Erin Austin: All right. Hello, ladies. Welcome to the hourly to exit podcast. I am very excited to have Erica good with me today. Hi, Erica.

Erica Goode: Hey, thanks so much for having me. Well,

Erin Austin: we go a bit back. And so I'm excited to have you on to talk about, um, financials, uh, that buyers care about. I think you might've called it financials that matter to buyers, but before we jump in, I'd love for you to introduce yourself to

Erica Goode: the audience.

Erica Goode: Sure. So I'm Erica Goody. I'm a CPA and I am a fractional CFO for coaches and consultants and individuals who are growing those practices, whether they decide to be a soloist or they want to build an agency. I work with them on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. Uh, not just once a year as most CPAs is that that's how often most people see their CPAs, but I am meeting with my clients every single month and we are talking about what has happened in their business and more importantly, what's going to happen in their business and planning that out.

Erica Goode: So do you consider

Erin Austin: yourself a fractional CFO? Is that kind of the role?

Erica Goode: I do. Yeah. Yes. And you know, different people know of that and don't know of that. And so, yeah, I think it's, it's a great resource to have if you're ready to bring. A financial professional into your business more than just once a year.

Erica Goode: Uh, definitely fractional CFO. It can be such a huge resource into your business. Oh,

Erin Austin: I will say like a lot of us don't understand completely the difference between any kind of accountant versus a CFO. Like what's the difference?

Erica Goode: Yeah. So that's not uncommon. I think there's so much confusion in the industry and looking into the industry on what everybody does and who do we call what?

Erica Goode: And. A lot of times the, the labels overlap and people do similar things, but I would say like CPAs. I think there's an assumption that a CPA does tax. I think CPAs is just a designation. CPAs wear many different capes, right? They can do many different things. And so I think there's a difference of, you can have a CPA who is your tax CPA.

Erica Goode: And you can have accountants or CPAs who are fractional CFOs and those serve very different purposes. And a lot of times business owners or individuals get frustrated because they think their tax CPA should be acting like a financial planner or a fractional CFO. And then there's all this kind of.

Erica Goode: Yucky feelings against each other. Like, well, my CPA is not providing this and my client's asking me for things that they didn't pay me for. And so there's this lot of confusion around, um, what is the, what is the purpose and what are you paying for when you have a tax CPA versus a fractional CFO? Yeah,

Erin Austin: I've had both and I've had the disappointment of having someone who was just like, all I'm doing is your taxes.

Erin Austin: And I'm like, but I've got this issue, you know, and, uh, And then I've had the, fortunately, I don't, I'm not with that person anymore. Now I have the more of the, the, um, CFO helps me kind of forecast, helps me think about my business and, and things like that, which is great resource to have. So,

Erica Goode: yes, absolutely.

Erica Goode: So I would, yeah, I would say the fractional CFO is usually looking forward more than they're looking backwards. They need to look backwards, but their focus and their value comes from looking forward.

Erin Austin: Right. So when, when is somebody ready for you?

Erica Goode: When is, you know, there's a different, I, I provide different level of services depending on where people are.

Erica Goode: Um, a lot of times I see people around, come in around like the two to 300, 000 revenue mark, because they're having a lot of questions around converting to an S Corp and they don't know what that means. They don't know if that's right for them. And they don't want to, you know, everybody's afraid of doing the wrong thing and getting arrested by the IRS.

Erica Goode: The IRS will not arrest you also. So everything's going to get arrested. And they're

Erin Austin: attached. Jail or debtor

Erica Goode: jail or something like that. There is for sure tax jail. I would feel very confident in saying the listeners of this podcast are probably trying to do the right thing. And they're probably never, ever, ever going to get close to tax jail.

Erica Goode: Um, tax jail is reserved for people who are purposefully doing really bad things. Well, they would

Erin Austin: probably at, at scale, I imagine too.

Erica Goode: Yes. At scale. Believe me, they deserve it. You missing a couple of deductions or putting in wrong numbers on your tax return will not land you in tax jail. Um, so yeah, I see people.

