0:05:28 And then that gave you their email address.
0:05:30 – And I started to craft
0:05:31 what I thought the challenge should be like.
0:05:34 I was like, all right, so I teach this six-week course
0:05:35 for the United Way.
0:05:37 So how do I condense this into,
0:05:39 I think at the time, the first challenge,
0:05:41 I condensed it into five weeks.
0:05:44 And the way the challenge works is I really played into
0:05:48 what I knew about people from a teaching perspective
0:05:51 is that people wanna be told exactly what to do.
0:05:53 They don’t want you to have them figure it out.
0:05:55 So I was like, okay, so instead of me saying,
0:05:57 here’s some ways to do stuff.
0:06:00 What if every single day I told you exactly what to do?
0:06:01 And so that’s the way the challenge works.
0:06:04 You sign up and every day in your inbox
0:06:06 for the length of the challenge, which is about a month,
0:06:09 you get one easy financial task that says,
0:06:12 hey, call your service provider.
0:06:13 Tell them you don’t have the money.
0:06:14 Here’s a script.
0:06:17 If they say no, here’s script number two.
0:06:20 If they say yes, here’s script number three.
0:06:22 And then let me know how it goes.
0:06:23 So that’s how each task went.
0:06:25 You didn’t have to know how to do anything
0:06:28 except for read, write, add, subtract.
0:06:30 – Okay, so for five weeks, people are getting,
0:06:32 it is all delivered through email.
0:06:33 – Yes.
0:06:34 – Are you writing these out like the day,
0:06:36 the morning of and hitting send?
0:06:39 – Yeah, in the beginning I was, and that was really hectic.
0:06:41 And so I realized, you know what?
0:06:43 Maybe are there other ways I can get people
0:06:45 to connect to different platforms?
0:06:47 So I’m like, okay, one, I finally,
0:06:48 I think I signed up at the time.
0:06:51 I use Infusionsoft now, but I was using Aweber.
0:06:54 So I’m like, okay, one, they’re opening my emails,
0:06:56 but what if I could get them to my blog?
0:06:57 So in the email, I would say,
0:07:00 hey, today’s task is learn how to budget.
0:07:02 You can learn how to rock this task here.
0:07:04 Link to the blog post.
0:07:06 So it like forces all of these people
0:07:09 to one, open my email, then two, head to my blog.
0:07:11 And then while on my blog,
0:07:13 I was like, I would have like, tweet this out.
0:07:15 So then I was like, every step of the way,
0:07:18 I was trying to get them to touch all of my platforms
0:07:20 to raise like my profile on all the platforms.
0:07:21 – Okay, okay.
0:07:22 Now there’s always a debate, like, oh, you know,
0:07:24 how much of the information do I include
0:07:25 in the body of the email?
0:07:28 Or just like, trying to get traffic back to the site.
0:07:29 I’m glad to hear your take on it.
0:07:30 – Because before then, like,
0:07:32 I don’t really consider myself a blogger
0:07:34 because I was literally blogging like,
0:07:35 I mean, if you got something out of me
0:07:37 once every four months, you’re lucky.
0:07:38 So I didn’t have anything on there
0:07:40 and trying to get my blog active.
0:07:42 And so this was kind of the way like, okay,
0:07:46 well, I know that at the time, my first year in 2015,
0:07:48 I wanted 10,000 people to sign up and we got that.
0:07:51 We got about 20,000 people signed up for the challenge.
0:07:54 And I would say about 50 to 60% of them
0:07:57 came fairly regularly to the blog via the daily emails.
0:08:00 For me, sometimes things happen that I don’t plan on,
0:08:02 but it was totally awesome.
0:08:05 So I had this online Facebook group
0:08:07 and it was specifically for when I was teaching
0:08:10 these classes in person in the community and volunteering,
0:08:12 people kept emailing me and I was like,
0:08:14 look, I can’t email everybody back the same answer.
0:08:16 I’m gonna form a Facebook group.
0:08:17 If you’re a class member,
0:08:19 if you’ve come to one of my classes,
0:08:20 post your question here.
0:08:22 I just added those people to the Facebook group.
0:08:25 And I called it Dreamcatcher’s Live Richer.
0:08:29 And somehow people from the challenge found the group.
0:08:30 I didn’t post it anywhere.
0:08:31 I don’t know how they found it.
0:08:34 And people started adding themselves and asking to join
0:08:37 and then sharing what was happening with them
0:08:38 during the challenge.
0:08:40 And I was like, this group is not for that.
0:08:43 And then I realized, duh, dummy, light bulb, this is awesome.
0:08:47 And so I started posting the group link in the blog post,
0:08:52 like, hey, tell me how you rocked out on today’s task here,
0:08:53 group link to the Facebook group.
0:08:56 And it’s a private group, so you have to request to join.
0:08:58 And that is what really made the challenge take off
0:09:01 because now you had people, 10,000 people,
0:09:05 every single day talking about one particular task
0:09:06 that you gave to them.
0:09:07 – Now you mentioned people, okay,
0:09:09 they’re gonna link to the blog
0:09:11 and then they’re gonna have an opportunity to share this
0:09:14 on their own Facebook and on Twitter and stuff,
0:09:16 starting out with your own personal network
0:09:18 that you’d built over the years,
0:09:20 doing these in-person classes.
0:09:23 I’m curious how you went from your personal network
0:09:25 in this world, and maybe you just had a huge network,
0:09:27 to getting 20,000 people over the course of a year.
0:09:31 Like, there was some element of virality there,
0:09:33 you know, a tipping point,
0:09:36 and what do you think led to that explosive growth?
0:09:38 – Honestly, it was not explosive.
0:09:40 It was, like, it was so, like,
0:09:43 because what I did was I started in,
0:09:44 I want to say June,
0:09:48 and it literally took till January of the next year
0:09:50 to get the first, like, to get 10,000.
0:09:52 Like, every week was like,
0:09:56 we had to scrape big for people to join.
0:09:58 So my initial networks, I’ll tell you,
0:10:00 when I first put it up, I think 500 people instantly.
0:10:03 So that was, like, my, hey, I know Tiffany network.
0:10:04 – But that’s good, that’s okay.
0:10:06 – You know, because you have to remember,
0:10:08 by then, I had been teaching financial education
0:10:10 in the community, and I think I had, like,
0:10:12 an email list of, like, 2,500.
0:10:15 So getting 500, it was like, okay, 500 folks.
0:10:16 – Sure, sure.
0:10:19 – And then two, before Facebook kind of, like,
0:10:21 made this illegal, when I first was starting the budget
0:10:25 in 2009, 2010, one of my homeworks to myself was,
0:10:28 I used to go and friend 100 new people a day,
0:10:30 or at least request to friend them,
0:10:32 because I knew that, like, at the time,
0:10:35 Facebook didn’t have Facebook groups or Facebook business,
0:10:37 so I was using my personal page as, like,
0:10:40 a soft business page, so I wanted a whole bunch of friends.
0:10:42 – Just random people?
0:10:43 – Yes, so what I would do is, I’d be like,
0:10:45 like, let’s just say I was your friend,
0:10:48 and I’d be like, oh, Nick and I are friends in real life.
0:10:49 Let me go through Nick’s friends list.
0:10:50 These people have headshots.
0:10:52 He looks important, friend.
0:10:54 This one looks like, you know?
0:10:56 So literally, I would friend you based upon your picture.
0:10:57 You look like you work for a company
0:10:59 that might pay me to speak, friend.
0:11:02 And so literally, like, but like,
0:11:03 obviously you cannot do that now.
0:11:06 So now I have a friend list of, like, 5,000,
0:11:09 but really it started in 2010, and then in 2010,
0:11:10 I used to post a tip of the day,
0:11:13 a financial tip of the day on my Facebook page.
0:11:15 So on Facebook, I was known as, like,
0:11:19 and my nickname on Facebook, well, my name was Tiffany,
0:11:20 the budget needs to aliche.
0:11:22 And so I’m posting tips of the day.
0:11:25 I’m sharing pictures of me speaking around in the community.
0:11:27 So I had already laid a strong foundation
0:11:30 for when the challenge came, it wasn’t this huge,
0:11:31 like, who’s this girl?
0:11:33 It was like, we’ve seen for years that she does this.
0:11:34 – Now I’m looking back.
0:11:36 I was like, yeah, I think, I think we were friends
0:11:37 on Facebook before I ever met you.
0:11:39 I was like, wait a minute.
0:11:41 – You got caught up in the Facebook.
0:11:43 Like, hey, he looks like he might be somebody
0:11:45 who might know somebody who might know somebody.
0:11:47 – Oh, you get strong, you get strong, okay.
0:11:49 – And so, so when I put it out, yes,
0:11:50 about 500 people signed up right away,
0:11:53 but then I went to school, my bachelor’s degrees
0:11:55 in marketing, and I used every marketing thing
0:11:56 I could think of.
0:11:59 I used to do a quote of the day, like,
0:12:02 did you know 60% of women, you know,
0:12:03 don’t have enough for retirement.
0:12:05 Don’t let that be used, started for the challenge.
0:12:09 So we were using all of these different tricks and tips
0:12:11 and posting all of these different quotes
0:12:13 and creating all of these meme boxes
0:12:15 to get people interested.
0:12:18 One thing that helped a lot was I reached out
0:12:20 to the first 500 and say, how many of you ladies
0:12:23 would love to be a Live Richer Challenge leader?
0:12:24 And they were like, oh my gosh,
0:12:25 ’cause women love to be like a part
0:12:26 of like an exclusive group.
0:12:28 They’re like, I would, meanwhile, it meant nothing.
0:12:30 Like, there’s no such thing as a Live Richer Challenge leader.
0:12:31 I just made it up.
0:12:34 But as a result, I got my friend who was a designer
0:12:37 to create these meme boxes where it was their picture
0:12:40 and it says, I am a Live Richer Challenge leader
0:12:42 and the website at the bottom.
0:12:44 And the women loved them ’cause they were really pretty
0:12:47 and their job as a leader was to sign up
0:12:49 between 10 and 20 of their friends.
0:12:52 And so that helped significantly.
0:12:54 And then once a month, for like six months,
0:12:56 I would talk to the leaders on the phone
0:12:58 to see what was working, what was not working.
0:13:00 The leaders formed their own Facebook pages
0:13:02 to sign up their friends and get their friends excited
0:13:04 because the leaders, most of the leaders knew me personally.
0:13:06 – So initially, yeah, there was a personal connection.
0:13:07 – Exactly.
0:13:08 So they were just like, you know,
0:13:09 to tell their friends like, oh my God, I know Tiffany,
0:13:10 she’s awesome.
0:13:11 The challenge is gonna be great
0:13:13 because people had not experienced the challenge,
0:13:14 so it was a hard sell.
0:13:16 So that helped significantly.
