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Making Healthy Investments in Your Soul Business

January 14, 2023

In this episode of Waking Up With Melissa Ruiz, I’m going to talk about making healthy investments in your soul business. I’m going to bring forth this concept of hiring a team, when you should do it, what are the things that we need to look out for, and ultimately how to activate our leadership, how we become a good boss, and how to identify if we need help. Let’s get right into the episode and let’s find out.

A BREAKDOWN OF THIS EPISODE

[00:28] What is a healthy investment and when you should make it

[05:56] A few things to watchout for in making investments

[18:20] How you become a good boss

[24:15] When to bring on the ideal VA for your business

[33:30] Identifying where are you in your business now

When should you invest in your soul business?

The short answer? Whenever you can!

At the end of the day, scaling your soul business requires you to assess risk on a regular basis. Every potential investment, after all, carries with it a level of risk.

Most business owners put ROI on a pedestal when it comes to making these crucial decisions. But I argue that, more than ROI, lessons learned about the art of leadership and management are the biggest benefits of any investment made. And your knowledge can make you money forever and ever.

The value of a dollar depreciates every single day. The value of knowledge never does.

What should you invest in?

First and foremost, your education, whether through courses or a coach. Once you’ve laid a knowledge foundation for yourself, I recommend that your first hire be a virtual assistant.

But the key to deciding when to make those first few hires (and honestly, every hire you ever make) is to diagnose your business, determining which tasks are becoming a time suck that prevent you from taking your budding empire to the next level.

If there is an opportunity for you to learn a skill and do it, absolutely go ahead and educate yourself.

But clear indicators that you need help include being unable to take on more clients because you lack the infrastructure, or being unable to turn your creative ideas into offerings because you lack the technical or marketing knowhow.

When you find yourself stuck in those situations, it’s probably worth every penny to make an investment in your business.

Make investments from an empowered state.

When making a hire, for example, approach it with this attitude: “I love what this person is doing. They’re creative geniuses. If I work with them, they’ll only magnify what I already have.”…

…rather than this one: “I need to hire this person because I’ve hit a standstill. I need something to go viral so I can get out of this rut and finally start to make money!”

This attitude will lead to disaster, because you’ll be depending too much on another person to get you a specific result.

Most successful creative or talented people don’t wait for someone to discover them. They get discovered because they’re consistently doing the thing.

How to be a good boss

I don’t see my team as my employees. I see them as family. I see them as people who have enrolled in my vision and believe in my vision so damn hard that I can feel it.

They’re my support team. They’re invested in me as a human, and I’m invested in them as humans.

You become a good boss by treating people well, not because you want something out of them, but because you want something for them. You look out for their wellbeing. The most enduring quality you look for “in return” is a deep belief in what your business stands for.

The more connected they are to your brand and mission, and the better you treat them along the ride, the greater your culture.

When it’s time to scale, you need to accept the responsibility of being the creative director, and hire implementers who help you turn your ideas into reality. To that end, who should you be looking to be part of your team?

Hiring a VA

If you do decide to hire a VA, one of the first things you’ll probably consider is pricing. This isn’t an easy thing to navigate, since prices for good VAs can range from $500 all the way to $1500 and more.

It all depends on what type of virtual assistant you want to work with.

What should you be looking out for? Look at whether they’ve worked with other entrepreneurs and at what level these entrepreneurs were at. Someone who’s worked with multiple six-figure entrepreneurs is obviously going to be a more valuable hire and, by extension, a more expensive one.

But those rockstar VAs aren’t your only options. Someone who’s relatively new to the role but clearly demonstrates great skills and a greater attitude is also worth considering.

In fact, I hired my first VA for $500 and could only afford to have them on for a few hours a day; but, they were amazing and the perfect fit for me as a business owner at the time.

Again, everything depends on where your business is currently at, what your goals are, and your financial situation. But ultimately, remember that your VA, like everyone else you put on your team, is an investment that will potentially result in exponential returns!

Hiring an OBM

This is your operational business manager, and the best go for at least $700, with some going all the way up to $3500 or so. Like a good VA, it all depends on your type of business and the goals you have for it.

But essentially, an OBM is a virtual assistant with the added benefit of having so much experience with the ins-and-outs of business that they can practically run the whole ship for you if you ask them to.

Your OBM should not be your first hire, because an OBM operates within an established system.

What is a system? It’s the process you use to onboard a client. If you have only a few clients, you can do this manually. If you have 30 or more, the whole thing falls apart unless you have an experienced professional keeping the ship running in the back while you serve your clients.

Hiring a social media manager

So many people run to get one of these right out of the gate. The funny thing is, a social media manager is often the last person you need on your team.

And before you send those outraged DMs, I do see and appreciate the value of a great social media manager! And there are entrepreneurs who run the sorts of businesses that just need someone to take care of this foundational aspect of their branding efforts.

The real problem is that newer business owners expect a social media manager to post all their photos and write all their captions for them.

That’s not the point of a social media manager.

A social media manager is there to enhance, magnify, and take your brand to the next level. But they’re not there to tell your message on your behalf. They’re not there to replace your unique voice and vision. They’re not there to attract clients to your business in your stead.

Rather, they take the time-consuming processes off your hands, but you still have to work closely with them, providing creativity and guidance to their management and efficiency.

Invest in the right team and get ready to be a creative director

Remember, when your business is sizable enough that it’s time to scale, you need to put your creative director cap on and lead your implementers.

Success from this point onwards demands clarity, consistency, and high-touch relationship-building.

Combine this commitment to leadership with the willingness to make healthy investments in the form of your ideal team, and you’ve got yourself the burgeoning soul business of your dreams!

If you enjoyed this episode and experienced a shift or got more clarity, I would love for you to screenshot this episode, share it on Instagram, and tag @iammelissaruiz – let’s start a conversation!

Or rate and review the podcast, so that it can reach more people like you and make a difference in their lives. Reviews are every podcaster’s love language.

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