Hey, badass. Thanks for tuning in. And can I just say, the love that we have been getting since launching the badass empires Instagram, and the reaction and feedback to the first few episodes of the podcast? Wow, it has been incredible. I'm just so, so excited for this journey. I have messages coming in saying, "This has happened to me at the exact right time. This is something I've always wanted to do, but didn't know how to start." You know, I've just maybe had a major life transition. Someone said they have had a baby, and they have a little one-year-old girl, and they hate having to leave her every day to go to work. And they've been wondering, "Is there a better way?" It just made me so determined, even more committed to this mission and making this thing work. Because I've got a lot to say, I've got a lot to teach. And I think there are a lot of people out there who are going to be building empires, which I am incredibly excited for. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Now, let's talk about business models. There are a lot of myths around businesses, right? Especially because rules and old truths around physical, brick-and-mortar-based businesses are very different from online businesses. That's why people say business is risky, hard, and you have to lose money in your first few months or years for it to work. Most businesses fail, right? We've heard all these things around how business is this risky, scary option that doesn't work out for most people. The reality is, from where I'm sitting today, four years in, my revenue is incredibly stable and consistent, pretty predictable. In the grand scheme of things, I leave room for magic and for happy surprises. There is a way for this to all come together without taking much risk at all. And for literally $0, you can get started. It doesn't cost a lot; you don't risk much money to get started.
All of this to say, I really feel that I've hacked the system and found a business model that is, in my opinion, the safest and most profitable way to do business. It's the business model I'm using here with badass empires, the business model of badass careers. If you've listened to my origin story episode, you know that I've been around the block, trying out different ways of hustling, making money online, figuring out how this all works. I've tried job dropshipping, consulting, freelancing, affiliate marketing, and I grew a really successful YouTube channel on the side. So, I've tried out lots of different things. But nothing compares to this business model, which is the safest, most sustainable, predictable, and profitable way to make money online. It's through a service-based or expertise-based business model where you monetize your knowledge or passion area by educating and empowering people in that particular area.
In other words, you take your knowledge, experience, expertise, qualifications, and something not always, in fact, most of the time not, formal qualifications. But maybe you have skills and experience through some kind of qualification, whatever it is. You know that you could help other people make progress in that area. Some examples might be helping people land more interviews and dream jobs. Hello, badass careers, helping women regulate their hormones through food choices, helping people train their dogs, helping people get their babies to sleep through the night, helping people go vegan, helping people take good care of themselves, whatever it may be. If you're particularly skilled in that area.
I could be helping people to go vegan helping people to take good selfies seriously, I have been in the room with a multi millionaire, online service based business owner, who teaches other people how to take really good selfies, and take their own photos with social media. Okay, it could be helping people to build their websites live a minimalist lifestyle, achieve early retirement, even overcome urinary incontinence, like anything you can think of. That's an expertise. Okay, so the goal of an online expert based business model, is to design a business you can run from anywhere that you have Wi Fi, it comes with an overflow of both purpose and profit. And essentially feels damn good to run. It's often called a service based business model as well, because you can make money by being of service to other people and helping them get from point A to point B, where they currently are to where they want to go. So if you're in the business of being of service to people, or helping people online, you will typically do so by becoming a coach, a mentor, a consultant, a course creator, or a content creator, slash educator, slash, thought leader, and often several of these all at once. Okay, so essentially, it's around building a personal brand faced.
And often several of these all at once, right, there's nothing stopping you from being a coach who sells courses, who does speaking events that you name it, and do some consulting on the side for corporates. Essentially, you create an offer that helps people to take action and achieve their goals. And at the simplest level, I want to break this down. So at the simplest level
So at the simplest level, I want to break this service based model, this expertise based business model down for you. And to just three core components. This is all attacks. Number one, you figure out how you can use your expertise to help a specific type of person to achieve a specific result. Number two, you build an online community where you can be of immense value to those people for free, backed by your own unique personal brand. And number three, you design and sell a VIP product or service to the most motivated subset of that community, the subset who want to go deeper and get results even faster, by working with you. The cool thing about this business model, which blows my mind still today is that it really is one of the most safest and sustainable online business models because you're leveraging who you are, which is all yours. It's your personal brand as your story. It's your knowledge, your experience, your expertise. And you're leveraging that to help people. And this way, you will not only the owner of your brand, the owner of your audience, the owner of your email list, your costs, your programme materials, your intellectual property, your client experience, but you have a huge degree of control over your income and profit. Because it's a business model that doesn't rely on anyone else. On any external platform. Even if you use the power of social media to grow your audience, you'll have your email list, you'll make sure that you are keeping your data in a place that you own. Okay. And this is a very different dynamic to something like affiliate marketing. Okay, so with my YouTube channel, I tried out affiliate marketing where essentially, I'm sure you've seen it before, and the description of YouTube videos, or blogs or whatever it is, you can recommend products. And these products are affiliate links. So if someone clicks on that link, and ends up buying that product, you might get, say a 3% payout. The cool thing about using something like Amazon, for example, say I recommended a book on French grammar. And people clicked on that link. They checked out the book that I recommended on French grammar, and they decided not to buy it. But hey, while they were on Amazon, they started looking for a brand new camera for example, and they ended up buying I camera, because I was the one who referred them to the site, I'll still get a certain percentage of that sale, even though it wasn't the specific product that I recommended, okay, so it's quite a cool thing to try out.