0:13:17 And honestly, we didn’t use,
0:13:18 I didn’t even know how to do Facebook ads.
0:13:20 I didn’t spend any money on ads
0:13:22 for the first 20,000 women.
0:13:23 – This is like, you know, taking a page
0:13:25 out of the network marketing book,
0:13:29 except without really, you know, buy my SIE drink.
0:13:30 – It was.
0:13:32 And honestly, I didn’t know anything about like,
0:13:34 you know how like you have all the marketing guys online now.
0:13:37 I didn’t know anything about any of that.
0:13:40 All I knew was intrinsically what made people move.
0:13:42 One, being part of a community.
0:13:44 Two, we used a little bit of fear tactic.
0:13:46 Like you don’t want to be the old lady eating cat food.
0:13:48 Join the challenge, you know?
0:13:50 – More with Tiffany in just a moment,
0:13:52 including the one little tactic that has stuck with me
0:13:55 even eight years later, right after this.
0:13:59 What if you no longer needed five separate apps
0:14:00 for your business bank account,
0:14:03 expense tracking, invoicing, contractor payments,
0:14:04 and tax planning?
0:14:06 I’m excited to partner with our new sponsor,
0:14:09 Found for this episode because Found is business banking
0:14:11 designed specifically for side hustlers,
0:14:14 solopreneurs, and small business owners like you.
0:14:17 Under the hood, you’ll find one easy to use app
0:14:20 to help manage your money, track your spending,
0:14:22 invoice clients, and even handle your taxes.
0:14:24 So you can focus on more important things
0:14:25 like running your business.
0:14:27 There’s no minimum balances,
0:14:28 there’s no account maintenance fees,
0:14:32 and there’s no paperwork or credit checks when you sign up.
0:14:35 One cool feature Found calls them pockets
0:14:37 lets you allocate income to certain categories
0:14:40 like marketing or taxes or profit,
0:14:42 which is really handy if you wanna practice
0:14:44 the profit first methodology,
0:14:46 but you really don’t wanna set up
0:14:47 a bunch of different accounts.
0:14:50 Over 500,000 small business owners like you
0:14:52 chose Found as their banking solution.
0:14:55 So stop getting lost in countless finance apps
0:14:59 and try Found for free at found.com/sidehustle.
0:15:04 Sign up for Found for free today at f-o-u-n-d.com/sidehustle.
0:15:08 Found is a financial technology company,
0:15:12 not a bank, banking services are provided by Pyrmont Bank,
0:15:15 member FDIC, Found’s core features are free.
0:15:19 They also offer an optional paid product, Found Plus.
0:15:21 We’re at our local street fair last month
0:15:24 and my kids are like magnets to any of these vendor booths
0:15:27 that have a prize wheel or a bowl of candy.
0:15:29 And one of those booths happens to be
0:15:32 one of the big name brand wireless carriers.
0:15:34 So the woman asks me as the kids are collecting
0:15:37 their little trinket prize, are you a customer of ours?
0:15:40 And I have to say, no, I’m actually on Mint Mobile
0:15:42 and have been for a long time.
0:15:44 So she asks, well, how much do you pay?
0:15:47 And so I tell her and she says, yeah, I can’t match that,
0:15:49 which is why I’m excited to partner
0:15:51 with Mint Mobile for this episode
0:15:54 because friends don’t let friends overpay for wireless.
0:15:56 Mint Mobile is just 15 bucks a month
0:15:58 when you purchase a three month plan.
0:16:00 And all plans come with high speed data
0:16:02 and unlimited talk and text delivered
0:16:05 on the nation’s largest 5G network.
0:16:07 You can use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan
0:16:09 and bring your own phone number
0:16:11 along with all your existing contacts.
0:16:12 To get this new customer offer
0:16:15 and your new three month premium wireless plan
0:16:16 for just 15 bucks a month,
0:16:20 go to mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:23 That’s mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:25 Cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month
0:16:28 at mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:32 $45 upfront payment required equivalent to $15 per month.
0:16:35 New customers on first three month plan only,
0:16:38 speeds slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited plan,
0:16:41 additional taxes, fees, and restrictions apply,
0:16:43 see Mint Mobile for details.
0:16:48 – Okay, so 60% of people don’t have enough for retirement.
0:16:50 One day join the challenge, next day don’t eat cat food.
0:16:53 – Yes, and then two, really to me what Tip did
0:16:55 was having the literature leaders sign up their friends.
0:16:59 Then two, what we did is in the beginning of the challenge,
0:17:02 one of the tasks were to get an accountability partner,
0:17:04 ask your friend, your coworker, your mom,
0:17:06 your sister, your someone to do the challenge with you
0:17:08 as she had to sign up too.
0:17:09 – Okay, so you’re getting like two for one?
0:17:12 – Yeah, so we said, and plus it was free,
0:17:14 but that helps significantly too.
0:17:16 So people started, and then once we kind of tipped over,
0:17:19 I think once we hit like 5,000,
0:17:21 it started to roll a little bit faster
0:17:23 because we were posting the numbers like,
0:17:24 every time we hit a big number,
0:17:26 like 5,000 women have signed up for the challenge.
0:17:27 What are you waiting for?
0:17:30 I would post it across all my social media platforms.
0:17:32 And then women would be like, oh my God, 5,000,
0:17:34 it can’t be a scam if all of these people have signed up.
0:17:36 – Yeah, the safety of numbers, right?
0:17:38 – And then what I would do was for the women
0:17:41 that did sign up, like every two weeks,
0:17:44 I would send like a awesome resource,
0:17:45 so that way they wouldn’t forget
0:17:46 that the challenge was starting.
0:17:47 So like every two weeks I’d be like,
0:17:49 hey, here’s this great website I like.
0:17:51 You know, challenge is starting in six months.
0:17:53 Hey, this is great book I’m reading.
0:17:54 Challenge is starting in six months.
0:17:56 Don’t forget to ask your mom,
0:17:57 your sister, your cousin, your friend.
0:18:01 So I kept them engaged because I started collecting people
0:18:03 a full six to eight months
0:18:05 before we actually launched the challenge.
0:18:05 – That’s a good point.
0:18:07 So this is kind of a start and stop thing.
0:18:11 It only goes for five weeks or a five week period
0:18:12 where this content is being delivered.
0:18:16 So the rest of the time is kind of like in anticipation.
0:18:18 And what happens after the fact?
0:18:19 Like, can you go through it again?
0:18:22 Or how do you engage those people?
0:18:23 If somebody wants to join in the middle,
0:18:28 like if it’s all kind of on an automated delivery system,
0:18:29 theoretically they could,
0:18:30 but like you want everybody going through
0:18:32 like the same tasks at the same time.
0:18:33 Well, in the beginning,
0:18:35 it was just my intention to do this one time.
0:18:36 Like wham, bam, thank you, ma’am.
0:18:37 I’m like, all right, we’re done.
0:18:40 And then the women were like, no, where are you going?
0:18:42 We want, like I want to do it again.
0:18:44 And I was just like, okay.
0:18:45 And so that’s when I was like,
0:18:47 – Was it the same content like the second time around?
0:18:51 – So I recognize that some women started late
0:18:53 or there was some Johnny come lately, you know?
0:18:55 Like, oh, my sister told me it was awesome.
0:18:56 Is it too late?
0:18:57 So it took me a month,
0:18:59 but I automated, yes, the same content.
0:19:01 And then we, you could just sign up for it.
0:19:03 And it would run throughout the year.
0:19:05 And then what I did was I said, you know what?
0:19:07 Let’s do a new challenge every year.
0:19:10 So 2015 was the first challenge
0:19:11 and we automated it
0:19:14 after the collective community did it in January,
0:19:16 by March, anyone could join.
0:19:19 And then by like November, I turned it off.
0:19:20 And then we started collecting people
0:19:22 for the 2016 challenge,
0:19:23 which was the savings edition,
0:19:25 which is just about savings.
0:19:27 And so we ran that in January.
0:19:29 And then as soon as it finished in February,
0:19:30 we turned it on automatic.
0:19:33 So right now that’s automated.
0:19:35 So you can join the savings edition challenge
0:19:37 or you can join the first initial challenge,
0:19:40 which covers budgeting, saving, credit, debt,
0:19:42 insurance, investing, money, mindset.
0:19:44 It covers like basically everything, you know?
0:19:47 And so both of those you can sign up for it
0:19:49 and you’ll get those automatic emails in your inbox
0:19:51 and you can do it whatever you want.
0:19:53 And so when I got the first 10,000 women,
0:19:55 those are the women who had signed up
0:19:56 by the time we started.
0:19:58 The other 10,000 came throughout the year
0:20:00 through the automated challenge.
0:20:01 If I want to sign up today, I could
0:20:03 and it would be no effort on your part.
0:20:04 Like it would be automated delivery.
0:20:05 – To automated delivery.
0:20:07 And then you would just like,
0:20:09 you would still get the same content as everybody else,
0:20:11 but automated delivery and the group still runs.
0:20:13 So now the group has shifted away
0:20:15 from being just about the challenge.
0:20:17 And now it’s just women helping women
0:20:18 with their financial lives.
0:20:21 So 24 hours a day, women post everything from,
0:20:22 somebody wrote the other day,
0:20:24 I’m so mad at my husband, I could throat punch him,
0:20:26 which I thought was hilarious.
0:20:28 She was like, he’s the worst spender.
0:20:29 He doesn’t know how to say, what can I do?
0:20:31 And so other women will give her advice,
0:20:33 which I thought was, so that’s what the group has become.
0:20:36 Like, hey, I’m buying a house, what do I do?
0:20:38 Or whoop, whoop, I bought a car
0:20:40 with the money that I saved from the challenge.
0:20:41 What are you guys up to?
0:20:42 So it’s just a support group
0:20:44 for women working on their money.
0:20:46 – What’s your time investment in, you know, moderating?
0:20:50 I mean, any group that size is going to attract spammers.
0:20:51 – Yes, for sure.
0:20:53 So one thing we do do is in the beginning,
0:20:54 you could just join.
0:20:57 Now, if someone added you, we would add you.
0:20:59 So now we have some rules that one,
0:21:00 you can’t be added by someone else.
0:21:03 So if it says Nick Loper added Dave,
0:21:05 we ignore those and we delete those requests.
0:21:06 Dave has to add himself.
0:21:08 So that helps because it’s like someone
0:21:10 has chosen to be here.
0:21:12 Two, it’s difficult to just be added to the group.
0:21:15 So one way to be added or one way to find us
0:21:18 is you go through the challenge and then you get an invite.
0:21:20 And then also on the challenge page,
0:21:23 there’s actually a little link that says like, join the forum.
0:21:25 And when you click the link, it’s actually a survey
0:21:27 that kind of runs you through the group rules
0:21:28 before you join.
