Pod Insights The $100 MBA Show If You Have Less Than $10,000 Saved- Do This And Thank Me Later. About this episode Watching your savings sit below $10,000 can feel heavy. It is not just about money, it is the pressure of knowing your time is limited and one wrong move could push things over the edge. When your runway feels short, the usual advice does not feel good enough and honestly, it just makes you feel more stuck. In this episode, Omar breaks down a completely different approach to changing your situation fast. He shares the shift that helped him go from struggling to pay rent to generating serious income in a short amount of time. This is not about cutting back or waiting years to feel secure. It is about using what you already have, taking action quickly, and creating real momentum that can change your financial position much sooner than you think. The way he frames it might challenge what you have been told about money and side businesses. Click play at the top of the page and learn how to turn what you have right now into something that actually buys you more time, more options, and a whole lot more breathing room. MBA2788 If You Have Less Than $10,000 Saved- Do This And Thank Me Later. Recommended episode to explore: Five Lazy Ways To Start A Business On The Side This Weekend Watch the episodes on YouTube: https://lm.fm/GgRPPHi SUBSCRIBE YouTube | Apple Podcast | Spotify | Podcast Feed Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 Today's episode is supported by Cash App. When it comes to Bitcoin, you may be surprised to learn that it was invented way back in 2008. But you still haven't made the jump to Bitcoin yet? Cash App makes it easy. When you buy Bitcoin on Cash App, they hold real Bitcoin for you, one to one, and you can withdraw it anytime. It works more like real money and less like something locked in an account. No extra steps, no restrictions, just access and control when you need it. With Cash App, you can actually do that. For a limited time, new customers can get $10 added to their balance. Just use code BITCOIN10 when you sign up. And, don't forget this part: send at least $5 to a friend in the first two weeks. Terms apply. Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank.
0:45 Speaker 00 Banking services provided by Cash App's bank partners. Bitcoin services provided by Block Incorporated brand. For additional information, see the Bitcoin disclosures at cash.app/legal/podcast. Small business owners, listen up. You started your business, but you can't do it alone. And that means you have to hire people to help. That's where Justworks comes in. Justworks is a payroll, benefits, and global hiring platform to unburden your brain from all the complicated small business stuff. They handle the things you can't afford to get wrong, so you don't have to worry. So you can focus on the parts of running a business that you enjoy, knowing everything else is running smoothly. You don't have to worry when it just works.
1:28 Speaker 00 If you have less than $10,000 saved right now, that means you have roughly 60 days of runway. That's it. 60 days before losing your job becomes a crisis. I know how it feels. I was there at 32, borrowing money from my mom to pay for rent. Not a proud moment in my life. But now I'm a multimillionaire, and I was able to recently treat her to a trip to Greece. The first step between those two moments I shared with you, being broke as a joke to being a millionaire, is actually turning $10,000 to $60,000. That's the first step. If you can get there, because $60,000 is 12 months of runway, and that gives you options, and I want you to get there as fast as possible. And I'm going to show you exactly how to do it right now.
2:18 Speaker 00 Welcome back to the $100 MBA Show. I'm your host, Omar Zenhome, where I deliver practical business lessons three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, to help you start, grow, and scale your business.
2:31 Speaker 00 I got a quick favorite ask. If this show has helped you in any way, leave me a quick review. You could do so wherever you listen to podcasts. This helps me and my team reach even more people who need the same no-fluff, practical business advice that you're getting from the show. It only takes a few seconds, but it makes a huge difference. Thanks for being a part of our journey to help others on their journey. Most content that's aimed to people that have under $10,000 saved, give the same advice, and it's incredibly annoying. This advice sounds like this: Cut your expenses. Put your money in a high-yielding savings account. Start investing. In my opinion, that advice is wrong,
3:13 Speaker 00 because it's painfully slow, and it's not going to give you enough momentum and give you some wins to feel like you have some breathing room, that there is hope to get out of that situation. Let me paint the picture. If you save $500 a month, which for most people is genuinely difficult. It takes you over eight years to get to $60,000. That's if you're disciplined enough to save $500 a month, month after month, for eight years straight. In my opinion, that's not a plan, that's a sentence. The faster path is the one that nobody actually talks about, and the one that I used to get out of my situation. And I'm talking about building a side income stream that generates real money as quickly as possible
3:57 Speaker 00 with almost no startup costs, so that you're not out of pocket. And we want to use the hours you already have available outside your job. This episode is not going to push some passive income fantasy. It's not some sort of dropshipping, blah, blah, blah. It's not crypto. It's not NFTs. None of this BS. We're going to build a business, specifically a service business, around something you already are good at, that delivers a clear result to a specific customer. This is the path we're going to take on today's journey. And I'm going to show you exactly how it works, because I lived it. Before I get into the nitty gritty specifics, I want to give you the principles so that you can make decisions on your own. And here it is, people do not want to learn how to do something.
