333: How Long Does It Take To Make Money With Your Business With Steve Chou

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You’re listening to the My Wife Quitter Job podcast, the place where I bring on successful bootstrap business owners and delve deeply into the strategies they use to grow their businesses. Today, I’m doing a solo episode to answer one of the top three questions that I get almost every single week. How long does it take to make money with your business? But before we get into all that, I want to give you guys some quick updates about my e-commerce store over at bumblebelenons.com. Because many of you have been asking me about how COVID has affected our business.

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And I’m happy to say that this past November was the all time highest month that we’ve ever had and we’re significantly up for the year despite having the worst March and April in the history of the company. Now the pandemic has really caused e-commerce to skyrocket. And in my humble opinion, there’s no better time to be starting an e-commerce business. Now to keep things in perspective, I also want to give you the bad with the good. Now, even though we had a record number of orders, the pandemic has also prevented us from hiring people to work in our warehouse.

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So we’re actually pretty short staff right now and orders are coming in a little bit faster than we can actually fulfill them. So as a result, it’s been all hands on deck. I’ve been going to work, answer calls and that sort of thing, but it’s a good thing. Now, the other bad thing that’s happened to our store, which has nothing to do with the pandemic or anything, is that PayPal decided to deprecate their old PayPal Express Checkout API right in time for the holidays. And for all of you who aren’t aware of what PayPal Express Checkout is and why it’s important,

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PayPal checkout allows users to sign into their PayPal accounts and have all their payment and address information imported automatically into your site. And this is especially important for mobile shoppers who don’t like to type on their phones. And it makes a huge difference to have this enabled. And it actually lifted my mobile conversion rate by over 39 % when I implemented this feature a long time ago. Anyway, it turns out that PayPal decided to deprecate this old API and it actually stopped working in September of this year. Now it’s my fault.

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and I didn’t really notice that it wasn’t working until Black Friday. And this might sound careless on my part, but the old implementation was a little bit flaky because sometimes people don’t have their addresses in their accounts set up correctly on PayPal. So the old implementation would crap out sometimes, so I didn’t think anything of it. But during Black Friday, everyone was complaining about PayPal. So I took a closer look and it was busted completely. So I literally spent all of Small Business Saturday, literally 14 hours straight.

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putting up a new implementation for my shopping cart from scratch. Anyway, I just wanted to share with you the good with the bad, and it also just goes to show that it’s important to use a well-supported shopping cart with your e-commerce business. And with that, let’s get on with the guts of today’s episode. Before I begin, I wanna thank Postscript for sponsoring this episode. Postscript is my SMS or text messaging provider that I use for e-commerce, and it’s crushing it for me right now.

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I never thought that people would want marketing text messages, but it works. In fact, my tiny SMS list is performing on par with my email list, which is easily 10x bigger. Anyway, Postscript.io specializes in text message marketing for e-commerce, and you can segment your audience just like email, and it’s a very inexpensive solution. It converts like crazy, and you can try it for free over at Postscript.io slash Steve. That’s P-O-S-T-S-E-R-I-P-T dot I-O slash Steve.

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I’m also crushing it with email using Klaviyo and Klaviyo is also a sponsor of the show. Klaviyo is the ultimate e-commerce marketing platform for online brands of all kinds and all sizes. And with email automation, SMS marketing, list growth tools and more, you get everything that you need to build strong relationships that keep your customers coming back. And especially during the holiday season, this is very important and you can get up and running quickly with Klaviyo’s integrations, pre-built marketing automations and beautiful email templates.

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And so it doesn’t matter if you’re a large business or if you’re just starting out, Klaviyo is by far the best marketing platform for email during the holidays and long after. You can try it for free over at klaviyo.com slash my wife. That’s K-L-A-V-I-Y-O.com slash my wife. Now onto the show.

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to the My Wife, Quit Her Job podcast, where we’ll teach you how to create a business that suits your lifestyle so you can spend more time with your family and focus on doing the things that you love. Here’s your host, Steve Chu.

04:24
Welcome to the My Wife Could Her Job podcast. In this episode, I’m gonna give you my take on how long it should take to make money with your online business. Now I receive many questions via email every single day, but probably my number one most asked question is, Steve, how long do you think it’ll take me to make money with my business? And here’s another common permutation of the same question. Steve, I need to be able to make money in six months. Can it be done? And then finally, here’s my favorite permutation, which is can I expect to make 100K in the first year with my online store like you did?

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One year ought to be enough runway, right? So here’s the truth. Brand new entrepreneurs are horrible at predicting how far they can get with their businesses in the short term. And in fact, they grossly overestimate how much money they can make in their first year. But on the flip side, they also grossly underestimate how much they can make in three plus years with their businesses as well. So anytime a reader or a student asks me any of the above questions, I immediately start to question their commitment.