Erica Goode: You know, one point is I see them usually at the two to 300, 000 mark when they start wanting to look forward in their business. And when they're starting to seal, see significant growth and scale and like that kind of that click moment, like, Oh, I figured this out. Finally, after years of, you know, trying different things and experimenting, I figured this out.

Erica Goode: And now I see that there

Erica Goode: is I plan for it? I think the best problem that I get to solve is I have money coming in. What do I do with it? Or how do I do it the right way? Or how do I save on taxes the right way? Or how do I invest in my retirement the right way? And so I always say I get to solve the really fun problems, right?

Erica Goode: Having too much cash, cash is a fun problem. Yes. And we get to figure out how to make more cash, save more cash and invest it in the right ways. Um, so that's one point and then another point that people tend to bring me in is when they've created what is like an agency or something where they have a staff of people and things get, uh, you know, they've, they've done very well and they've been able to track things.

Erica Goode: Uh, along the way, uh, probably until their first million with their bookkeeper or by themselves sometimes. And then they get to the point where cash is flying in every direction. We've got to make payroll twice a week. We're bringing in invoices, but some of them aren't getting paid. How do I get those paid?

Erica Goode: I can't miss payroll. And we start to get these really big, um, tens of thousands of dollars in and out swings on a weekly or biweekly basis that can get really nerve wracking if you don't have a good visual into. The plan for those and, um, and how your cash flow is kind of growing and fluctuating as you run that business.

Erica Goode: Yeah,

Erin Austin: that's great. Yeah. The first example like that was when I, cause I've had, I have never, I haven't done my taxes like ever. I don't think so. I've always used accountants. For my taxes, but it wasn't until kind of that flex point that I brought in, you know, someone to kind of do financials, which, which brings us to, because I never had financials before that I just said, yeah, so, so that brings us to our.

Erin Austin: Topic today. And so I'm excited about it because I haven't been talking on the exit side of the hourly to exit journey for a while. So we're going to talk about that today and about the financials that will matter to a buyer. But just starting from the beginning, like, what do we mean when we say financials?

Erica Goode: Yeah. So what, what I mean, at least is, I mean, really simply a balance sheet or a profit and loss statement and, or a profit and loss statement, no matter where you are at any point in your business, you're going to need to do those, whether you keep them in a spreadsheet, there's no shame in spreadsheet, whether you keep them.

Erica Goode: On a legal pad. That's okay, too. Like those, um, those financials statements is always going to be what feeds your taxes. So whether you do it on your own or you have an accountant do your taxes, you're always going to have to produce some kind of financials. And that's usually going to be your balance sheet and your profit and loss statement at the very minimum for every business owner in in whatever stage you're at.

Erin Austin: Right. And what is a

Erica Goode: balance sheet? Oh, thank you. A balance sheet. Yes, that's true. A balance sheet tells you what assets you have and what debts you owe. And so accountants love to be in balance. Balance sheets are called a balance sheet because they should balance your assets are always going to equal your debts plus your equity in there.

Erica Goode: And so I'm going to take it out of business for a second. Cause there's. Uh, sometimes we're like, wow, that's I don't even know what my assets are in my business. But when I think about something very basic, like, if you think, um, in terms of owning your home. Your home is your assets. Let's say you have a 400, 000 home and you have a 300, 000 mortgage on it.

Erica Goode: That means your asset is the 400, 000 thing, the home. Your debt is the 300, 000 thing and your equity in that is 100, 000. And so the 400 equals the 300 plus the 100, right? And it works the same way with our business. We have assets in our business, and then we might have debt in our business. And the difference is the equity or the, the value that we, the owner have when we Pay off the debts, basically.

Erin Austin: All right. I'm going to go in this direction. Just bear with me. So, you know, I like to talk about intellectual property as being an asset in the expertise based business, but I don't think they show up on the balance sheet. Tell us how, what that

Erica Goode: is. Yes. So that is really, so there's some really nitty gritty accounting that we won't go into into the depths of it can show up on your balance sheet.

