Resources
Business & Legal
Recommendations only - I am NOT a financial advisor.
First thing - Make it legal. Not totally necessary but you'll thank me when it's time to pay taxes. Whether it's a DBA or you take it as far as an LLC or S Corp, I leave that up to you. You can make it legal using incfile.com. It's fast, easy and cheap.
Manage Your Money (Important)
To make it as easy to manage as possible. You should have these 4 things.
Personal Account:
Pretty self-explanatory. Keep your personal spend separate from your business.
Business Account:
Deposit all funds here made from your business and pay yourself from this account. I would, however, recommend paying all business expenses from your business credit card. Rack up as many miles or cash back as you can, depending on what card or perk you prefer. Think of your Business Bank Account as REVENUE and your Business Credit Card as EXPENSES.
Business Credit Card
Use this card for ALL expenses. Advertising and bills associated with your business. This could be software such as page builders, autoresponders, legal such as Incfile, accounting apps, everything. Again, I'm going to rephrase this here - I am not a financial advisor. Any bills you pay currently that could reflect as a business expense - do it. i.e. phone, internet, miles, car, business mentorships (hint hint) etc... Write as much off as you can (legally, of course) and save some money.
Accounting App
This is the thing that brings everything together. I love using Quickbooks self-employed. You can merge your bank accounts and set rules to automate everything for you. The only thing I merge here is my business Bank account for invoicing and my business Credit Card for expenses. You can also submit and integrate everything to Turbo Tax in itemized fashion for a speedy and easy tax season.
Tools
By now, we should have already had our first meeting, and I've recommended what tools to use for your specific business. I'll list most of them here with a quick link for easy access. If for any reason something isn't listed, as always, just send me a Skype message, and I'll point you in the right direction. FYI, everything listed here is a business expense.
Clickfunnels (pagebuilder):
You will only need the basic plan. $97/month. You most likely will not need the upgraded plan unless I told you to do so.
WordPress & Elementor (pagebuilder):
Two separate accounts that integrate into one. WordPress - get the business version. Elementor - get the pro version.
Aweber (Autoresponder/follow-up/list builder):
I have been using Aweber for over 10 years. Excellent deliverability and easy to use. If you already have one, that's fine - just my recommendation.
ScheduleOnce (Auto appointment booking and calendar service)
If you are speaking to people on the phone in a number of industries. This is for you. Get the professional edition.
Provesource (Social Proof)
I don't have a lot to say about this one. Sometimes it's cool, other times unnecessary. More often than not, you can probably get away with the free version.
As always - if you have any questions about any of this. Just reach me on Skype.