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and how serious they are about starting a real business. Now why is that? It’s because when someone asks me how much they can make in six months, it usually means that they’re only willing to stick it out for six months to see if their business has a chance. And that is definitely not enough time. Now starting a business takes a lot of commitment. And I don’t mean a year or a couple of years. When I say commitment, I’m talking about giving it a go for at least three to five years. Now when my wife and I started our own online store, we were in it for the long haul.

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And although we set a goal to make 100K before the baby arrived, we were ready to work at it and keep the store float indefinitely until we got the formula correct. And if we didn’t have this mentality, we might have quit at six months because sales were not where we wanted them to be. We were not convinced that our store could ever make enough money to supplant my wife’s income. And we didn’t believe that our market was large enough. We didn’t think that we could crack the front page of search to get the necessary traffic. Now what’s funny is that we started our online store with the delusion of grandeur.

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that our business would start making decent money within the first three months. After all, we had what we thought was a foolproof strategy. Our initial plan was to siphon away eBay customers by posting auctions online and steering them over to our online store through links in the auction description. Then we would roam the wedding forums and guide customers over to our shop by making recommendations to would-be brides. But what ended up happening?

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is that we violated eBay’s terms of service and got our account temporarily suspended for posting external links on auctions. And then furthermore, we repeatedly got banned on the wedding forms for being overly promotional. There are no shortcuts. You have to be in it for the long haul. So if you’re wondering whether you can start making money right away because you are in a desperate situation, then chances are you lack the resolve to see your business idea through. So here’s what’s interesting about human nature.

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When my wife and I reached our goal of making 100K during the end of our first year business, we were overjoyed. But at that point, we did not think that we could do it again. We did not think that our business could possibly grow anymore. And from our perspective, our business had peaked already. After all, it was a major struggle for us to reach that number in the first place because it involves so much legwork and a little bit of luck. And in fact, we didn’t think that we could achieve the same sales pace ever again.

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Now what we didn’t realize was that the first year was just the tip of the iceberg. And every year since then, our business has increased in the double and triple digits. And never in a million years do we think that this could happen, let alone have our business be a seven figure online store. Which brings me to reiterate my second point. As humans, we often overestimate what we can accomplish in the short term, but we vastly underestimate what can be done in the long run. When I first started MyWifeQuarterJob.com,

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I was hoping to start making significant money within a year of launch. And even though I started my blog with a five-year plan towards profitability, I full-on expected to be making at least five figures by the end of year one. But in reality, it wasn’t until well into year three when I started to see hockey stick growth, and today the blog is practically growing on autopilot. Now, when I launched my Creative Profitable Online Store course, I was only hoping to sign on about 30 students. But today I have over 70x that amount,

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and the course’s growth continues to surprise me. Now the key to running any successful business is to set the right expectations and the right level of commitment. And when my wife and I began our online store in 2007, we full on planned to still be in business in 2012. When I started my blog at the end of 2008, I full on planned to be blogging five years later. When I launched my created profitable online store course in 2011, I made a long-term commitment to continuously add content to the course for many years to come.

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And even though the course started out with practically no content, today I have well over 100 hours of video in the course and a 400 page PDF ebook to show for it. And the best part is that the course continues to grow and evolve. Most people quit their businesses within the first year. If you aren’t willing to devote at least three to five years to your business, don’t even bother. Why is that? Because most of the wealth and the profits are to be had well after your first year. Expecting your business to be vastly profitable within a short timeframe

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is a half-assed way to think about your business. So let’s be realistic here. During the first year of any online business, your website is probably not going to have superior search engine placement. Your business probably won’t have a large customer base, and your business probably won’t have that much name recognition. It takes a lot of time for word of mouth to spread. It takes a lot of time for things to snowball. And looking back in my blog, I didn’t think that I was getting anywhere at all after year one. But after doing this for almost a decade now,

10:03
I look back and I’m completely amazed at how far I’ve come. So here’s the biggest problem that I see with most people in that question that I got asked. They expect to make a significant amount of money in under a year and then they give up when they don’t reach their goal. I’ve had several students in my course give up early and even had an extremely talented student give up on his online store after just six months. The first year is gonna be tough and the most awkward. After all, you know nothing during your first year. And if you have a great mentor or teacher,

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you still might not be able to absorb all the material right away. So you’ll make mistakes, but that is fine. That first year is also when you’ll be having the most fun because you’ll be learning a heck of a lot. Year one should not be your end game. Instead, you should treat year one as your learning year and expect to reap the rewards in the years ahead. Now in a recent survey conducted among students, it might create a profitable online store course. 56 % of the students in my class who launched a product and stuck it out for an entire year are now making at least four figures per month.