Erica Goode: Um, One of the ways it can show up is if you buy that. And so actually, when you're talking about exiting, I didn't know we were going to go this direction. You're really, uh, making me scratch my brain for some really good gap accounting here. Um, but this is good because this is talking about exit. So if you do have intellectual property to you.

Erica Goode: To me, the business owner, if I have intellectual property, it might not show up on my balance sheet. You're right. But when it does show up on a balance sheet is if a buyer comes in and says, Ooh, I see you have something of value intellectual property. I want to buy that from you. It now if the buyer pays money for it, it is now an asset on their balance sheet, right?

Erica Goode: Yeah. And so it didn't it. You're right. It wasn't on the seller's balance sheet as soon as it gets sold and somebody pays money for it. Then it's an asset to them.

Erin Austin: All right. Well, that brings us to the financials that buyers like, and maybe there's then the extras that aren't quite on your financial statement as a seller.

Erin Austin: So, um, yeah, do you want to. Anyplace you want to start

Erica Goode: there? Ah, let's jump into the profit and loss statement. We talked about balance sheet. I think a buyer's before anything, a prospective buyer is. Probably not going to care about your balance sheet. Your balance sheet is your balance sheet. Whatever you owe in your business is you is literally your business.

Erica Goode: They're likely not going to take on debt, uh, from you. And so what a buyer is really going to care about is what's happening on your profit and loss statement. And more importantly, what's going to happen in your profit and loss statement. And so what you have, every business owner is going to have what happened in the past.

Erica Goode: What they want to see is probably what's going to happen in the next five to 10 years. They're going to care a lot about your revenue. They're going to care a lot about your profit, and they're going to care a lot about the difference between those every year going forward or your trend lines. And so they want to know if you're increasing in revenue, how fast you're increasing in revenue, and what it takes to increase that from like an extent expense standpoint.

Erica Goode: Um, one second. I've got a dog here. Can you stop? Thank you. Thank you. I know your editor will take that. No, she just decided that she's going to chase her tail on the couch right now.

Erica Goode: So they're going to worry about how fast that trend is moving in profit and revenue and what it takes to get there. Because if you've set up your business, so they care, they're going to look at what happened in the past. You've created this business. It's hopefully moving in an upward into the right direction, right up into the right.

Erica Goode: That's what everybody wants to see up into the right. And it's and it's moving at a scalable clip. But if it's taking expenses. And it's degrading profit, right? That that's what a buyer cares about. They care that they're going to be able to take by that business and make more money and more profit every year in the future.

Erica Goode: And so a couple of really important things is, uh, your financials matter because we care that they're accurate in the past. That they're very accurate in the past because that's what's going to feed your forecast in the future. And we care that when you talked about having a fractional CFO, that the person helping you build out that forecast is really keenly aware of how your business operates.

Erica Goode: Because you can have an exam, you can have a, you can have an example of. Maybe you're building a business and it does take in year 1 and 2 a lot of expenses to stand up what you're doing. But those expenses are 1 time costs, and maybe they're not going to be there in year 3 through 8. Right? And so you care very much that the person helping you build your forecast understands that.

Erica Goode: Those expenses are one time things and they're not projecting them into the future and that that's where the buyer is going to see values. You've built up and created this thing and now it's going to run at a much better operating margin. Now,

Erin Austin: if I'm thinking about selling my business, is there like take us to like the T minus.

Erin Austin: You know, three years, five years. What like, okay, I want to sell my business in 2025. Well, it's too late now. If I wanted to start that was let's say 2030. Like when do I need to start thinking as a seller, as opposed to just an operator or maybe they're the same.

Erica Goode: Oh, I think, I think they can be the same. I think, um, here's why I think that because.

Erica Goode: a business that you are going to, that somebody else is going to see as very valuable is now currently also very valuable to you. What is, what a buyer thinks is valuable is something that's going to kick off a lot of profit and a lot of cash relatively easily because it has a, a solid operating system behind it, you know, processes and it's, it's running efficiently.