4:42 Speaker 00 I'm going to say that again. People do not want to learn something. They want to get the thing done. This is the most important insight in any service business. Your future customers are not looking for a course on how to build a website. They want a website. That's why they're trying to learn. They're not looking for a podcast tutorial. They want their podcast setup and sounding professional. They're not looking for a content strategy framework. They want content that actually performs. When you sell a service, you sell the result rather than the education. You remove the biggest objection in any sale. The objection is not price if you're selling to the right people. The objection is time, is skill and confidence.
5:27 Speaker 00 And the customer does not have the time to learn this. For example, I need to put up some sound panels in my studio right now. We have a new studio in Sydney and we have some really cool deluxe sound paneling, but I need to put them up. I need to get them cut to measure. I need to have them stuck on the wall. I don't want to learn how to cut these sound panels. I don't want to look up some YouTube video. I don't want to borrow some saw. I don't want to figure out which adhesive is not going to mess up the wall. I don't want to figure out how to line it up perfectly. I don't want to make sure that it's leveled. I don't want any of that. I'm doing this once, maybe twice. It's not a skill that I really should invest in. I want it done. The beauty of a service is that it removes all three objections in one move. Time, skill and confidence, gone out the window because you don't need them because I'm going to do it for you.
6:11 Speaker 00 So what business should you start? Here's how I think about this. You are looking for a business that meets three criteria. Criteria number one, you already have success in this area. I'm not talking about theoretical knowledge. I'm talking about actual results. Maybe you've built a podcast that has grown like our podcast. Maybe you've run social media for a business and the numbers really moved and you have some real proof that you could do this. Maybe you're exceptional at video editing or writing or at systems or financial organization, whatever it is, you've done it and it has worked. It got results. You have a track record for what you do. Criteria number two: The result is clear and measurable. Huge.
6:54 Speaker 00 The customer needs to be able to see and feel the outcome. A website that looks professional and works properly. For example, a podcast that's set up, that's edited, that's published consistently. It needs to be seen by the customer. Okay, this is proof that this person knows what they're doing. A set of thumbnails that are on-brand and drives clicks to a video. A month of social media content that shows up every day for the client without lifting a finger. These are tangible things that a customer could see and say, "Yep, this is what I'm looking for." The clearer the result, the clearer picture that you can show the customer, the easier the sale. The easier for them to say, "Yes, yeah, yeah, I can use that in my business."
7:38 Speaker 00 Don't bank on the fact that can imagine it, okay? "I used to do this all the time," because I'm a very cerebral kind of person that can picture things in my head. A lot of people can't do that, okay? They need to actually see it with their own eyes. They need to see examples of what you're talking about so they can see what you could do for them. Criteria number three: Zero to minimal startup cost. I don't want you to have any inventory, no equipment you don't have already, okay? No upfront investment before you make your first dollar and some traction to see if this thing has legs. A service business built around your existing sales costs essentially nothing to start. Just requires a little bit of sweat equity. You don't need business cards, please do not do that. No website is required from day one. You could pitch somebody on email.
8:23 Speaker 00 You don't need to establish an LLC or a PTY LTD or anything like that before you have your first client. Sell it, then you build it, and that's the order. Don't try to build something and spend months and then go ahead and try to sell it and realize, "Oh, that's not what people want." First, make the sale, see what actually sells, and then once you say, "Oh, that's what people want," then you can start building it. Today's episode is supported by Rosetta Stone. I absolutely love Rosetta Stone because it's helping me learn Italian faster than I can ever imagine. Why do I want to learn Italian? Well, who doesn't love Italy? But of course, Nicole's family is Italian and I'd love to have some quick Italian conversations with her mom. And Rosetta Stone just came out with Rosetta Stone Sapphire, their biggest launch in over a decade.