However, if Amazon decides to cut its affiliate marketing program or reduce its commissions from 3% to 0.2%, my earnings change drastically, and I can't do anything about it. The same concept applies to something like dropshipping. What if the platform or people printing and shipping your dropshipping goods increase their prices? What if their payouts decrease, and so on and so forth? It's very different from something like being a freelancer, where you're still trading time for money and have income caps. As a freelancer, there are typical market rates, and that tends to play into the hourly rate structure. You can only charge so much per hour, and you can only work so many hours per week. This is why many models out there have these massive limits. In contrast, the expertise-based business model reigns supreme for several reasons. Firstly, it's highly profitable. You don't have any rent to pay, no brick-and-mortar building, and no need to keep the lights on. You work from home using your Wi-Fi connection, and you don't have to pay investors or shareholders. It's literally free to start and extremely cheap to scale, making it very low risk. You don't have to hire or delegate until you want to. It's you and your time as the biggest investment. And let's be honest, you'd invest time into any business. Additionally, it's highly purposeful. Unlike other ventures, you get paid to help people and make a genuine difference in their lives. Whether it's writing resumes, balancing hormones, helping babies sleep through the night, or exploring non-monogamous relationships in a safe and positive way, you're helping people achieve results faster by showing them the way, step by step. The expertise-based model is also incredibly lifestyle-friendly. You get to work where you want, when you want, and how often you want. You're in charge of your schedule, offer design, and the number of clients you have. If you want fewer clients, raise your prices or change your business model. It offers incredible flexibility to adapt to life's ups and downs. The business model is extremely low barrier to entry; all you need is an idea, a phone, and a computer with a Wi-Fi connection. While there might be exceptions, most cases do not require any formal qualifications to get started. You don't need a degree or certification to become a coach; it's about getting results and helping others progress, not a piece of paper. This model is also full of growth opportunities. You start with the expertise you have today, and as you continue learning, you can help others who are just starting on their journey. Share your knowledge, develop your expertise, and grow over the years.
When I started with Badass Careers, for example, I had worked in human resources, leadership, and leadership development globally all around the world. I had an incredible corporate career in the Human Resources space. However, I had never specifically helped people find their life purpose. That is not something that I had been trained in or had done. It was adjacent to other activities that I had done. For example, I had helped people know their strengths or guided them through Coaching Questions and helped them understand their results. I had sort of gone around the edges of that, but I had never actually done that. So when I started Badass Careers, I began with what I did know—the expertise I had in the career space, particularly helping people write and review their resumes, cover letters, and LinkedIn profiles. I was very pragmatic and practical upfront, knowing that ultimately, my purpose was to help people gain career clarity, find a career purpose, and design fulfilling careers, even though I hadn't done it before. I started with resumes, cover letters, LinkedIn, and job search stuff because that was easier for me to get started with. In the meantime, I upskilled, read research, spoke with people, tried coaching people for free, worked with beta clients, and did many things to learn what it might take to help someone find their purpose. I developed that methodology over time while still working with clients, making money, starting my business, and getting cash in the door. Then, I felt ready to go to the next level and offer purpose coaching. You don't have to know everything from the get-go. You get to keep learning, growing, and building various skills. As a solopreneur, doing everything yourself, you will learn about content marketing, budgeting, business forecasting, and business plans. Keep researching and becoming the expert and thought leader you want to be. The expertise-based business is the best because it is highly scalable. Everything you learn from working with clients one-on-one can be developed into multiple income streams. You could create self-study courses, run workshops, become a keynote speaker, or write a book. The options are endless. Start by helping people one-on-one first; it lays the groundwork for developing a solid framework that works for a broader audience. The expertise-based business is also highly switchable. Even if you decide to do something different later on, all your business assets, including skills, content creation abilities, audience, email list, everything you've developed, and lessons learned, come with you. This flexibility and the trust and personal brand you've built up will contribute to your success in anything you choose to do. It's also really fun. You get to continually research your favorite topic, educate people, share your knowledge, get creative, empower people to transform their lives, and make incredible money—all at the same time. It's the sweet spot between being purposeful, profitable, and scalable. Money doesn't depend on how many hours you show up physically at a desk anymore. You fully own what you create, giving you freedom over what you offer, talk about, and work on. For all these reasons and many more, I hope you understand why we are focused on helping people build expertise-based lifestyle businesses. That is the vibe of a Badass Empire. I would love to hear from you. Do you have any empire ideas of your own that would suit this expertise-based lifestyle business model? Do you have any questions about how it works? Screenshot this episode, tag me in your story, and I will reshare it on my Instagram. I look forward to hearing from you at @badassempires_. Until next week, Reign on My Badass, and we will speak very soon.