Erica Goode: It doesn't take just. Me as the seller to operate it and to push all the buttons every single minute of every single day. And so in essence, if you're building something that's going to look very attractive to a buyer, you've built something that is already very valuable to you, it's already kicking off profit.

Erica Goode: It's already making a good cashflow and it's relatively. You know, quote, easy to run without you, or at least you specifically

Erin Austin: somewhat independent from you. Exactly. Yeah. And, um, and so what about if, you know, I'm trying to pay myself kind of nothing so I can keep cash in the business and keep growing it.

Erin Austin: Like, how will the seller buyer look at that?

Erica Goode: Hmm. So cash in the business is we kind of always have lots of questions around. Um, and I'm going to go into taxes for a second. Do I get taxed on the money that I take out of the business or do I get taxed on any money that the business generates? Right. And so there's this, sometimes there's this misnomer that like, if I keep money in the business, I don't pay tax on it.

Erica Goode: Uh, usually I would guess the listeners of this podcast are either an LLC or an S corp. They're probably not a C corp. So you're going to pay tax on anything that is just revenue minus your expenses. Is your profit, and it's also going to be what the potential buyer cares about. They don't care whether you took money out of the profit to pay yourself or you didn't.

Erica Goode: In essence, that cash isn't going to be there's anyways, like you've earned that cash. You're going to walk away with that cash when you sell it. What they care about is that profit line item. And so if, as the. Seller, if you are generating a lot of cash and you can pay yourself. By all means pay yourself, but if there's a reason that you want to keep that cash in the business, because you think that that helps you build or grow something that in the future is going to be valuable, then by all means, if that's, if that's your purpose, do it.

Erica Goode: I wouldn't say keep money, never keep money in your business. Sometimes I get people like it's December, how much money should I spend so I can reduce my tax burden? And I always say. You should spend 0 if you don't have to, right? Like, we should never be spending 1 to save 0. 30. Oh, yeah. It's the same thing.

Erica Goode: Yes, and I think there's, uh, there's a misnomer out there that, like, I need to spend something in December so I can save on my taxes, but. We should never be spending money that doesn't need to be spent. I would rather you take home a dollar and spend and pay 30 cents on tax on it. Then take home 70 and then pay tax on that.

Erin Austin: It was going to be, you know, you're going to buy it in January. Like, okay, right. Right. Right.

Erica Goode: You know, and so I'd be very careful. Keep money in your business. If you think that you can spend it in a way that's going to make your price tag later higher. So

Erin Austin: that's, it's an investment. Like, you're waiting maybe to make capital investments and things like that.

Erin Austin: Yeah. So if I underpay myself. Does that not increase, like, what looks like profit, even though it really isn't because they would have to pay someone the market rate in order to

Erica Goode: replace me. Right. So there's 2 ways to pay yourself. Uh, let's assume you're an S corp. Somebody listened to this is probably an S corp.

Erica Goode: you probably are on the books having a salary. Um, you want to, you always want to pay yourself a reasonable rate. Um, and the IRS requires, they call it a reasonable compensation. You have to pay yourself what you would pay somebody else to do the work for you if you wanted to sit and sip coffee all day.

Erica Goode: Right. And so, um, really like the underpaying yourself. shouldn't be an option. Now, if you want to take less distributions outside of that, that's actually still not going to make a difference to your profit at the end of the day because your owner distributions aren't a part of your profit and loss statement, just your salary.

Erin Austin: Oh, okay. Okay. All right. That makes sense. And then what are the, I mean, have you taken someone like done someone's books as they were exiting a business and

Erica Goode: I haven't gone through the exit. I've gone up. I've gone through the, we know that this is our exit plan is. To exit in the next 5 years. So let's make sure we're a doing all of this accurately.

Erica Goode: So somebody can't come in and be like, well, what's this number? Like, we're going to always be prepared for an audit. Like, if you're prepared for an IRS audit, you're going to be prepared for somebody to come in and look at your books during a due diligence process. Um, so, so, yeah, we've, we've gone through the process of getting.

Erica Goode: Investors and also, um, being prepared for if somebody comes knocking, we're ready to tell you how much this thing is worth.