9:07 Speaker 00 One of the coolest features is chat missions, which turns conversation practice into a game. With chat missions, you're put in interactive scenarios and given three objectives. A mission to accomplish, like asking how much something costs, ordering a cold brew coffee, or getting a wifi password. Along the way, you get real-time corrections and feedback to help you sound more natural and confident. It's a supportive way to build confidence before putting your language skills to use in real life. I've been using Rosetta Stone for over two years and I actually can have some small Italian conversations with Nicole's mom now. Just the other day, she asked me, "When are you traveling?" And I said, "Dopo domani mattina," which means "after tomorrow morning." She was incredibly impressed I was able to answer in Italian. How could you put a price tag on a happy mother-in-law?
9:51 Speaker 00 If you want to take your language skills to the next level, don't wait to try Rosetta Stone Sapphire. The $100 on BGA show listeners can get 20% off the Rosetta Stone Sapphire subscription when they sign up today. This gets you access to Rosetta Stone Sapphire in 25 languages. Support for today's episode comes from Square. You probably know Square is the thing you tap your card on at your favorite coffee shop, restaurant, salon, or local store. But for the person running that business, Square is a whole lot more than a way to get paid. Square brings the tools you need to run and grow your business together in one system. From payments on appointments, to staff, inventory, sales, and customer relationships. Whether you're selling lattes, cutting hair, detailing cars, running a restaurant, or starting something new.
10:34 Speaker 00 Square keeps your business tools working together so you can focus less on managing the moving parts and more on what's next. And right now, listeners can get up to $200 off Square hardware when you sign up at square.com/go/mba. That's S-Q-U-A-R-E.com/go/mba. Visit Square to get started because running a business is complicated enough. Your tools don't have to be.
10:59 Speaker 00 I want to give you some real numbers, what this actually looks like. Let me tell you my story, because I did not come up with this model in theory. I lived it. When I left my teaching job, I became a full-time entrepreneur. I needed to make money immediately. Bills are coming in. I didn't have a paycheck. I had some skills, though. I knew how to build websites, not because I was a developer, but because I taught myself enough to get the job done for some small businesses. I knew more than my clients. I wasn't the best by any means. But in one month, I found three clients. At the start, I was very intimidated. I was not so confident, so I only charged $1,500 for a website.
11:41 Speaker 00 So that's $4,500 in my first month as an entrepreneur. Month two, I raised my prices to $2,000. I had two clients. Now, I only made $4,000 because I had two clients at 2,000, but there was more potential to make more because now I'm raising my prices. So the current running total is $8,560 in 60 days, the first two months. Month three, and here is a part that surprises people. I raised my prices to $5,000 per website. I more than 3x my first price, my original price, and more than doubled my second price. And to my surprise, it was a whole lot easier to sell a $5,000 website than it was to sell a $2,000 or $1,500 website. I got four clients, easily.
12:25 Speaker 00 That's $20,000 in a month. So in 90 days, I had $28,500 in revenue, from zero, with no startup costs. I had a computer. I just used the computer I had. I didn't have a fancy office. I went to a coworking space that was free, actually, at the time. It was sponsored by some company. I had no team. It was just me. Just a skill, a clear result for my customer, and the willingness to sell it. That's it. So the trajectory from $4,500, then $8,500, then $28,500, this is not a fantasy. It happened. And what happens is that when you find the right model and you start selling and then you build and you start raising your prices to start experimenting to see what works,
13:08 Speaker 00 you start to learn more about how to make it easy on yourself. The reason why it was so easy to sell a $5,000 website is because it didn't live in no man's land. 2,000, 1,500, it's kind of weird. It's like, why are you charging so little? What's going on with that? It attracted really strange clients, very difficult clients. 5,000 was like the beginning of like, okay, this is a legit person that's creating a website. That's not wasting their time. And I want to stay on this point for a moment because it's counterintuitive, but it's important. Most people assume that charging more makes selling harder. My experience and the experience of almost every service business owner, every coach, every consultant is the same. Here's why. At low prices, you attract who are price sensitive.
13:52 Speaker 00 They question everything. They want to negotiate everything. They require more handholding and more revisions. And they are the most demanding clients for the least amount of money. It's like a lose-lose situation. You are spending a lot of time making little money. At higher prices, you attract clients who value results over the cost. They are easy to work with. They trust you. They trust the process. They pay on time. Sometimes they pay even early. They refer other people at the same level. You get high-level clients referring other high-level clients. The jump I made from 1,500 to 5,000 is not just a financial upgrade. It's a client quality upgrade.