0:21:30 So I have about 12 admins.
0:21:31 I don’t heavily admin the group
0:21:33 because they pretty much take care.
0:21:36 I just kind of go in and give virtual high fives
0:21:38 and answer some basic questions.
0:21:40 But we’ve got a ton of financial experts in there
0:21:42 that just like willingly share.
0:21:44 So I don’t have to be like, you know,
0:21:46 in the beginning though, it was like hours and hours.
0:21:48 But now, you know, I might spend,
0:21:50 I want to say maybe an hour a day,
0:21:51 depending like sometimes I’m having fun
0:21:53 and I spend a ton of time
0:21:55 and some days I don’t make it to the group at all.
0:21:56 – Yeah, it’s been kind of, you know,
0:21:58 I was hesitant to start the Cyanosl Nation Facebook group
0:22:00 for kind of that same feeling.
0:22:02 I don’t want another thing to manage and moderate
0:22:03 and create content for,
0:22:06 but it’s like, it’s kind of turned into this cool community
0:22:08 on its own where people are answering,
0:22:10 asking and answering questions without my involvement.
0:22:12 And I so far knock on wood, like, you know,
0:22:14 do very little moderating.
0:22:16 Like only, you know, maybe I delete one post a week
0:22:18 or something or say, hey, you know,
0:22:19 thanks for sharing that.
0:22:20 But like, can you give us a little more,
0:22:22 give us a little more meat of like,
0:22:24 what can we take away from this experience or something?
0:22:25 This is all awesome.
0:22:28 – My question for you is you’re giving it all away for free.
0:22:31 How does this help you pay the bills?
0:22:33 I know you still have like living expenses
0:22:34 and then I’ve turned this into a business.
0:22:37 So you want to talk about what that has turned into
0:22:38 as a result of this?
0:22:40 – Yeah, honestly, surprisingly, I’m not gonna lie.
0:22:41 We make a lot.
0:22:43 We make about a half a million dollars a year.
0:22:44 I know, right?
0:22:45 Sometimes I’m like–
0:22:46 – Give it away for free.
0:22:47 – Yeah, I know.
0:22:48 Honestly, and here’s how.
0:22:52 So one, I use my social influence to flex on social media.
0:22:55 So basically, you know, I’ll share like,
0:22:57 oh, like we’ve got 10,000 women doing this
0:22:59 and we’re saved 17 million dollars.
0:23:03 And so companies hired me to speak to teach their audiences.
0:23:04 So that’s one way.
0:23:07 So last year, my speaking and like book sales.
0:23:10 So even though the literature challenge
0:23:11 is actually free online,
0:23:13 yo, they kick button book sales.
0:23:15 Even though I say it on the site,
0:23:17 like because what I do is every day,
0:23:20 the task on my blog post at the bottom, it says,
0:23:23 hey, do you want to do the same challenge,
0:23:26 but in book form, maybe you’re not a computer person
0:23:27 buy the book here.
0:23:29 It’s at the bottom of every single day.
0:23:29 So for three weeks,
0:23:31 you’re seeing that little picture of the book
0:23:33 and it says that and people buy the book
0:23:35 even though they know, yo, it’s free online.
0:23:36 I’m doing it for free.
0:23:37 And that’s where I’m seeing this link.
0:23:39 And that’s the only way I advertise the books.
0:23:42 People buy like the book, like just this month alone,
0:23:44 we sold well over a thousand books this month alone.
0:23:45 – Wow.
0:23:46 – And so that’s one.
0:23:49 Two, like I said, speaking for different companies.
0:23:50 Colleges hire me.
0:23:51 Like I work with Prudential.
0:23:53 I just signed an influencer contract with Ford today.
0:23:54 – Oh wow.
0:23:55 I used to work in Ford.
0:23:56 – Really?
0:23:57 I’m excited.
0:23:58 They sent me a car.
0:23:58 I was like, okay, we can do this.
0:23:59 – What?
0:24:00 – I know.
0:24:01 – Jeez.
0:24:03 – And so, but because that happens when
0:24:07 because I’m treating my audience well, they come,
0:24:09 they stay and they’re interactive.
0:24:12 And as a result, companies want to get close to that.
0:24:13 So they pay.
0:24:14 And so last year, like I said,
0:24:15 so last year in speaking and in book sales,
0:24:17 I made about $150,000.
0:24:20 And then this year, we launched the Live Richer Academy.
0:24:22 So this will be the first time
0:24:24 that we really charge the individual.
0:24:26 So the Academy, the way it works is that
0:24:29 it’s a monthly fee and it’s the next level.
0:24:32 The challenge is basic financial education.
0:24:34 The Academy, I’ve gotten all these financial experts
0:24:36 from around the country to come
0:24:38 and teach a course that’s their expertise.
0:24:40 So we have a tax lady.
0:24:41 We’ve got a student loan lady.
0:24:43 You know, we’ve got people that that’s not my expertise.
0:24:45 And it costs $12.99 a month.
0:24:48 At first it was $9.99 a month when we first opened in March.
0:24:50 And now it’s $12.99 a month.
0:24:53 And we already have over 4,000 students.
0:24:55 So just do the math for 10 bucks.
0:24:57 4,000 students, that’s $40,000 a month.
0:25:00 – That’s a pretty serious, pretty serious continuity business
0:25:01 and membership business.
0:25:02 – Exactly, on top of that.
0:25:05 But that came from years of giving and giving and giving.
0:25:07 I was nervous to say, hey, audience,
0:25:08 would you pay for more?
0:25:09 Because they’re not used to paying.
0:25:11 And they were like, ah, okay.
0:25:12 And then I do affiliate links,
0:25:15 but I’m always very transparent about
0:25:16 the three or four things I actually really like.
0:25:20 Like I love digit, I love Ebates, I love credit karma.
0:25:22 So I didn’t even know that they had affiliates.
0:25:23 In the first challenge,
0:25:25 I was mentioning all of these great resources,
0:25:26 but I didn’t have a link
0:25:28 ’cause I didn’t know anything about affiliates.
0:25:29 And then a friend of mine was like,
0:25:31 why are you not making money off these suggestions?
0:25:33 I’m like, well, how do you do that?
0:25:34 And he was like, these companies have affiliate links.
0:25:36 You’re already mentioning them because you use them
0:25:37 and you love them.
0:25:38 Throw your link in there.
0:25:40 And I was like, it can’t be that much money.
0:25:40 What?
0:25:42 This year alone in affiliate money,
0:25:44 I think I probably made about $60,000 in affiliate money.
0:25:45 – It can add up.
0:25:46 – Yeah.
0:25:49 And so like all of these things combined,
0:25:52 that’s why I said like, this year at minimum,
0:25:53 we’ll take in about half a million.
0:25:56 By next year, I really at the rate that the academy
0:25:58 is growing ’cause we just opened a March
0:26:00 that will be about a million dollar a year business
0:26:01 by next year.
0:26:02 – Yeah, okay.
0:26:03 So we’re recording middle of June.
0:26:04 So it’s only three months old.
0:26:05 – Yeah.
0:26:06 And we’re already making basically like,
0:26:09 what is 40,000 times 12?
0:26:11 – Yeah, like you said, 40 grand or 50, almost 50.
0:26:14 So, and it’s easy to look at that and say,
0:26:15 wow, that’s crazy, I wanna do the same thing.
0:26:18 But it’s like, we kind of not glossed over,
0:26:21 but well, you know, we put in some time for four, five years
0:26:23 leading up to this to build, you know,
0:26:25 it’s that whole no like and trust pyramid
0:26:28 where, you know, you’ve been given this value away
0:26:31 for quite a while, but still really, really inspiring.
0:26:33 What do you see as like the next step
0:26:36 outside of the academy, outside of the speaking things?
0:26:38 Like you’re doing keynote stuff.
0:26:39 Where is this thing going?
0:26:41 – Yeah, so I do do some keynote stuff,
0:26:43 but I was asking myself that the other day
0:26:45 ’cause you know, you kind of like, ooh,
0:26:46 I remember my first goal was,
0:26:49 if I can make $500 a month, I’ll be golden.
0:26:50 You know?
0:26:51 – I’ve been there, I’ve been there.
0:26:53 – You know, and then you’re like, oh, like,
0:26:55 I mean, the academy has blown everything out of the world.
0:26:56 I’m not even gonna lie.
0:26:58 It’s not even, there’s no precedent.
0:27:00 I mean, just last year, like we’ve quadrupled this year.
0:27:03 So this, I just, I feel like honestly,
0:27:05 I just wanna do good work.
0:27:06 I’m writing a children’s book
0:27:07 since I used to be a preschool teacher.
0:27:09 I feel like there’s a lack of fun,
0:27:11 financial education materials for kids.
0:27:12 So I’m writing a children’s book.
0:27:13 And I think it would be so awesome
0:27:15 if like I have a main character in the book
0:27:17 and I want her to become like the door of the explorer,
0:27:20 but for money and kids like on Nickelodeon somewhere.
0:27:22 So that would be awesome.
0:27:24 And then like we’re opening these things
0:27:25 called dream catcher chapters.
0:27:27 So the women, which is so awesome,
0:27:31 they’ve actually started meeting monthly offline.
0:27:32 So there’s like a, there’s a New York group.
0:27:33 There’s a St. Louis group.
0:27:35 There’s a Texas group that’s 500 women strong.
0:27:37 And I’m like, wait, you guys are meeting without me?
0:27:38 What the heck?
0:27:39 How did this happen?
0:27:40 And so we’re gonna make it official.
0:27:43 So we’re gonna roll out dream catcher chapters.
0:27:45 Yeah, the dream catcher, so that’s the name of our tribe.
0:27:47 They named themselves after the name of the group,
0:27:48 dream catchers.
0:27:50 And the other day they were like, yo, we want a T-shirt.
0:27:52 And I was like, yeah, nah, I don’t really feel like it.
0:27:53 They were like, one lady was like,
0:27:55 if you don’t make a T-shirt, I’m making a T-shirt.
0:27:56 And that’s like, all right.
0:27:58 And so I put up like a design
0:28:00 and I was like, well, pick which one you guys like.
0:28:03 Over 4,000 people were like, we like this one.
0:28:05 And I’m like, wait, 4,000 times,
0:28:08 let’s just say I make a T-shirt and it’s 10 bucks profit.
0:28:09 That’s crazy.
0:28:10 And I didn’t even want to make it to,
0:28:11 not that I didn’t want to make a T-shirt,
0:28:14 but I don’t like putting out chachis just to put it out.
0:28:15 Yeah, so they’re asking for it.
0:28:16 Exactly.
0:28:17 So that’s what I’ve learned.
0:28:20 I’ve learned that I deliver what’s requested
0:28:23 and you don’t have to wonder if it’s gonna do well or not.
0:28:25 So yeah, there’s just all of these different streams
0:28:26 of income.