Erin Austin: And when the, a deal falls through because of the due diligence process, like what are typically like, what, what went wrong?

Erica Goode: Oh, I'm definitely not an expert or a broker in the due diligence process.

Erica Goode: My guess would be that, uh, something looked rosier than. It was proposed to be that it was actually, and, you know, due diligence is somebody comes in and starts asking all of the questions. They start nitpicking everything, which is a hard process to go through. Right. And, and that is the nature of the process.

Erica Goode: And they. You've maybe said, oh, we're at a 50 percent margin. And so they're going to dig into who are your contracts? What are what makes those up? How long are those? How easy are those to get when they expire? And then somebody is going to dig into all your expenses. And if after they do all that digging.

Erica Goode: Cause what they're doing, they're trying to poke holes in your forecast. And so if they poke holes in that and they're like, wait, you said you're going to grow at 30 percent revenue for the next five years, year on year, every year. I don't know how that's possible based on what I'm seeing today. That's what they're trying to kind of poke holes into.

Erica Goode: And so that's where like. We can all make up a forecast. Any CFO can make up a forecast that looks real great. Um, but the moment somebody starts poking holes in it and can't get to the same numbers that you did, that's where a due diligence process would start. I imagine, uh, breaking down and a buyer would either walk or say, I still want it, but at a very different price.

Erin Austin: Right. Right. That's when the retraining, I guess the term is starts, right? Yes. So if somebody's thinking about, they want to sell their business someday, that's why we're here. Like what, something that they can do today with or without a CFO's assistance that can help them kind of get on the right path.

Erica Goode: Yeah. I, I don't think it's ever wasted time to sit down. In a spreadsheet of your own and start forecasting out what the future of your business looks like or what it could look like. Um, and it doesn't have to be a really nitty gritty process. I think sometimes we can hear, hear words like that and be like, oh, I don't know how to do that.

Erica Goode: I, I wouldn't even know where to start. It's really just, you know, open up a spreadsheet and say, this is what I think this year will look like. Here's what I think. Okay. The next five years could look like and from a revenue standpoint, and then what would it take from an expense standpoint? Like, is that going to cost me money?

Erica Goode: Is that going to make me hire somebody? And what does that do to, to my margin? And it can be very high level, but it starts to get your. Yeah. your brain working in that future direction. If you've only ever really looked through the past for tax purposes, it'll start making you thinking, wow, why would a buyer want this?

Erica Goode: Or what would a buyer want? And how can I make that happen?

Erin Austin: That's great advice. Like just thinking about, you know, looking back, like starting out there and what resources are required. To get there and start thinking about it that way, as opposed to, like, instead of pushing up the Hill, like, how do you pull yourself up to where you want to be?

Erin Austin: I like that. Yeah,

Erica Goode: go ahead. No, I was going to say, there was a lot. There's a lot of times where, um, as business owners, especially as excited business owners, I hear things like, okay, well, we're going to increase revenue by 100, 000 dollars in this next 2 months. And I'm like, great. Are you going to have to hire to do that to complete those contracts?

Erica Goode: And it kind of stops. I'm like, oh. Yeah, yeah, I guess I will. So your, your 100, 000 of profit really is maybe more like, you know, 70, 000. And that's, well, if you need to

Erin Austin: hire an expert, then yeah. What does that mean?

Erica Goode: Yeah. Which is fine. That doesn't mean it's a bad thing. That doesn't mean don't do it. That just means like take both sides into consideration.

Erin Austin: All right. So do you, okay. So, so I usually ask about, you know, trends in someone's area and I don't know, are there trends in

Erica Goode: accounting? Financial or, uh, qualitative? Uh,

Erin Austin: either

Erica Goode: one. Um, right, right now the trend in the accounting space that everybody is paying attention to is the, uh, shortage of CPAs and accountants in our space.

Erica Goode: Yes. It is, and it is very well known in, In the industry, but if you are outside of the industry, I don't think people realize that there is, um, a shortage. I believe there is a crazy statistic that says something like in the next 10 years, 75 percent of CPAs will retire. And they're, they're not coming in at the same clip that they're retiring at this point.

