[00:00:00] Emma: Alrighty. Tell me if this sounds familiar. You're scrolling through Instagram and bam, some coach is telling you, I made six figures in six weeks, and you can too!
Or you open an email and it screams if you're not making a million dollars, you're playing small. Suddenly you feel a little, well less than you start wondering, am I behind?
Am I even doing this right? Okay, let me stop you there. Today we are breaking down the right way to talk about money because yes, money is important, very important, but that doesn't mean it needs to be shoved down our throats with a side of guilt. Let's have a [00:01:00] real. Healthy and empowering conversation about money without the shame, without the pressure, and without the hype.
Are you with me? Grab a cup of tea oil with coffee or something bubbly. No judgment. Let's dive in. I'm so thrilled to be back with you. We have had so much beautiful feedback from the FO podcast. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for following along. I. It means the world that you are listening and we will keep creating content for as long as we possibly can.
And we love the feedback. The amount of feedback we get is incredible and I'm very, very grateful for it. Today though, I wanna talk about a topic that always stirs up big feelings, doesn't it? It's money talk. Oh my goodness. It always stirs up. Conversations, it triggers people. It's really important.
There's no question about it. It does give us choice, and it does give us freedom. It allows us to build businesses and lives that feel aligned with who we are. But here's the [00:02:00] thing. I see so many coaches out there, do this one thing and you'll make six figures overnight. Or if you're not making, you know, a million bucks, then you're not just working hard enough.
And honestly, that kind of money talk isn't just unhelpful, it's toxic. So today we are going to break it down. What does healthy money conversation even look like? How do we talk about revenue? How do we talk about pricing? How do we talk about financial growth in a way that is actually empowering?
See the problem is, the first problem I see is, bro marketing money talk. Let's start with that. That is not working. You've seen the posts, you've heard the pictures. Join my program, and you'll make six figures in six weeks. What a load of bs. You're leaving money on the table if you're not charging premium rates.
Partly, I agree with that, just saying, if you're not making X amount of money, you're not serious about your business. Can we just not? 92% of us in small business world in Australia are earning less than a [00:03:00] hundred thousand dollars. 8% of us are earning much more than that. Can we just help everyone get to a certain level?
If we get to $100,000 a year, yay. We're in the 8%. If we get to $200,000 a year, we are in the 83% of businesses that survive. Yay. Everyone should be. trying, striving to make $200,000 if they wanna have a business that works and a business that is thriving, not purely in survival mode.
Now, I know that feels like a lot. If you're not earning much, that feels like a lot. Reach out to me. I will help you work out what plan you can have in place to hit those numbers. But here's what I know, ladies, if you can hit a hundred thousand, you can hit 200,000. If you can hit 200,000, you can hit half a million.
Do the levels change? Of course. Is the amount of detail different? Yes, it is. Are the conversations different from 100 to half a million? Yes, they are, but what I know, and I've worked with millionaires, I've worked with startups, I've worked with people who are earning 200, [00:04:00] 500, a million. I've worked with them all.
What I know is those that are moving up are always learning, always leveling up is a different conversation and they know it. They're making sure that their support systems work. They make sure the systems in their business work all the things right? And so we can lift that level up if that's what you want.
I like to work with people who want that. I like to work with people who have a particular revenue goal in mind and a particular profit goal in mind, and we help them get there. But this bro marketing
money talk does not help. This kind of messaging makes people feel like they are failing if they're not hitting some magical income goal. And that's not just how growth works. Growth isn't necessarily linear. Have you noticed that there are peaks and there are troughs? There are times when it's more tricky and times when it's smooth sailing. I would love that to be 365 days of the year. Love that.
Some months are amazing. You're on top of the world. Things are happening, [00:05:00] offers are out there, people are accepting your proposals. And then others are just a challenge. And I wanna normalize that. I have clients who sometimes say to me, this is really hard. And in that moment it is really hard. And that's okay.
That's okay. That is totally normal. No one should be feel shamed, for being in a different stage in their journey. Money is important, yes, but it is not everything. And more importantly, money without meaning. It's just a number and that kind of sucks. question to you, my lovely listeners, is what does a healthy money conversation look like?
So if all the make money fast talk isn't serving us, what does serve us? What are the money conversations that actually help us grow both financially and personally? I reckon there are three things that healthy money talk looks like.
One transparency over hype instead of saying, I made six figures last year. Ugh. let's talk about how [00:06:00] that happened. Break it down for people. Was it through steady growth? Was it through one amazing project? Was it through a huge launch? Years of trial and error? What was it? The number one thing that people tell me is I like your transparency, Emma, because you break it down, you're very practical and you normalize.
What it means to make that kind of cash. We have to normalize the conversations about expenses, about profit margins, about real business, about the costs of real business making money's great, but keeping it and using it wisely. That's the real flex. That's success in my book. Profit in the Bank Account. and while we are here, I just wanna talk about profit for a moment. If you don't have a profit bank account set up,
please set one up and go a step further. Every week when you open your bank account to do your reconciliations or whatever it is, pay your bills, whatever it is, drag a percentage of your.