0:28:27 I don’t know what the end goal is.
0:28:30 The end goal is just to do dope work and make good money.
0:28:31 I’m with you.
0:28:33 Like, I don’t know, you know, I could retire tomorrow
0:28:35 and you know, what would the day look like?
0:28:36 But you’ll probably be doing the same thing
0:28:37 ’cause I love doing it.
0:28:40 It sounds like you’re kind of in the same boat.
0:28:41 So that’s really, really cool.
0:28:42 I’m curious.
0:28:43 Oh, I’m just on the membership site.
0:28:46 One of the challenges that always comes up is like,
0:28:48 well, how do I keep people in there?
0:28:49 How do people engage?
0:28:52 And so are you gonna be constantly trying to create
0:28:56 new, like exclusive content for just for that group?
0:28:58 So yeah, so the way it took, like, I’m not gonna lie.
0:29:00 This is how, you know, people really love you.
0:29:02 So when we first opened the membership site in March,
0:29:03 it totally sucked.
0:29:05 I was like, what the hell is this?
0:29:06 And people signed up.
0:29:08 And I remember we were like constantly like,
0:29:09 I thought it was awesome.
0:29:10 And so people were kind of in there.
0:29:12 And they were like, what?
0:29:14 ‘Cause it was prerecorded.
0:29:17 And they kind of ran through all of the courses so quickly.
0:29:19 And so I was like, wait, so how do I keep people engaged?
0:29:22 It took forever just to take these first 10 classes.
0:29:24 And it cost a ton of money.
0:29:26 And I was like, it’s gonna eat up all of our profits.
0:29:29 So what I did was I said, okay,
0:29:31 we started thinking of other ways to deliver.
0:29:33 So one of the things we do is we have instructors
0:29:34 now teach live.
0:29:35 I have a private YouTube channel.
0:29:39 And then I upload or I embed the video
0:29:40 into the actual Academy.
0:29:43 So once a week, you can take this live course.
0:29:45 Like right now, of course that’s happening
0:29:47 is real estate investment for beginners.
0:29:50 And so Christina teaches on Tuesday nights at seven.
0:29:52 And we haven’t had a started business course.
0:29:55 Shike teaches Wednesday nights at eight for three weeks.
0:29:57 And so that keeps people going.
0:29:58 And then every single Sunday,
0:30:00 we have an ask the expert series
0:30:04 where I find one of my dope friends to come on for a Q&A
0:30:07 about like their particular financial expertise.
0:30:09 And so I don’t have to teach the other courses,
0:30:12 but on Sundays, I do like, you know,
0:30:14 that’s kind of like where I have to invest the time.
0:30:15 It’s like on Sundays for an hour,
0:30:18 I sit and I do the Q&A and people watch live.
0:30:20 So that keeps people interested because you know,
0:30:22 there’s gonna be a new course
0:30:24 that’s gonna roll out every month or so.
0:30:26 And then every Sunday is gonna be new material.
0:30:27 So that’s what keeps them going.
0:30:29 And we have a private Facebook group
0:30:30 specifically for the Academy.
0:30:31 – Sure, well, if you need some help,
0:30:33 people have questions about side hustling.
0:30:34 You know, I’m happy to help out.
0:30:35 – No, I would love to.
0:30:37 That’s one of the biggest requests, so for sure.
0:30:38 – Absolutely.
0:30:40 Tiffany, this has been just really eye-opening stuff,
0:30:42 like an incredible movement that she built.
0:30:45 Check Tiffany out at thebudgetnista.com.
0:30:47 You find all the information about the literature challenge
0:30:49 over there, everything she’s got going on.
0:30:50 Just wanna say thank you for joining me
0:30:52 and let’s wrap this thing up
0:30:55 with your number one tip for side hustle nation.
0:30:57 – Build your tribe now.
0:30:59 I wish I wouldn’t have waited so long
0:31:02 because we’d be like probably a quarter of a million by now.
0:31:04 Start now, I don’t care if you have 10 people.
0:31:08 Build your tribe, treat them awesome, and give, give, give.
0:31:08 – Love it.
0:31:09 Thank you so much, Tiffany.
0:31:10 We’ll catch up with you soon.
0:31:11 – Thank you.
0:31:12 (upbeat music)
0:31:13 – All right, hopefully this chat with Tiffany
0:31:15 has your gears turning on.
0:31:17 What kind of free challenge you can host
0:31:19 to grow and connect with your audience?
0:31:20 I know she’s got me thinking about
0:31:22 how I can borrow her strategy there.
0:31:25 So my top takeaways from this chat, number one,
0:31:28 it starts with your network and it snowballs out from there.
0:31:30 I know this is a common theme,
0:31:32 but strengthening your relationship
0:31:34 is something you work on regardless
0:31:36 of whether or not you have a business today.
0:31:39 Like when people ask, oh, how can I get guests
0:31:41 for my podcast, it’s the same answer.
0:31:42 Like it starts with your network
0:31:43 and it spiders out from there.
0:31:44 How do I get freelance clients?
0:31:47 It starts with your network and it spiders out from there.
0:31:49 So I know you’ve heard me say that over and over again,
0:31:50 but I think it’s true.
0:31:52 Your network really is your net worth
0:31:53 and that’s how it started for Tiffany.
0:31:54 That’s how it started for me
0:31:56 and that’s how it started for just about everybody.
0:31:57 I can think of.
0:32:00 So number two, give people tangible results.
0:32:04 She gave the example of a step-by-step money saving script
0:32:05 and that’s the kind of thing
0:32:07 people can immediately take action on
0:32:09 like following a recipe, step-by-step-by-step.
0:32:10 And when they see it work,
0:32:12 they’re motivated to keep paying attention
0:32:14 and help you spread the word.
0:32:17 Takeaway number three, figure it out as you go.
0:32:19 This thing started with what Tiffany knew,
0:32:22 personal finance, including admittedly her successes
0:32:24 and her failures along the way,
0:32:26 but she didn’t know anything about online business,
0:32:28 but she figured it out one step at a time
0:32:30 and that’s what we all have to do.
0:32:33 Like I’m still figuring it out as I go.
0:32:36 So be sure to head over to sidehustlemation.com/livericher,
0:32:39 all one word, all of the budget nieces,
0:32:41 top tips from this conversation.
0:32:43 I wanna thank you guys so much for tuning in this week.
0:32:45 Until next time, let’s go out there,
0:32:46 make something happen and I’ll catch you
0:32:49 in the next edition of the “Sign Hustle” show.
0:32:49 Hustle on.
0:00:05 from the Side Hustle Show, greatest hits collection.
0:00:10 How a free challenge turned into a $500,000 a year business.
0:00:13 Welcome to the Side Hustle Show.
0:00:15 We’re aspiring part-time entrepreneurs
0:00:18 learn how to turn their side hustle dreams into reality.
0:00:21 Because your nine to five may make you a living,
0:00:23 but your five to nine makes you alive.
0:00:26 And now your host, Nick Loper.
0:00:30 (upbeat music)
0:00:32 – What’s up, what’s up, Nick Loper here.
0:00:33 Welcome to the Side Hustle Show,
0:00:36 live from beautiful Livermore, California.
0:00:39 Got an awesome, inspiring, actionable show for you today.
0:00:43 My guest is Tiffany, the budget Nista Aliche.
0:00:45 She’s a former preschool teacher who’s built up a business
0:00:47 that’s on track to do half a million dollars
0:00:48 in revenue this year.
0:00:49 And the cool thing is,
0:00:52 it all started with a completely free challenge.
0:00:54 She runs the Live Richard Challenge
0:00:56 at LiveRichardChallenge.com,
0:00:58 which has helped more than 160,000 participants
0:01:01 save a collective $17 million
0:01:04 and pay off one and a half million dollars in debt.
0:01:06 In this episode, you’re gonna hear
0:01:09 how Tiffany came up with the challenge idea,
0:01:10 how she got people to join.
0:01:12 And now the four or five revenue streams
0:01:16 she’s using to turn this thing into a super successful business.
0:01:18 Notes and links to all the resources mentioned
0:01:22 are at sidehustlenation.com/liverichard.
0:01:23 And I know Tiffany’s challenge in marketing
0:01:26 have evolved in the years since this was recorded.
0:01:28 It may not exist in the same form that we talked about,
0:01:32 but my challenge to you is to think of how you could apply
0:01:34 a similar strategy in your own niche.
0:01:37 What kind of cool value-packed challenge could you offer
0:01:41 to reach new people and turn them into raving fans?
0:01:42 Ready?
0:01:43 Let’s do it.
0:01:45 (upbeat music)
0:01:47 – I was a preschool teacher for 10 years
0:01:48 and I was doing well.
0:01:52 I mean, I was making like between $65,000 and $70,000 a year
0:01:54 because I used to tutor on the side
0:01:57 and babysitting stuff on the side and everything seemed great.
0:01:59 A group in the house where money was talked about
0:02:03 all the time, my father was a CFO and an accountant.
0:02:04 So I just learned about money at home.
0:02:08 And then when I lost my job, everything fell apart.
0:02:10 Like I lost my savings.
0:02:12 I took all the money out of my retirement account.
0:02:13 Like they tell you not to.
0:02:15 I ran up my credit card debt.
0:02:16 My house went into foreclosure.
0:02:18 I was like, sheesh.
0:02:19 Like just everything fell apart.
0:02:23 And it was in the rebuilding that I realized,
0:02:25 okay, all the lessons I kind of learned at home
0:02:26 ’cause my dad was like serious
0:02:28 about like learning about money.
0:02:31 Like he took us to like money classes and stuff.
0:02:34 So I used, you know, everything that I learned.
0:02:35 – Well, that’s a great influence.
0:02:36 – No, it was honestly.
0:02:40 And so when I was rebuilding, people would ask me,
0:02:41 well, how are you doing it?
0:02:42 Because I’m in the same position.
0:02:45 So I just started showing family and friends
0:02:46 and that’s how it started.
0:02:47 – Family and friends are asking,
0:02:48 hey, what are you, what’s going on?
0:02:50 So did you end up getting a new job at that point?
0:02:51 Another teaching job?
0:02:53 – I knew I didn’t want to teach in the classroom anymore
0:02:55 just because I felt like I’d outgrown that.
0:02:58 So I was volunteering at all these different places
0:03:00 like the Boys and Girls Club, the United Way
0:03:02 and trying to figure out what I wanted to do,
0:03:04 thinking I wanted to be a party planner.
0:03:05 Don’t ask me where that came from.
0:03:06 But I was like, that’s what I totally want to do.
0:03:08 – That’s like everybody’s dream to be like a wedding
0:03:09 coordinator or something like that.
0:03:10 – I know.