Erica Goode: And so I would be shocked if somebody listening to this had not had an issue. If they'd gone out looking for a CPA recently, a new one had an issue finding one. Um, because even in even inside the industry, if I'm trying to refer somebody, I cannot find somebody to refer you to.

Erin Austin: That is so interesting. So why is it just not the hot.

Erin Austin: Major anymore, what's going on there?

Erica Goode: Oh, there that's a, that's a deep answer. The deep answer. I think this is. This is my opinion. So don't, uh, don't, you know, if you, um, there's a lot of people giving this quote though. So, uh, I think it's been a very, I'm trying to speak kindly to my industry. Uh, there are long hours.

Erica Goode: There can be very long hours in accounting and, uh, the burnout rate is very high and accountants are notoriously also bad at pricing. And so you get this. This funny squeeze where, uh, accounting firms aren't making enough margin and they're treating their employees poorly because they have to get their contracts completed.

Erica Goode: And so you have this burnout and. If you ask, I can imagine if I am a college student thinking about majoring in accounting and I ask 10 CPAs who have been in public accounting, they're not going to say necessarily kind things about how their work life balance has been, which will not motivate anybody to go into the industry.

Erica Goode: And so I think it's, I think. There's a lot of things playing in to the industry, but it's, it's not an attractive, uh, work life balance in, in the traditional sense. There's a lot of, um, younger accountants who are changing the industry, but it takes a while to turn a ship. And so we are slowly moving in the right direction, but I think right now there is a lot of old schools of thought and traditional ways of running firms that does not appear to be attractive to, to new up and coming college graduates.

Erica Goode: Are

Erin Austin: you mentoring young accountants to kind of have a different business model than billing hourly.

Erica Goode: I think I'm trying to figure out my own way of doing it. And, uh, and, and then we'll see if I can pass along the knowledge to the next. Next generation, but gosh, I mean, I, I wanted, yeah, I see those young kids and there are people who should be accountants.

Erica Goode: Like that sounds like a funny thing, but there are personalities and the way certain brains work that they should be accountants. And I would hate for them. I would hate for our society to lose that because of, of just. Inefficient and, and poor work life balance, you

Erin Austin: know, and everyone can't be a computer engineer or, you know, whatever the hot, hot things are now that, um, yeah, we need professionals all across the board.

Erin Austin: So, all right.

Erica Goode: Absolutely. And we need to treat our people well and across every industry. We people should be treated like people. Well, I would

Erin Austin: imagine the market will correct itself at some point. Like, if you can't recruit and retain talent, then you need to change something. Right. And, uh, certainly, um, our people working remotely, like, is that.

Erica Goode: Yeah, it's starting and so what I imagine will happen is the people who are running traditional firms with old schools of thought will, they will have an extremely hard recruiting process and the up and coming firms who have very progressive new ways of thinking will easily recruit people and you will just see this shift of.

Erica Goode: Market share move towards the progressive thinking firms.

Erin Austin: Yeah, and similar things happening in the legal industry. I will say I'm pretty far removed from it at this point, but, um, I mean, I haven't been in a law firm and God, I don't even know a very long time, but, uh, but, but the different kinds of firms that are.

Erin Austin: Um, you know, virtual and have kind of, you know, independent partners, people who have their own firms, but then come together under 1 brand to market their services together. And, um, and so they don't have the same and you can work as hard as you want to, or, um, and, uh, and have a little more, um, balance in their lives.

Erin Austin: Uh, yeah, I mean, the burnout in the legal. Industry is, you know, hasn't changed.

Erica Goode: I think, I think lawyers and accountants, uh, run very similarly run businesses and business models. And I think it'd be, it'd suit us all for those industries to think differently. Yes,

Erin Austin: absolutely. Absolutely. Well, you know, this is the hourly to exit podcast.