14:33 Speaker 00 And it made me up my game as a website developer because I was dealing with professionals. Raise your prices faster than it feels comfortable. Always feel a little bit, almost embarrassed to say your price. That's the sweet spot. Hey, if you're enjoying today's episode, I highly recommend you subscribe to the channel because I'm releasing an episode really soon that I think you're gonna absolutely love. It's called "Don't Make These Mistakes When Starting A Business From Home." If you want to get going and turning your $10,000 to $60,000 and you're gonna do it from home, which most people will, then you need to make sure that you create the circumstances to allow you to be successful, to maximize your chances of success.
15:17 Speaker 00 There are a lot of mistakes people make that I need to make sure that you don't make so that you win. So hit subscribe so you don't miss it. Here's a mistake that kills almost every side business I've seen before they even make their first dollar. People build first and sell second. I mentioned this earlier, but I gotta drill this home. They spend weeks, sometimes months, creating a thing before they even have one single paying customer. That's just bad economics. They build themselves a website, they record the whole course, they design a logo, they set up systems, and then they try to sell it. And then they find out the hard way that nobody wants it, or the price is wrong, or the customer's wrong, or way packaging the product, or who you're targeting is wrong. Maybe your whole idea needs to be different.
16:02 Speaker 00 All that work, all that time wasted. Here's the right order. You need to sell it first, validate it, to make sure that somebody actually wants to pay for it. But you might be saying, "Omar, I sell content, I sell courses, I sell coaching. How can I show people that I'm legit if I don't create something and show it to them and ask them for their money?" Fair question, but you're building out an empire of content and then selling it. What you need to do is do what they do in the software world, which is called Minimal Viable Product, MVP. You don't need to create a whole course. You can run one paid webinar. That's an hour or 90 minutes where it just talks about one aspect of what you teach or what you provide.
16:45 Speaker 00 You charge a minimal amount, $19, $20, $100, whatever you want to do. See if people are interested enough to pay for this topic, to pay to learn how to solve this problem. And then you can build out whatever you want to build out based on what you learned. Now, this is if you're selling information. And the example I gave today is selling a service-based business. What I like to do sometimes is I like to run a webinar to learn about the pain points so I could build a service around it. Stop guessing what people want and start actually asking them in person or in a webinar. So let's get tactical. The first week, what are you gonna do before you spend a single dollar? Day one, identify your skill.
17:29 Speaker 00 What have you done in your job, in your life, in any context that produced a measurable result for someone? Write it down. Not what you're interested in or passionate about, what you actually have done that has produced a win for somebody. Day two, define the result. What result are you promising your clients? When they finish working with you, what do they get in exchange for the money they're paying you? Do not say the result is better social media presence. That's too vague. You need to say something like 30 pieces of content scheduled and published every month. That is tangible. I can see that result. Not improved operations. You're gonna say something like a project management system fully set up and your team
18:14 Speaker 00 is trained on it within the first two weeks. Specificity is what makes the sale because there's a clear picture. And like I say over and over again, a confused mind never buys. Day three, identify five potential clients. Not strangers, people you already know, people that you've done business with, worked with, interacted with socially, personally. You're looking for people that have the problem that you solve. Think about the businesses you frequent. Maybe the corner cafe that you see all the time. Maybe you can solve a problem for them. Someone in your network, somebody who's complained about this problem before. Just write down five names. Day four, create your proof of concept.