0:03:13 And so, but in that, I found that as I was volunteering
0:03:15 for these different organizations,
0:03:17 I found myself sneaking into their classrooms
0:03:19 and watching their like presenters teach
0:03:21 and being like, that’s not how you do it.
0:03:23 And like teaching and showing them
0:03:26 and then as I was helping people
0:03:28 at the organization with their finances,
0:03:30 people started asking me more and more
0:03:31 and I would sit down with folks and they were like,
0:03:34 well, can you write us like a curriculum
0:03:35 since you’re a teacher?
0:03:36 And at the time I had my master’s
0:03:38 and I still do an education.
0:03:40 So I thought I was gonna become a principal one day,
0:03:41 but I didn’t.
0:03:44 And so I started writing curriculum and lesson plans
0:03:46 for these organizations where I was volunteering.
0:03:48 And so those lesson plans and curriculum
0:03:51 eventually became the literature challenge.
0:03:53 – Okay, listening to what people are asking you
0:03:56 for help with already, I like that.
0:03:59 What was like the first step in getting this challenge
0:03:59 off the ground?
0:04:02 I mean, did you take me about the early days?
0:04:04 Like I could, I could start like the side hustle challenge.
0:04:06 Like how am I getting my first participants?
0:04:09 – I started, I started a post at the end of 2014.
0:04:13 Like, hey, I’m gonna be doing a literature challenge.
0:04:14 It’s gonna be a free resource
0:04:16 to help you get on financial track.
0:04:18 If you’re interested, let me know below.
0:04:19 It was just a Facebook post.
0:04:21 – Just on your personal Facebook page.
0:04:22 – Mm-hmm.
0:04:24 And a ton of people were like, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.
0:04:26 ‘Cause by then I was already like three years
0:04:27 into being the budget nieces.
0:04:29 So around the city where I live,
0:04:30 people knew me to be like,
0:04:32 oh, that’s the financial education lady.
0:04:34 Because I had taught volunteering
0:04:35 does something great for you.
0:04:37 You get your face in front of so many people.
0:04:38 So people knew me.
0:04:40 So when I posted it, it wasn’t a huge surprise
0:04:44 because by then I was hosting free community classes.
0:04:45 They were sponsored by the United Way.
0:04:47 They would pay me and I would host classes
0:04:49 for the whole community to come to for free
0:04:51 and teaching financial education.
0:04:54 So when I said, hey, I’m gonna be doing it online,
0:04:57 the same stuff we do in class, people just showed interest.
0:04:58 And I did it on purpose
0:05:00 so I could start to collect interested parties.
0:05:03 And then I think I put up like an event-bright link
0:05:06 just so people can say that to add themselves to like a list.
0:05:08 And I didn’t, I wasn’t even using like, you know,
0:05:10 like Aweber or like Infusionsoft or anything like that.
0:05:12 It was just post-interest.
0:05:15 Here’s an easy free link to sign up
0:05:17 so I can collect the emails.
0:05:19 – Okay, so when somebody signs up for your event-bright thing,
0:05:20 which was it free?
0:05:21 – Yeah, it was free.
0:05:25 – Okay, so a free event-bright event.
0:05:28 And then that gave you their email address.
0:05:30 – And I started to craft
0:05:31 what I thought the challenge should be like.
0:05:34 I was like, all right, so I teach this six-week course
0:05:35 for the United Way.
0:05:37 So how do I condense this into,
0:05:39 I think at the time, the first challenge,
0:05:41 I condensed it into five weeks.
0:05:44 And the way the challenge works is I really played into
0:05:48 what I knew about people from a teaching perspective
0:05:51 is that people wanna be told exactly what to do.
0:05:53 They don’t want you to have them figure it out.
0:05:55 So I was like, okay, so instead of me saying,
0:05:57 here’s some ways to do stuff.
0:06:00 What if every single day I told you exactly what to do?
0:06:01 And so that’s the way the challenge works.
0:06:04 You sign up and every day in your inbox
0:06:06 for the length of the challenge, which is about a month,
0:06:09 you get one easy financial task that says,
0:06:12 hey, call your service provider.
0:06:13 Tell them you don’t have the money.
0:06:14 Here’s a script.
0:06:17 If they say no, here’s script number two.
0:06:20 If they say yes, here’s script number three.
0:06:22 And then let me know how it goes.
0:06:23 So that’s how each task went.
0:06:25 You didn’t have to know how to do anything
0:06:28 except for read, write, add, subtract.
0:06:30 – Okay, so for five weeks, people are getting,
0:06:32 it is all delivered through email.
0:06:33 – Yes.
0:06:34 – Are you writing these out like the day,
0:06:36 the morning of and hitting send?
0:06:39 – Yeah, in the beginning I was, and that was really hectic.
0:06:41 And so I realized, you know what?
0:06:43 Maybe are there other ways I can get people
0:06:45 to connect to different platforms?
0:06:47 So I’m like, okay, one, I finally,
0:06:48 I think I signed up at the time.
0:06:51 I use Infusionsoft now, but I was using Aweber.
0:06:54 So I’m like, okay, one, they’re opening my emails,
0:06:56 but what if I could get them to my blog?
0:06:57 So in the email, I would say,
0:07:00 hey, today’s task is learn how to budget.
0:07:02 You can learn how to rock this task here.
0:07:04 Link to the blog post.
0:07:06 So it like forces all of these people
0:07:09 to one, open my email, then two, head to my blog.
0:07:11 And then while on my blog,
0:07:13 I was like, I would have like, tweet this out.
0:07:15 So then I was like, every step of the way,
0:07:18 I was trying to get them to touch all of my platforms
0:07:20 to raise like my profile on all the platforms.
0:07:21 – Okay, okay.
0:07:22 Now there’s always a debate, like, oh, you know,
0:07:24 how much of the information do I include
0:07:25 in the body of the email?
0:07:28 Or just like, trying to get traffic back to the site.
0:07:29 I’m glad to hear your take on it.
0:07:30 – Because before then, like,
0:07:32 I don’t really consider myself a blogger
0:07:34 because I was literally blogging like,
0:07:35 I mean, if you got something out of me
0:07:37 once every four months, you’re lucky.
0:07:38 So I didn’t have anything on there
0:07:40 and trying to get my blog active.
0:07:42 And so this was kind of the way like, okay,
0:07:46 well, I know that at the time, my first year in 2015,
0:07:48 I wanted 10,000 people to sign up and we got that.
0:07:51 We got about 20,000 people signed up for the challenge.
0:07:54 And I would say about 50 to 60% of them
0:07:57 came fairly regularly to the blog via the daily emails.
0:08:00 For me, sometimes things happen that I don’t plan on,
0:08:02 but it was totally awesome.
0:08:05 So I had this online Facebook group
0:08:07 and it was specifically for when I was teaching
0:08:10 these classes in person in the community and volunteering,
0:08:12 people kept emailing me and I was like,
0:08:14 look, I can’t email everybody back the same answer.
0:08:16 I’m gonna form a Facebook group.
0:08:17 If you’re a class member,
0:08:19 if you’ve come to one of my classes,
0:08:20 post your question here.
0:08:22 I just added those people to the Facebook group.
0:08:25 And I called it Dreamcatcher’s Live Richer.
0:08:29 And somehow people from the challenge found the group.
0:08:30 I didn’t post it anywhere.
0:08:31 I don’t know how they found it.
0:08:34 And people started adding themselves and asking to join
0:08:37 and then sharing what was happening with them
0:08:38 during the challenge.
0:08:40 And I was like, this group is not for that.
0:08:43 And then I realized, duh, dummy, light bulb, this is awesome.
0:08:47 And so I started posting the group link in the blog post,
0:08:52 like, hey, tell me how you rocked out on today’s task here,
0:08:53 group link to the Facebook group.
0:08:56 And it’s a private group, so you have to request to join.
0:08:58 And that is what really made the challenge take off
0:09:01 because now you had people, 10,000 people,
0:09:05 every single day talking about one particular task
0:09:06 that you gave to them.
0:09:07 – Now you mentioned people, okay,
0:09:09 they’re gonna link to the blog
0:09:11 and then they’re gonna have an opportunity to share this
0:09:14 on their own Facebook and on Twitter and stuff,
0:09:16 starting out with your own personal network
0:09:18 that you’d built over the years,
0:09:20 doing these in-person classes.
0:09:23 I’m curious how you went from your personal network
0:09:25 in this world, and maybe you just had a huge network,
0:09:27 to getting 20,000 people over the course of a year.
0:09:31 Like, there was some element of virality there,
0:09:33 you know, a tipping point,
0:09:36 and what do you think led to that explosive growth?
0:09:38 – Honestly, it was not explosive.
0:09:40 It was, like, it was so, like,
0:09:43 because what I did was I started in,
0:09:44 I want to say June,
0:09:48 and it literally took till January of the next year
0:09:50 to get the first, like, to get 10,000.
0:09:52 Like, every week was like,
0:09:56 we had to scrape big for people to join.
0:09:58 So my initial networks, I’ll tell you,
0:10:00 when I first put it up, I think 500 people instantly.
0:10:03 So that was, like, my, hey, I know Tiffany network.
0:10:04 – But that’s good, that’s okay.
0:10:06 – You know, because you have to remember,
0:10:08 by then, I had been teaching financial education
0:10:10 in the community, and I think I had, like,
0:10:12 an email list of, like, 2,500.
0:10:15 So getting 500, it was like, okay, 500 folks.
0:10:16 – Sure, sure.
0:10:19 – And then two, before Facebook kind of, like,
0:10:21 made this illegal, when I first was starting the budget
0:10:25 in 2009, 2010, one of my homeworks to myself was,
0:10:28 I used to go and friend 100 new people a day,
0:10:30 or at least request to friend them,
0:10:32 because I knew that, like, at the time,
0:10:35 Facebook didn’t have Facebook groups or Facebook business,
0:10:37 so I was using my personal page as, like,
0:10:40 a soft business page, so I wanted a whole bunch of friends.
0:10:42 – Just random people?
0:10:43 – Yes, so what I would do is, I’d be like,
0:10:45 like, let’s just say I was your friend,
0:10:48 and I’d be like, oh, Nick and I are friends in real life.
0:10:49 Let me go through Nick’s friends list.
0:10:50 These people have headshots.
0:10:52 He looks important, friend.
0:10:54 This one looks like, you know?
0:10:56 So literally, I would friend you based upon your picture.
0:10:57 You look like you work for a company
0:10:59 that might pay me to speak, friend.
0:11:02 And so literally, like, but like,
0:11:03 obviously you cannot do that now.
0:11:06 So now I have a friend list of, like, 5,000,
0:11:09 but really it started in 2010, and then in 2010,
0:11:10 I used to post a tip of the day,
0:11:13 a financial tip of the day on my Facebook page.
0:11:15 So on Facebook, I was known as, like,
0:11:19 and my nickname on Facebook, well, my name was Tiffany,
0:11:20 the budget needs to aliche.