Erin Austin: You know, we were talking about building a scalable and saleable expertise based business. And so I have, of course, the soft spot for creating, uh, and protecting intellectual property. So when you are working with expertise based businesses, um, and they work with their intellect, uh, do you ever come across challenges?

Erin Austin: We talked a little bit about it. Like the fact that we can't put the, those assets on our balance sheets. Um, but do they have, uh, other issues that come up regarding protecting their intellectual property and, and what kind of questions do they ask you? I imagine they ask you about, about their, how to value it.

Erica Goode: I think a lot of, of what I see my, my clients deal with is creating the processes around and like the frameworks. It's always about framework. And I don't think, um, whether you're an IT, I have. It marketing, um, coaching, like all these different, you know, kind of until it is all intellectual property. Um, but I don't think they and we always see it as I.

Erica Goode: P. I think, I think sometimes until we've been educated, we have very, very narrow. Minds about what IP is, and I think we grossly underestimate that the things we are creating and the things my clients are creating, the frameworks, the processes, the platforms, like these are all very saleable and transferable ideas and things that they're building.

Erica Goode: And I don't, I honestly don't see somebody coming alongside them from a legal standpoint. Calling that out for them. I'm not sure that we always know to do that when we're creating these things because we don't see them as IP from that side. Yeah, I like,

Erin Austin: you know, of course, I'd like to say that is everywhere because every time we're using our intellect where you are creating intellectual property and then it's not just those things that we are selling like.

Erin Austin: Books and courses and software. It's also the things that we use internally in our businesses to help create leverages in our businesses. So absolutely. I love that. All right. So we know this is a very meta podcast. I'm a female founder of an expertise based business that I hope to sell someday. You are the female founder of an expertise based business.

Erin Austin: Are you thinking about selling it someday?

Erica Goode: Not at this time. Um, I am in a season of life. We talked in the green room beforehand. We talked about the ages of our kids. I have a 12 year and an 8 year old. And so right now, um, I am pretty focused on getting these little people grown up and running a business that just.

Erica Goode: is truly like a lifestyle suited for me business. And so my goal today, I don't have selling on the mind. Uh, that doesn't mean that it couldn't be in the future. Um, I don't have, I don't have a finish line that I'm racing to. I enjoy what I do. I want to keep doing it. Um, yeah. Yeah. This doesn't mean it won't change.

Erin Austin: I'm with you on that. We did talk. I have a senior and I am racing to the finish line for that anyway. And, um, but like you, like when my son was young, like My business was very lifestyle. It was very much like, I did not do any business development. It was just like, I had my well clients. That was it, you know, and then, you know, I had, I could focus on other things.

Erin Austin: Um, and now that he's pseudo independent. I was starting to, you know, definitely like put way more energy into my business and, you know, things that I've been doing the last couple of years. Um, and so there is a season, yeah, for all of our businesses that go along with our lives, but certainly when we are soloist women.

Erin Austin: And, uh, and so, um, yeah, I, I, I agreed with you there and, you know, the funny thing about retirement and I guess maybe I think of retirement almost as like a employee kind of thing, as opposed to a business owner kind of thing, you know, assuming you've created a business that you love, you know, to me, focus on, it's not retirement, but just.

Erin Austin: Relaxing, you know, like having less intense needs in my business, but creating those revenue streams that require less and less of made to me. That is retirement. And that's what, you know, I am, I'm working

Erica Goode: on. So I think that's such, that's such a good call out because we do, I think so much of society has this W 2 employee mindset of retirement.

Erica Goode: Like I turned this age and I'm done. And coming out of. Coming out of corporate, coming out of burnout, like what if, what if we just created work for ourselves that we enjoyed that didn't kill us, right? Like, what if we enjoyed every day what we did and we weren't so desperate to retire? What would that look like?

Erica Goode: And I, I, I like that idea. Um, But you're right. It's not something that we think about creating until we've left that W two mindset. Right?

Erin Austin: Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, and you need to do something. I mean, assuming we're healthy and our minds still work, you know, and we have like, what are you going to do?

Erin Austin: I don't get what people do after they retire. I don't know. Maybe. I don't know. I'm going to do what they do.