18:57 Speaker 00 You want a mock-up, a sample, a design, a template, and you can easily do this with AI. You want one example of what the result looks like in practice. Paint them an after picture. Doesn't need to be perfect, but it needs to be something that they can see and look at. Day number five, make the approach. Send a proof of concept to the first person in your list and show them what you can do. Some sample work. I'm gonna give you a perfect example because this thing works like gangbusters. When we were looking to improve our design, our UX and UI, user interface with our software, Webinar Ninja, somebody approached us to apply for the job. And instead of just applying with their CV and filling out an application, they sent
19:38 Speaker 00 me an email with a video that shows what they would do, an actual redesign of our website. This person, Chris, just did the first page of our website, our homepage. But I got to see what this person can actually do. And I was impressed by the choices they made, the decisions they made. And the website looked a lot like something that I wanted. And I was like, hey, I want that. I guess I gotta hire this person. And Chris became the designer on our team and created incredible results for us. But I knew, because he showed me proof before we even agreed and hired him. So you can literally use a script. And I'm gonna give you an easy script. You could just send them an email or even in person and say, hey, I noticed your, whatever
20:21 Speaker 00 you do, website, social media, your operations, your content, whatever you do, has an opportunity I could help with. I put together a quick example of what I think is possible. I'd love to show you what I can do for your whole business, website, social media channels, whatever it might be. Would you be open to a quick conversation? That's it. That is the pitch deck. You don't need to talk about pricing. You just need to show them proof that you can help them out. For the love of God, do not send the email and say, hey, I'd love to have a chat with you. Can I have five minutes of your time? And not attach proof of what you could do for them. No one's responding to that because that's a waste of time. I'm not wasting my time with somebody that is lazy to the point where they can't put something together to show me proof.
21:05 Speaker 00 Now, you might be saying, well Omar, I'm gonna put something together, it's gonna take some time and effort. What if they don't use it? What if they don't hire me? You're right, they may not hire you. But you're increasing the likelihood of all the people reaching out to hire you when you do this, okay? You want to make sure that you are capitalizing every time you reach out to somebody and increase the likelihood of them saying yes. So instead of having to reach out to 100 people to get one yes, you may not need to reach out to five people to get a yes. Before we wrap up, I want to give you some honest expectations. Okay. Month one, you're learning the sales process. You're making approaches. You're landing your first one or two clients. Realistic revenue is going to be about $2,000 to $5,000, depending on what you charge. Month two, you'll have a proof of concept, at least one testimonial from a client that you've worked with.
21:49 Speaker 00 And now you can start raising your prices. Realistically, you can start making $4,000 to $8,000. Month three, the process starts refining even more. You're getting more referrals. You're getting more testimonials. And now you could make some serious dough, like $8,000, maybe $10,000 a month, maybe $20,000, depending on what your price point is. And that's on top of your existing job. But remember, this is not infinitely scalable until you start hiring out and getting a team to help you with the workload because you only have 24 hours in the day. So at some point, you're going to have to make that leap. And you only can tell yourself how much revenue you need to make in order to make that leap, to cover your expenses, and of course, to cover the business expenses. Because this is not all profit. This is just your revenue, depending on how much time you're spending or any resources you're spending on tools or anything else to make sure
22:34 Speaker 00 that you deliver on your promises to your clients.
22:38 Speaker 00 Listen, if you have less than $10,000, maybe you have $1,000, maybe you have $500 on the bank. And you might feel like you're behind and things are tight. And that's true. But what's also true is you can change things in an instant. And you have to see this as a starting line. And the difference between the two scenarios, the two mentalities of like, oh, man, I'm behind and things are really tight. Or, hey, I can actually change things. And the way you start moving towards the positive is you have to take action. That's just the bottom line. In the next seven days, commit to doing the steps I outlined and gave you on a silver platter. Please, just go ahead and start taking action. You could commit to seven days. If you do the things I told you to do in the first seven days, you will win. It's just inevitable. You'll start to feel like a winner. You'll start to feel like things are moving forward.
23:22 Speaker 00 You'll start to feel that there is light at the end of the tunnel. But by not doing anything, you're not changing anything. Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. Hopefully, you found today's episode helpful and a little bit of tough love. But if you want to take things to the next level, if you want to learn more, there's a recent episode we recently published called "Five Lazy Ways to Start a Business on the Side This Weekend." It's going to give you a little bit more fuel that you need to keep moving forward.
23:49 Speaker 00 If you found today's episode helpful and you want more practical business lessons to help you start, grow, and scale your business, the best thing you could do is subscribe to this podcast. Hit subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast app, the one that you're using right now, whether it's Apple or Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically, and it's the best way to support the show. It's absolutely free, and it's a way for you to commit to growing your business. And now that you've subscribed, I'll check you in the next episode.
24:27 Speaker 01 Mazda has been named Consumer Reports' safest new car brand. It starts with our approach. Every Mazda comes standard with proactive safety features, so you're more aware of what's around you, more focused on the road ahead, and ready before problems ever start. Mazda, more of what matters most to you. Go to MazdaUSA.com to learn more. Consumer Reports does not endorse or promote any product.
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