0:11:22 And so I’m posting tips of the day.
0:11:25 I’m sharing pictures of me speaking around in the community.
0:11:27 So I had already laid a strong foundation
0:11:30 for when the challenge came, it wasn’t this huge,
0:11:31 like, who’s this girl?
0:11:33 It was like, we’ve seen for years that she does this.
0:11:34 – Now I’m looking back.
0:11:36 I was like, yeah, I think, I think we were friends
0:11:37 on Facebook before I ever met you.
0:11:39 I was like, wait a minute.
0:11:41 – You got caught up in the Facebook.
0:11:43 Like, hey, he looks like he might be somebody
0:11:45 who might know somebody who might know somebody.
0:11:47 – Oh, you get strong, you get strong, okay.
0:11:49 – And so, so when I put it out, yes,
0:11:50 about 500 people signed up right away,
0:11:53 but then I went to school, my bachelor’s degrees
0:11:55 in marketing, and I used every marketing thing
0:11:56 I could think of.
0:11:59 I used to do a quote of the day, like,
0:12:02 did you know 60% of women, you know,
0:12:03 don’t have enough for retirement.
0:12:05 Don’t let that be used, started for the challenge.
0:12:09 So we were using all of these different tricks and tips
0:12:11 and posting all of these different quotes
0:12:13 and creating all of these meme boxes
0:12:15 to get people interested.
0:12:18 One thing that helped a lot was I reached out
0:12:20 to the first 500 and say, how many of you ladies
0:12:23 would love to be a Live Richer Challenge leader?
0:12:24 And they were like, oh my gosh,
0:12:25 ’cause women love to be like a part
0:12:26 of like an exclusive group.
0:12:28 They’re like, I would, meanwhile, it meant nothing.
0:12:30 Like, there’s no such thing as a Live Richer Challenge leader.
0:12:31 I just made it up.
0:12:34 But as a result, I got my friend who was a designer
0:12:37 to create these meme boxes where it was their picture
0:12:40 and it says, I am a Live Richer Challenge leader
0:12:42 and the website at the bottom.
0:12:44 And the women loved them ’cause they were really pretty
0:12:47 and their job as a leader was to sign up
0:12:49 between 10 and 20 of their friends.
0:12:52 And so that helped significantly.
0:12:54 And then once a month, for like six months,
0:12:56 I would talk to the leaders on the phone
0:12:58 to see what was working, what was not working.
0:13:00 The leaders formed their own Facebook pages
0:13:02 to sign up their friends and get their friends excited
0:13:04 because the leaders, most of the leaders knew me personally.
0:13:06 – So initially, yeah, there was a personal connection.
0:13:07 – Exactly.
0:13:08 So they were just like, you know,
0:13:09 to tell their friends like, oh my God, I know Tiffany,
0:13:10 she’s awesome.
0:13:11 The challenge is gonna be great
0:13:13 because people had not experienced the challenge,
0:13:14 so it was a hard sell.
0:13:16 So that helped significantly.
0:13:17 And honestly, we didn’t use,
0:13:18 I didn’t even know how to do Facebook ads.
0:13:20 I didn’t spend any money on ads
0:13:22 for the first 20,000 women.
0:13:23 – This is like, you know, taking a page
0:13:25 out of the network marketing book,
0:13:29 except without really, you know, buy my SIE drink.
0:13:30 – It was.
0:13:32 And honestly, I didn’t know anything about like,
0:13:34 you know how like you have all the marketing guys online now.
0:13:37 I didn’t know anything about any of that.
0:13:40 All I knew was intrinsically what made people move.
0:13:42 One, being part of a community.
0:13:44 Two, we used a little bit of fear tactic.
0:13:46 Like you don’t want to be the old lady eating cat food.
0:13:48 Join the challenge, you know?
0:13:50 – More with Tiffany in just a moment,
0:13:52 including the one little tactic that has stuck with me
0:13:55 even eight years later, right after this.
0:13:59 What if you no longer needed five separate apps
0:14:00 for your business bank account,
0:14:03 expense tracking, invoicing, contractor payments,
0:14:04 and tax planning?
0:14:06 I’m excited to partner with our new sponsor,
0:14:09 Found for this episode because Found is business banking
0:14:11 designed specifically for side hustlers,
0:14:14 solopreneurs, and small business owners like you.
0:14:17 Under the hood, you’ll find one easy to use app
0:14:20 to help manage your money, track your spending,
0:14:22 invoice clients, and even handle your taxes.
0:14:24 So you can focus on more important things
0:14:25 like running your business.
0:14:27 There’s no minimum balances,
0:14:28 there’s no account maintenance fees,
0:14:32 and there’s no paperwork or credit checks when you sign up.
0:14:35 One cool feature Found calls them pockets
0:14:37 lets you allocate income to certain categories
0:14:40 like marketing or taxes or profit,
0:14:42 which is really handy if you wanna practice
0:14:44 the profit first methodology,
0:14:46 but you really don’t wanna set up
0:14:47 a bunch of different accounts.
0:14:50 Over 500,000 small business owners like you
0:14:52 chose Found as their banking solution.
0:14:55 So stop getting lost in countless finance apps
0:14:59 and try Found for free at found.com/sidehustle.
0:15:04 Sign up for Found for free today at f-o-u-n-d.com/sidehustle.
0:15:08 Found is a financial technology company,
0:15:12 not a bank, banking services are provided by Pyrmont Bank,
0:15:15 member FDIC, Found’s core features are free.
0:15:19 They also offer an optional paid product, Found Plus.
0:15:21 We’re at our local street fair last month
0:15:24 and my kids are like magnets to any of these vendor booths
0:15:27 that have a prize wheel or a bowl of candy.
0:15:29 And one of those booths happens to be
0:15:32 one of the big name brand wireless carriers.
0:15:34 So the woman asks me as the kids are collecting
0:15:37 their little trinket prize, are you a customer of ours?
0:15:40 And I have to say, no, I’m actually on Mint Mobile
0:15:42 and have been for a long time.
0:15:44 So she asks, well, how much do you pay?
0:15:47 And so I tell her and she says, yeah, I can’t match that,
0:15:49 which is why I’m excited to partner
0:15:51 with Mint Mobile for this episode
0:15:54 because friends don’t let friends overpay for wireless.
0:15:56 Mint Mobile is just 15 bucks a month
0:15:58 when you purchase a three month plan.
0:16:00 And all plans come with high speed data
0:16:02 and unlimited talk and text delivered
0:16:05 on the nation’s largest 5G network.
0:16:07 You can use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan
0:16:09 and bring your own phone number
0:16:11 along with all your existing contacts.
0:16:12 To get this new customer offer
0:16:15 and your new three month premium wireless plan
0:16:16 for just 15 bucks a month,
0:16:20 go to mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:23 That’s mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:25 Cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month
0:16:28 at mintmobile.com/sidehustle.
0:16:32 $45 upfront payment required equivalent to $15 per month.
0:16:35 New customers on first three month plan only,
0:16:38 speeds slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited plan,
0:16:41 additional taxes, fees, and restrictions apply,
0:16:43 see Mint Mobile for details.
0:16:48 – Okay, so 60% of people don’t have enough for retirement.
0:16:50 One day join the challenge, next day don’t eat cat food.
0:16:53 – Yes, and then two, really to me what Tip did
0:16:55 was having the literature leaders sign up their friends.
0:16:59 Then two, what we did is in the beginning of the challenge,
0:17:02 one of the tasks were to get an accountability partner,
0:17:04 ask your friend, your coworker, your mom,
0:17:06 your sister, your someone to do the challenge with you
0:17:08 as she had to sign up too.
0:17:09 – Okay, so you’re getting like two for one?
0:17:12 – Yeah, so we said, and plus it was free,
0:17:14 but that helps significantly too.
0:17:16 So people started, and then once we kind of tipped over,
0:17:19 I think once we hit like 5,000,
0:17:21 it started to roll a little bit faster
0:17:23 because we were posting the numbers like,
0:17:24 every time we hit a big number,
0:17:26 like 5,000 women have signed up for the challenge.
0:17:27 What are you waiting for?
0:17:30 I would post it across all my social media platforms.
0:17:32 And then women would be like, oh my God, 5,000,
0:17:34 it can’t be a scam if all of these people have signed up.
0:17:36 – Yeah, the safety of numbers, right?
0:17:38 – And then what I would do was for the women
0:17:41 that did sign up, like every two weeks,
0:17:44 I would send like a awesome resource,
0:17:45 so that way they wouldn’t forget
0:17:46 that the challenge was starting.
0:17:47 So like every two weeks I’d be like,
0:17:49 hey, here’s this great website I like.
0:17:51 You know, challenge is starting in six months.
0:17:53 Hey, this is great book I’m reading.
0:17:54 Challenge is starting in six months.
0:17:56 Don’t forget to ask your mom,
0:17:57 your sister, your cousin, your friend.
0:18:01 So I kept them engaged because I started collecting people
0:18:03 a full six to eight months
0:18:05 before we actually launched the challenge.
0:18:05 – That’s a good point.
0:18:07 So this is kind of a start and stop thing.
0:18:11 It only goes for five weeks or a five week period
0:18:12 where this content is being delivered.
0:18:16 So the rest of the time is kind of like in anticipation.
0:18:18 And what happens after the fact?
0:18:19 Like, can you go through it again?
0:18:22 Or how do you engage those people?
0:18:23 If somebody wants to join in the middle,
0:18:28 like if it’s all kind of on an automated delivery system,
0:18:29 theoretically they could,
0:18:30 but like you want everybody going through
0:18:32 like the same tasks at the same time.
0:18:33 Well, in the beginning,
0:18:35 it was just my intention to do this one time.
0:18:36 Like wham, bam, thank you, ma’am.
0:18:37 I’m like, all right, we’re done.
0:18:40 And then the women were like, no, where are you going?
0:18:42 We want, like I want to do it again.
0:18:44 And I was just like, okay.
0:18:45 And so that’s when I was like,
0:18:47 – Was it the same content like the second time around?
0:18:51 – So I recognize that some women started late
0:18:53 or there was some Johnny come lately, you know?
0:18:55 Like, oh, my sister told me it was awesome.
0:18:56 Is it too late?
0:18:57 So it took me a month,
0:18:59 but I automated, yes, the same content.
0:19:01 And then we, you could just sign up for it.
0:19:03 And it would run throughout the year.
0:19:05 And then what I did was I said, you know what?
0:19:07 Let’s do a new challenge every year.
0:19:10 So 2015 was the first challenge
0:19:11 and we automated it
0:19:14 after the collective community did it in January,
0:19:16 by March, anyone could join.
0:19:19 And then by like November, I turned it off.