Erica Goode: I don't know. I'm going to need to do something because I don't sit well.

Erin Austin: All right. So as we wrap up, you know, we believe in creating a more equitable society and we love to support businesses and organizations that, um, work, uh, to help us women in particular. And so is there a organization that you'd like to share

Erica Goode: with the audience? So I have a cause not a particular organization since day one of building this business, I have donated 10 percent of my salary and the profits of this business to domestic violence shelters.

Erica Goode: But because domestic I think the solution. And what do I know, I leave it to the experts but the, the solution to so much domestic violence. You know, problems is so local that my money, the causes that we donate to are specific to the local areas where our clients are located. And so I'm a virtual, I'm a virtual business.

Erica Goode: I have clients all over the U. S. So, 10 percent goes back to those cities, uh, domestic shelters in the cities where my clients are located. And so it's very, you know, there's not a national. You know, this is not a, this is not a chain restaurant. These are people on the ground in the cities, um, wherever you're living that are building up these organizations to help women and men and children of domestic violence situations.

Erica Goode: And so those are very, um, located all over the United States. And so. I get to actually search out these organizations and it's like my favorite thing to do in December. I get my, I get my card out, you know, my debit card out and I start, you know, looking up all of these, these organizations that I've now donated to for years.

Erica Goode: And funny thing happens every December. Uh, the bank shuts down my card on that day because I, because I'm dropping thousands of dollars in Portland and Austin and Illinois and like all these. And so then you see my card's been stolen. Um, so it usually takes me a few days to get through once I turn the card back on.

Erica Goode: But, um, but yeah, so my, my cause is, uh, domestic violence support for women and children and men also. Um, cause that is, it's a, It's, uh, not exclusive, um, gender problem, um, but when I do have a new client, I have to look for, uh, who's supporting that particular city. And so I will call out a website called domestic shelters.

Erica Goode: org and you can put in your zip code, your city, and it will tell you everybody. So who is supporting that, um, that area of the country. And I. tend to do my research for domestic violence situations, starting with that website. So domestic shelters. org. If you're looking for somebody to support, or if you know somebody who needs support, uh, you can find who's in their area there.

Erin Austin: That's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. And so, uh, do you have, uh, something special you want to, uh, alert the, the, the audience to about what's going on in your business offers that you may have?

Erica Goode: Yeah. So I have a podcast called coaches, consultants, and money. I'll assume anybody listening to, yeah, thank you.

Erica Goode: I'll assume if you're listening to this podcast, you like podcasts. And so if you want to look that up, coaches, consultants, and money and follow along there, or you can find me at ericagoodie. com or on the socials at Instagram and LinkedIn and just, uh, see what I'm up to. I would love to hear from you.

Erica Goode: You can welcome to DM me anytime.

Erin Austin: Yeah. I noticed that you're on Instagram. So your, your business is on Instagram.

Erica Goode: My business is on Instagram. Now, what do you do on Instagram? Mostly just have fun. Let's be honest. I go, I'm a little more steep. No, I'm not so serious. I'm a pretty lighthearted person, no matter where I show up.

Erica Goode: But, um, Instagram, if you drop into my Instagram stories, you will see a lot of lots of behind the scenes, family stuff, pictures of Idaho, things like that. And, um, you know, I, it's, this isn't, this is not a revenue generator for me, but it's fun to, to be out there and be who you are. And my prospective clients and my clients get to see who I am because at the end of the day, we're all usually, uh, buying.

Erica Goode: You know, the person behind the business. And so I think it's important to just be yourself and show up as you are. That's

Erin Austin: great. Yeah. Instagram is a little bit dangerous for me. Productive space for me.

Erica Goode: Not productive, but fun. If you want to have fun, go over to Instagram. If you want to get all the, the highly professional things probably head over to LinkedIn.

Erin Austin: Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Erica. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us and sharing, uh, domestic shelters, domestic

Erica Goode: shelter, but that org that domestic shelters. org.

Erin Austin: Thank you so much. All right. Thanks again.

Erica Goode: Thank you.