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And I think nine to 10 % are now making 50K plus per month. Now, one of the most unfortunate aspects of human nature is that we all love shortcuts. We all love to believe that we can strike it rich in just six months. And don’t get me wrong, it’s still possible to make a good chunk of change during your first year, but you should go into it expecting to commit at least three to five years. Now, if you’re gonna commit to a business for three to five years, you also wanna make sure your business model has long-term potential.

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And everywhere you look online these days, there are a number of make quick cash types of schemes out there on the internet. And yes, some of these might actually work, but only in the short term. So for example, there’s this scheme that really annoys me where people buy up goods on Amazon and sell them on eBay at higher prices. And lots of people are still making money this way, even though Amazon eBay actually banned this practice. So do you think this business model can last? Probably not, right?

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Most people are attracted to businesses that are as easy as possible to make money, but I’m actually the complete opposite. The harder it is to start your business, the more lasting power it will have. The more value you can add, the more money you will make. So before you choose an online business model, ask yourself how you are adding value. Is buying up surplus goods online and selling them on Amazon providing more value than coming up with your own branded products to sell? Are you spending all your time trying to make short-term money?

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that’s never gonna scale? Before you decide what to do, I want you to go and read my post on the pros and cons of the eight different e-commerce business models and choose one that fits your goals and your personality. Now the key to finding the right business to pursue is to avoid randomly pulling yourself in all directions at once. Do not throw up a bunch of businesses, give them all a go for six months as a trial and then take them all down because they aren’t working out. You should go into every business venture with a full commitment

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put your best foot forward, even if you aren’t seeing the results. Are you still going to want to be running this business in three to five years?

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If you sell on Amazon or run any online business for that matter, the most important aspect of your long-term success will be your brand. And this is why I work with Steven Weigler and his team from Emerge Council to protect my brand over at Bumblebee Linens. Now what’s unique about Emerge Council is that Steve focuses his legal practice on e-commerce and provides strategic and legal representation to entrepreneurs to protect their IP. So for example, if you’ve ever been ripped off or knocked off on Amazon, then Steve can help you fight back and protect yourself.

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Now, first and foremost, protecting our IP starts with a solid trademark and Emerge Council provides attorney-advised strategic trademark prosecution, both in the United States and abroad for a very low price. And furthermore, the students in my course have used Steve for copyrighting their designs, policing against counterfeits and knockoffs, agreements with co-founders and employees, website and social media policies, privacy policies, vendor agreements, brand registry, you name it. So if you need IP protection services, go to EmergeCouncil.com and get a free consult.

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And if you tell Steve that I sent you, you’ll get a $100 discount. That’s EMERGECONSCL.com. Now back to the show. If you don’t think you’re gonna be able to maintain your interest for that long, then do not even bother getting started. What you want to avoid is starting over every six months. And if this is happening to you, then you aren’t committed and you were calling it quits without giving your business a chance to grow into something bigger. Because you have to remember, most of the profits for your business

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are going to occur after three to five years. So make sure that you pick something that you’re willing to maintain for at least that long. And in fact, once you’ve decided what you want to do, take time out of the equation altogether. Don’t give yourself any artificial constraints on how well you need to perform in a given timeframe. And instead, you want to make your business a part of your daily or weekly routine. That’s right, set aside some time, the same time, every day or week to work on your business. And then don’t even think about it.

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Don’t even consider it work. Just work on it on a regular basis and tell yourself that you are going to maintain this routine forever. This way, your business will be a part of your life and then time becomes irrelevant. Hope you enjoyed that episode. And from now on, if anyone ever asks me the dreaded how long question, I want to point them to this podcast. For more information about this episode, go to mywifequaterjob.com slash episode 333. And once again, I want to thank Klaviyo, which is my email marketing platform of choice for e-commerce merchants.

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You can easily put together automated flows like an abandoned card sequence, a post purchase flow, a win back campaign. Basically all these sequences that will make you money on autopilot. So head on over to mywifequitterjob.com slash KLAVIO. Once again, that’s mywifequitterjob.com slash KLAVIO. I also want to thank Postscript, which is my SMS marketing platform of choice for e-commerce. With a few clicks of a button, you can easily segment and send targeted text messages to your client base.

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SMS is the next big own marketing platform and you can sign up for free over at postscript.io slash Steve. That’s P O S T S C R I P T dot IO slash Steve. Now I talk about how I use these tools on my blog. And if you were interested in starting your own e-commerce store, head on over to my wife, quitter job.com and sign up for my free six day mini course. Just type in your email and I’ll send you the course right away. Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening to the my wife quitter job.

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where we are giving the courage people need to start their own online business. more information, visit Steve’s blog at www.mywifequitterjob.com.