0:19:20 And then we started collecting people
0:19:22 for the 2016 challenge,
0:19:23 which was the savings edition,
0:19:25 which is just about savings.
0:19:27 And so we ran that in January.
0:19:29 And then as soon as it finished in February,
0:19:30 we turned it on automatic.
0:19:33 So right now that’s automated.
0:19:35 So you can join the savings edition challenge
0:19:37 or you can join the first initial challenge,
0:19:40 which covers budgeting, saving, credit, debt,
0:19:42 insurance, investing, money, mindset.
0:19:44 It covers like basically everything, you know?
0:19:47 And so both of those you can sign up for it
0:19:49 and you’ll get those automatic emails in your inbox
0:19:51 and you can do it whatever you want.
0:19:53 And so when I got the first 10,000 women,
0:19:55 those are the women who had signed up
0:19:56 by the time we started.
0:19:58 The other 10,000 came throughout the year
0:20:00 through the automated challenge.
0:20:01 If I want to sign up today, I could
0:20:03 and it would be no effort on your part.
0:20:04 Like it would be automated delivery.
0:20:05 – To automated delivery.
0:20:07 And then you would just like,
0:20:09 you would still get the same content as everybody else,
0:20:11 but automated delivery and the group still runs.
0:20:13 So now the group has shifted away
0:20:15 from being just about the challenge.
0:20:17 And now it’s just women helping women
0:20:18 with their financial lives.
0:20:21 So 24 hours a day, women post everything from,
0:20:22 somebody wrote the other day,
0:20:24 I’m so mad at my husband, I could throat punch him,
0:20:26 which I thought was hilarious.
0:20:28 She was like, he’s the worst spender.
0:20:29 He doesn’t know how to say, what can I do?
0:20:31 And so other women will give her advice,
0:20:33 which I thought was, so that’s what the group has become.
0:20:36 Like, hey, I’m buying a house, what do I do?
0:20:38 Or whoop, whoop, I bought a car
0:20:40 with the money that I saved from the challenge.
0:20:41 What are you guys up to?
0:20:42 So it’s just a support group
0:20:44 for women working on their money.
0:20:46 – What’s your time investment in, you know, moderating?
0:20:50 I mean, any group that size is going to attract spammers.
0:20:51 – Yes, for sure.
0:20:53 So one thing we do do is in the beginning,
0:20:54 you could just join.
0:20:57 Now, if someone added you, we would add you.
0:20:59 So now we have some rules that one,
0:21:00 you can’t be added by someone else.
0:21:03 So if it says Nick Loper added Dave,
0:21:05 we ignore those and we delete those requests.
0:21:06 Dave has to add himself.
0:21:08 So that helps because it’s like someone
0:21:10 has chosen to be here.
0:21:12 Two, it’s difficult to just be added to the group.
0:21:15 So one way to be added or one way to find us
0:21:18 is you go through the challenge and then you get an invite.
0:21:20 And then also on the challenge page,
0:21:23 there’s actually a little link that says like, join the forum.
0:21:25 And when you click the link, it’s actually a survey
0:21:27 that kind of runs you through the group rules
0:21:28 before you join.
0:21:30 So I have about 12 admins.
0:21:31 I don’t heavily admin the group
0:21:33 because they pretty much take care.
0:21:36 I just kind of go in and give virtual high fives
0:21:38 and answer some basic questions.
0:21:40 But we’ve got a ton of financial experts in there
0:21:42 that just like willingly share.
0:21:44 So I don’t have to be like, you know,
0:21:46 in the beginning though, it was like hours and hours.
0:21:48 But now, you know, I might spend,
0:21:50 I want to say maybe an hour a day,
0:21:51 depending like sometimes I’m having fun
0:21:53 and I spend a ton of time
0:21:55 and some days I don’t make it to the group at all.
0:21:56 – Yeah, it’s been kind of, you know,
0:21:58 I was hesitant to start the Cyanosl Nation Facebook group
0:22:00 for kind of that same feeling.
0:22:02 I don’t want another thing to manage and moderate
0:22:03 and create content for,
0:22:06 but it’s like, it’s kind of turned into this cool community
0:22:08 on its own where people are answering,
0:22:10 asking and answering questions without my involvement.
0:22:12 And I so far knock on wood, like, you know,
0:22:14 do very little moderating.
0:22:16 Like only, you know, maybe I delete one post a week
0:22:18 or something or say, hey, you know,
0:22:19 thanks for sharing that.
0:22:20 But like, can you give us a little more,
0:22:22 give us a little more meat of like,
0:22:24 what can we take away from this experience or something?
0:22:25 This is all awesome.
0:22:28 – My question for you is you’re giving it all away for free.
0:22:31 How does this help you pay the bills?
0:22:33 I know you still have like living expenses
0:22:34 and then I’ve turned this into a business.
0:22:37 So you want to talk about what that has turned into
0:22:38 as a result of this?
0:22:40 – Yeah, honestly, surprisingly, I’m not gonna lie.
0:22:41 We make a lot.
0:22:43 We make about a half a million dollars a year.
0:22:44 I know, right?
0:22:45 Sometimes I’m like–
0:22:46 – Give it away for free.
0:22:47 – Yeah, I know.
0:22:48 Honestly, and here’s how.
0:22:52 So one, I use my social influence to flex on social media.
0:22:55 So basically, you know, I’ll share like,
0:22:57 oh, like we’ve got 10,000 women doing this
0:22:59 and we’re saved 17 million dollars.
0:23:03 And so companies hired me to speak to teach their audiences.
0:23:04 So that’s one way.
0:23:07 So last year, my speaking and like book sales.
0:23:10 So even though the literature challenge
0:23:11 is actually free online,
0:23:13 yo, they kick button book sales.
0:23:15 Even though I say it on the site,
0:23:17 like because what I do is every day,
0:23:20 the task on my blog post at the bottom, it says,
0:23:23 hey, do you want to do the same challenge,
0:23:26 but in book form, maybe you’re not a computer person
0:23:27 buy the book here.
0:23:29 It’s at the bottom of every single day.
0:23:29 So for three weeks,
0:23:31 you’re seeing that little picture of the book
0:23:33 and it says that and people buy the book
0:23:35 even though they know, yo, it’s free online.
0:23:36 I’m doing it for free.
0:23:37 And that’s where I’m seeing this link.
0:23:39 And that’s the only way I advertise the books.
0:23:42 People buy like the book, like just this month alone,
0:23:44 we sold well over a thousand books this month alone.
0:23:45 – Wow.
0:23:46 – And so that’s one.
0:23:49 Two, like I said, speaking for different companies.
0:23:50 Colleges hire me.
0:23:51 Like I work with Prudential.
0:23:53 I just signed an influencer contract with Ford today.
0:23:54 – Oh wow.
0:23:55 I used to work in Ford.
0:23:56 – Really?
0:23:57 I’m excited.
0:23:58 They sent me a car.
0:23:58 I was like, okay, we can do this.
0:23:59 – What?
0:24:00 – I know.
0:24:01 – Jeez.
0:24:03 – And so, but because that happens when
0:24:07 because I’m treating my audience well, they come,
0:24:09 they stay and they’re interactive.
0:24:12 And as a result, companies want to get close to that.
0:24:13 So they pay.
0:24:14 And so last year, like I said,
0:24:15 so last year in speaking and in book sales,
0:24:17 I made about $150,000.
0:24:20 And then this year, we launched the Live Richer Academy.
0:24:22 So this will be the first time
0:24:24 that we really charge the individual.
0:24:26 So the Academy, the way it works is that
0:24:29 it’s a monthly fee and it’s the next level.
0:24:32 The challenge is basic financial education.
0:24:34 The Academy, I’ve gotten all these financial experts
0:24:36 from around the country to come
0:24:38 and teach a course that’s their expertise.
0:24:40 So we have a tax lady.
0:24:41 We’ve got a student loan lady.
0:24:43 You know, we’ve got people that that’s not my expertise.
0:24:45 And it costs $12.99 a month.
0:24:48 At first it was $9.99 a month when we first opened in March.
0:24:50 And now it’s $12.99 a month.
0:24:53 And we already have over 4,000 students.
0:24:55 So just do the math for 10 bucks.
0:24:57 4,000 students, that’s $40,000 a month.
0:25:00 – That’s a pretty serious, pretty serious continuity business
0:25:01 and membership business.
0:25:02 – Exactly, on top of that.
0:25:05 But that came from years of giving and giving and giving.
0:25:07 I was nervous to say, hey, audience,
0:25:08 would you pay for more?
0:25:09 Because they’re not used to paying.
0:25:11 And they were like, ah, okay.
0:25:12 And then I do affiliate links,
0:25:15 but I’m always very transparent about
0:25:16 the three or four things I actually really like.
0:25:20 Like I love digit, I love Ebates, I love credit karma.
0:25:22 So I didn’t even know that they had affiliates.
0:25:23 In the first challenge,
0:25:25 I was mentioning all of these great resources,
0:25:26 but I didn’t have a link
0:25:28 ’cause I didn’t know anything about affiliates.
0:25:29 And then a friend of mine was like,
0:25:31 why are you not making money off these suggestions?
0:25:33 I’m like, well, how do you do that?
0:25:34 And he was like, these companies have affiliate links.
0:25:36 You’re already mentioning them because you use them
0:25:37 and you love them.
0:25:38 Throw your link in there.
0:25:40 And I was like, it can’t be that much money.
0:25:40 What?
0:25:42 This year alone in affiliate money,
0:25:44 I think I probably made about $60,000 in affiliate money.
0:25:45 – It can add up.
0:25:46 – Yeah.
0:25:49 And so like all of these things combined,
0:25:52 that’s why I said like, this year at minimum,
0:25:53 we’ll take in about half a million.
0:25:56 By next year, I really at the rate that the academy
0:25:58 is growing ’cause we just opened a March
0:26:00 that will be about a million dollar a year business
0:26:01 by next year.
0:26:02 – Yeah, okay.
0:26:03 So we’re recording middle of June.
0:26:04 So it’s only three months old.
0:26:05 – Yeah.
0:26:06 And we’re already making basically like,
0:26:09 what is 40,000 times 12?
0:26:11 – Yeah, like you said, 40 grand or 50, almost 50.
0:26:14 So, and it’s easy to look at that and say,
0:26:15 wow, that’s crazy, I wanna do the same thing.
0:26:18 But it’s like, we kind of not glossed over,
0:26:21 but well, you know, we put in some time for four, five years
0:26:23 leading up to this to build, you know,
0:26:25 it’s that whole no like and trust pyramid
0:26:28 where, you know, you’ve been given this value away
0:26:31 for quite a while, but still really, really inspiring.
0:26:33 What do you see as like the next step
0:26:36 outside of the academy, outside of the speaking things?
0:26:38 Like you’re doing keynote stuff.
0:26:39 Where is this thing going?