Business bank account into your profit account. This compounds over time and week on week. If you're putting a little bit of profit away, it [00:07:00] adds up to quite a large thing. I've done this with one of my clients and we use it as a buffer over January and December, December, January. so she has profit in her bank account and it acts as a buffer in lean months and in December and January.
so that really works well for her now. Back to what does a healthy money conversation look like? So number one, transparency over hype. Number two, meeting people where they are. Success isn't just about hitting a specific income number. It's about what that number means for you personally, professionally, whatever it is.
Maybe your goal isn't a seven figure business. Maybe it's a business that gives you freedom and flexibility and joy. And guess what? That's also success. For me, my first thing was I wanna get to half a million dollars. And then it was like, how will I get to a million dollars? And then once I hit that, I was like, why do I need to do anymore?
Would I like to grab a team? Would I like to do something different? Or is [00:08:00] this enough? What else can we do? Can we just be really good at providing a beautiful service for our clients? Yes, we can. You need to decide what success looks like for you. And instead of asking, are we making six figures yet? How about are you making what you want?
And it helps to support your family. You get to reinvest a little bit back into your business in a way that feels good, in a way that feels good. You can have both. And then number three, I love this one because it rolls in my, one of my words for the year, which is sustainability. We need to focus on sustainable success.
You know, the success that is long-term. It's not fleeting, it's not a quick, grab for cash. We need to ditch that thinking, that quick cash, the get rich quick schemes and focus on long-term growth. Now I like to have goals that are. Short term, medium term, and longer term, right? Because that's what works for me. That keeps me motivated.
So what strategies help us build strong, resilient, and [00:09:00] profitable businesses over time? That's the question. There's nothing wrong with ambitious financial goals. I have had them. I have hit them. It didn't make me any less of a human being or any more of a human being.
It just was a number. But let's make sure that whatever you choose to do, if you are choosing ambitious financial goals, they're built on value. They're built on integrity, and they're built on real strategy, not just hype. PS. I do like a bit of hype, and I know I bring a lot of energy. Is energy the same as hype?
No, I don't think so. So we've gone over three things. Three things that I think helps with a healthy amount of conversation, transparency over hype, super practical, meeting people where they are. It might be that success means X to one person and A, B, C to another, and number three, focusing on sustainable success, whatever that looks like for you.
Now, you know, I love a challenge. So here is your challenge. I challenge you to think about the way you talk about money, [00:10:00] both to yourself. To others. I love this exercise because I am the woman. When someone says to me, we can't afford that, I say, there's always more money to be made. If you are my client, you'll be giggling.
You're right about now, because that's what I say, there's always money to be made. We can always make more money. Right, and that was not natural to me. I had to reframe my brain with some pieces of abundance in order to make that happen, and then I had to sink into it. I had to feel it. And now I'm like, we can always make more money.
Here's how we make more money. Here are the levers we pull. I know the practical realities. So if you are sitting there going, oh, Emma, I'm not making enough money, can I ask you, are you doing the revenue generating things that you need to do? Are you doing your follow-ups? Are you sending out proposals?
Are you doing phone calls? If you're doing none of those things, get your skates on babes. Harsh but true. Right. and back to reframing, we need to reframe our own money talk, right? Are you measuring success based on someone else's version of wealth? We all do [00:11:00] comparisonitis. It does not serve us at all.
Are you measuring success based on someone else's version of wealth? I. That's the first question. Number two, do you feel pressure to hit a certain number because that's what successful people do? Do you feel pressure to hit a certain number? Because that's what successful people do. And number three, are you having honest money conversations that feel empowering or ones that make you feel less than? I have a quick story for you. I have, when I'm talking to potential clients, I ask them their revenue. Do you know how hard it is for some people to tell me what their revenue is?
And it's not that they don't have decent revenue, they just don't know how to talk about it. It's like we've got all these stories that we are telling ourselves. and there's some brilliant books out there. Educate yourself on your money mindset. you will know because your parents probably said, money doesn't grow on trees.
You gotta save for a rainy day. All the things, right? And so you bring all of that bias into your [00:12:00] business as well. If you catch yourself in comparison mode or feel bad about you are, I just want you to like pause and remind yourself. Success is personal. Success is personal, my business, my numbers, my journey.
And if today's episode resonated with you, I would love to hear from you. Please DM me at Emma R McQueen on Instagram, and tell me what's one shift you're making in your money mindset. We need to keep this conversation going in a way that feels good. It needs to feel safe. It needs to feel a little bit challenging, but it also needs to keep going. If we don't talk about this, we are never gonna get good at it.
That's it for today. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Be sure to pass this episode onto someone who needs it, a business buddy. Leave a review for us. Share it with friends who might need a little money mindset boost today. And remember, money is a tool, not a measure of your [00:13:00] worth.
Build your business in a way that feels aligned, sustainable, and most importantly, empowering. Until next week, I hope you keep thriving. I hope you keep growing and I hope you keep focusing on your money mindset.