0:26:41 – Yeah, so I do do some keynote stuff,
0:26:43 but I was asking myself that the other day
0:26:45 ’cause you know, you kind of like, ooh,
0:26:46 I remember my first goal was,
0:26:49 if I can make $500 a month, I’ll be golden.
0:26:50 You know?
0:26:51 – I’ve been there, I’ve been there.
0:26:53 – You know, and then you’re like, oh, like,
0:26:55 I mean, the academy has blown everything out of the world.
0:26:56 I’m not even gonna lie.
0:26:58 It’s not even, there’s no precedent.
0:27:00 I mean, just last year, like we’ve quadrupled this year.
0:27:03 So this, I just, I feel like honestly,
0:27:05 I just wanna do good work.
0:27:06 I’m writing a children’s book
0:27:07 since I used to be a preschool teacher.
0:27:09 I feel like there’s a lack of fun,
0:27:11 financial education materials for kids.
0:27:12 So I’m writing a children’s book.
0:27:13 And I think it would be so awesome
0:27:15 if like I have a main character in the book
0:27:17 and I want her to become like the door of the explorer,
0:27:20 but for money and kids like on Nickelodeon somewhere.
0:27:22 So that would be awesome.
0:27:24 And then like we’re opening these things
0:27:25 called dream catcher chapters.
0:27:27 So the women, which is so awesome,
0:27:31 they’ve actually started meeting monthly offline.
0:27:32 So there’s like a, there’s a New York group.
0:27:33 There’s a St. Louis group.
0:27:35 There’s a Texas group that’s 500 women strong.
0:27:37 And I’m like, wait, you guys are meeting without me?
0:27:38 What the heck?
0:27:39 How did this happen?
0:27:40 And so we’re gonna make it official.
0:27:43 So we’re gonna roll out dream catcher chapters.
0:27:45 Yeah, the dream catcher, so that’s the name of our tribe.
0:27:47 They named themselves after the name of the group,
0:27:48 dream catchers.
0:27:50 And the other day they were like, yo, we want a T-shirt.
0:27:52 And I was like, yeah, nah, I don’t really feel like it.
0:27:53 They were like, one lady was like,
0:27:55 if you don’t make a T-shirt, I’m making a T-shirt.
0:27:56 And that’s like, all right.
0:27:58 And so I put up like a design
0:28:00 and I was like, well, pick which one you guys like.
0:28:03 Over 4,000 people were like, we like this one.
0:28:05 And I’m like, wait, 4,000 times,
0:28:08 let’s just say I make a T-shirt and it’s 10 bucks profit.
0:28:09 That’s crazy.
0:28:10 And I didn’t even want to make it to,
0:28:11 not that I didn’t want to make a T-shirt,
0:28:14 but I don’t like putting out chachis just to put it out.
0:28:15 Yeah, so they’re asking for it.
0:28:16 Exactly.
0:28:17 So that’s what I’ve learned.
0:28:20 I’ve learned that I deliver what’s requested
0:28:23 and you don’t have to wonder if it’s gonna do well or not.
0:28:25 So yeah, there’s just all of these different streams
0:28:26 of income.
0:28:27 I don’t know what the end goal is.
0:28:30 The end goal is just to do dope work and make good money.
0:28:31 I’m with you.
0:28:33 Like, I don’t know, you know, I could retire tomorrow
0:28:35 and you know, what would the day look like?
0:28:36 But you’ll probably be doing the same thing
0:28:37 ’cause I love doing it.
0:28:40 It sounds like you’re kind of in the same boat.
0:28:41 So that’s really, really cool.
0:28:42 I’m curious.
0:28:43 Oh, I’m just on the membership site.
0:28:46 One of the challenges that always comes up is like,
0:28:48 well, how do I keep people in there?
0:28:49 How do people engage?
0:28:52 And so are you gonna be constantly trying to create
0:28:56 new, like exclusive content for just for that group?
0:28:58 So yeah, so the way it took, like, I’m not gonna lie.
0:29:00 This is how, you know, people really love you.
0:29:02 So when we first opened the membership site in March,
0:29:03 it totally sucked.
0:29:05 I was like, what the hell is this?
0:29:06 And people signed up.
0:29:08 And I remember we were like constantly like,
0:29:09 I thought it was awesome.
0:29:10 And so people were kind of in there.
0:29:12 And they were like, what?
0:29:14 ‘Cause it was prerecorded.
0:29:17 And they kind of ran through all of the courses so quickly.
0:29:19 And so I was like, wait, so how do I keep people engaged?
0:29:22 It took forever just to take these first 10 classes.
0:29:24 And it cost a ton of money.
0:29:26 And I was like, it’s gonna eat up all of our profits.
0:29:29 So what I did was I said, okay,
0:29:31 we started thinking of other ways to deliver.
0:29:33 So one of the things we do is we have instructors
0:29:34 now teach live.
0:29:35 I have a private YouTube channel.
0:29:39 And then I upload or I embed the video
0:29:40 into the actual Academy.
0:29:43 So once a week, you can take this live course.
0:29:45 Like right now, of course that’s happening
0:29:47 is real estate investment for beginners.
0:29:50 And so Christina teaches on Tuesday nights at seven.
0:29:52 And we haven’t had a started business course.
0:29:55 Shike teaches Wednesday nights at eight for three weeks.
0:29:57 And so that keeps people going.
0:29:58 And then every single Sunday,
0:30:00 we have an ask the expert series
0:30:04 where I find one of my dope friends to come on for a Q&A
0:30:07 about like their particular financial expertise.
0:30:09 And so I don’t have to teach the other courses,
0:30:12 but on Sundays, I do like, you know,
0:30:14 that’s kind of like where I have to invest the time.
0:30:15 It’s like on Sundays for an hour,
0:30:18 I sit and I do the Q&A and people watch live.
0:30:20 So that keeps people interested because you know,
0:30:22 there’s gonna be a new course
0:30:24 that’s gonna roll out every month or so.
0:30:26 And then every Sunday is gonna be new material.
0:30:27 So that’s what keeps them going.
0:30:29 And we have a private Facebook group
0:30:30 specifically for the Academy.
0:30:31 – Sure, well, if you need some help,
0:30:33 people have questions about side hustling.
0:30:34 You know, I’m happy to help out.
0:30:35 – No, I would love to.
0:30:37 That’s one of the biggest requests, so for sure.
0:30:38 – Absolutely.
0:30:40 Tiffany, this has been just really eye-opening stuff,
0:30:42 like an incredible movement that she built.
0:30:45 Check Tiffany out at thebudgetnista.com.
0:30:47 You find all the information about the literature challenge
0:30:49 over there, everything she’s got going on.
0:30:50 Just wanna say thank you for joining me
0:30:52 and let’s wrap this thing up
0:30:55 with your number one tip for side hustle nation.
0:30:57 – Build your tribe now.
0:30:59 I wish I wouldn’t have waited so long
0:31:02 because we’d be like probably a quarter of a million by now.
0:31:04 Start now, I don’t care if you have 10 people.
0:31:08 Build your tribe, treat them awesome, and give, give, give.
0:31:08 – Love it.
0:31:09 Thank you so much, Tiffany.
0:31:10 We’ll catch up with you soon.
0:31:11 – Thank you.
0:31:12 (upbeat music)
0:31:13 – All right, hopefully this chat with Tiffany
0:31:15 has your gears turning on.
0:31:17 What kind of free challenge you can host
0:31:19 to grow and connect with your audience?
0:31:20 I know she’s got me thinking about
0:31:22 how I can borrow her strategy there.
0:31:25 So my top takeaways from this chat, number one,
0:31:28 it starts with your network and it snowballs out from there.
0:31:30 I know this is a common theme,
0:31:32 but strengthening your relationship
0:31:34 is something you work on regardless
0:31:36 of whether or not you have a business today.
0:31:39 Like when people ask, oh, how can I get guests
0:31:41 for my podcast, it’s the same answer.
0:31:42 Like it starts with your network
0:31:43 and it spiders out from there.
0:31:44 How do I get freelance clients?
0:31:47 It starts with your network and it spiders out from there.
0:31:49 So I know you’ve heard me say that over and over again,
0:31:50 but I think it’s true.
0:31:52 Your network really is your net worth
0:31:53 and that’s how it started for Tiffany.
0:31:54 That’s how it started for me
0:31:56 and that’s how it started for just about everybody.
0:31:57 I can think of.
0:32:00 So number two, give people tangible results.
0:32:04 She gave the example of a step-by-step money saving script
0:32:05 and that’s the kind of thing
0:32:07 people can immediately take action on
0:32:09 like following a recipe, step-by-step-by-step.
0:32:10 And when they see it work,
0:32:12 they’re motivated to keep paying attention
0:32:14 and help you spread the word.
0:32:17 Takeaway number three, figure it out as you go.
0:32:19 This thing started with what Tiffany knew,
0:32:22 personal finance, including admittedly her successes
0:32:24 and her failures along the way,
0:32:26 but she didn’t know anything about online business,
0:32:28 but she figured it out one step at a time
0:32:30 and that’s what we all have to do.
0:32:33 Like I’m still figuring it out as I go.
0:32:36 So be sure to head over to sidehustlemation.com/livericher,
0:32:39 all one word, all of the budget nieces,
0:32:41 top tips from this conversation.
0:32:43 I wanna thank you guys so much for tuning in this week.
0:32:45 Until next time, let’s go out there,
0:32:46 make something happen and I’ll catch you
0:32:49 in the next edition of the “Sign Hustle” show.
0:32:49 Hustle on.
More than 150,000 women have completed Tiffany “The Budgetnetista” Aliche’s Live Richer Challenge. The roughly 30-day challenge participants step-by-step instructions on how to get their financial lives in order, get out of debt, and start saving money.
Collectively, Tiffany’s tribe has saved $17 million and paid off $1.5 in debt!
I first heard Tiffany tell the story of how she started the challenge and how that’s turned into a thriving business at FinCon last year, and am excited to share it with you this week.
This year, The Budgetnetista expects to bring in more than $500,000 from speaking, book sales, sponsors and affiliate relationships, and a new private membership academy.
I think her model can be replicated across a number of different niches and industries so you can apply these same strategies and tactics in your business.
Tune in to hear how the former preschool teacher came up with the idea for the challenge, the innovative way she grew her tribe, and how giving it all away for free turned into a very profitable venture.
Full Show Notes: How a Free Challenge Turned Into a $500,000 a Year Business
New to the Show? Get your personalized money-making playlist here!
Sponsors:
Found — Stop getting lost in countless finance apps and try Found for free!
Indeed – Start hiring NOW with a $75 sponsored job credit to upgrade your job post!
Mint Mobile — Cut your wireless bill to $15 a month!
Airbnb — Discover unique stays and unforgettable experiences – find your dream getaway today!