It was February of 2023 when I decide to make the second most significant pivot of my personal brand. The first one happened years ago when I decided to rebrand my personal finance project that had a name that was hard for people to remember. It kept bugging me and finally I had the feeling that it was time to change the name.
So, I did.
And that’s when Michelle is Money Hungry was born. I wanted to talk about personal finance from a social equity, policy and access perspective and allow myself to say that I wanted to earn money. I knew my rebrand would be unnappealling to other people. It was, but for others, the new brand caught their attention and captured their interest. To this day, my mom dislikes the name of that project.
With this current pivot I spent a year feeling increasing dissatisfied with how my project was going. I was still working with great brands, creating award winning content and well respected in my space however something was missing.
Welcome to the Brand Building Lab, I’m your host Michelle Jackson and I help online entrepreneurs build kind online brands. There’s nothing better than getting paid while uplifting the communities that you serve online and not causing financial harm. I’m a podcast monetization coach focused on helping these creators create systems and strategies that get them paid and sustains the important work that they’re doing.
In this episode I share why I knew it was time to pivot my brand, I also share some signs to help you recognize if it’s time to pivot too and I talk about what I’m doing next.
*In order for me to support my blogging activities, I may receive monetary compensation or other types of remuneration for my endorsement, recommendation, testimonial and/or link to any products or services from this blog. Please read my disclosure and privacy policy here.*
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How to Know When It’s Time to Pivot Your Brand
It pains to me to say this but I’m a multi-passionate content creator. This means that I have several niche projects that I quietly work on in the background. This is important to know. When I first started creating content online I started a personal finance website and a website about Colorado. For reasons that baffle me to this day, I decided to focus on the personal finance website because it was the harder project to grow.
I was right in that assessment.
In fact, growing a personal finance website is incredibly hard to do and all of the wins that I’ve experienced throughout the years with that project were incredibly hard won. Nothing came easily with Michelle is Money Hungry. Instead, I decided to work on my Colorado project when I felt like it. Then I started getting a lot of questions about the business of creating content online.
At the time this began to happen I was really concerned about the business on online content creation canabolizing my personal finance content so I decided to create The Brand Building Lab and when I had time I would write a blog post or record a podcast that answered frequently asked questions. It may surprise you to learn that a lot of well-known creators who talk about the business of content creation came out of the personal finance space. The problem for me was that I was and still am very invested in having and hosting the financial conversations that I was having. I didn’t want making money content to kill the project that I worked on for so many years.
Basically, I was creating niche websites without calling them “niche sites.” The problem is that it’s very difficult to focus on multiple goals at the same time. You can work on multiple projects, but it’s important to dial in focus in order to achieve specific goals. Here’s how I knew it was time to pivot.
Clue #1-A Drop in Enthusiasm for the Project
I absolutely love, love, love Michelle is Money Hungry. But, the driving enthusiasm that directed my output was dropping. Part of this drop in enthusiasm was directly connected to dealing with intense financial conversations during COVID. We’ve been dealing with some tough financial conversations and I was constantly reflecting on those topics.
I got tired.
And I wanted to have different conversations.
Clue #2-My Personal and Professional Goals Had Changed
While I was making money with the content I was creating, how I wanted to make money had significantly changed. I didn’t want to make the majority of my income with active projects. I wanted to grow what is considered “passive income” By the way, growing passive income takes a lot of work. I wanted to earn money in the following ways:
- Course sales-I have two courses that I sell:
- Podcasters Getting Paid (multiple tiers)
- Make Money with Ebooks
- On-demand content sales
- Affiliate income
- Ebook sales
- Mediavine revenue
While I still want to work with brand partners, I found myself missing the passive income that I was making pre-COVID. That money saved my ass during the lockdowns because each month money would be deposited into my bank account. Understanding that my goals had changed meant that it was time to take different actions in order to achieve my new goals. These goals were not in alignment with the type of content that I was creating on my personal finance website. However, these goals were 100% in alignment with The Brand Building Lab.
Clue #3-Conversations That I Was Having Had Changed
Looking back at the past year in particular, I was constantly having conversations about podcasting, monetizing podcasts and showing up in podcasting spaces. These conversations were easy, almost effortless and I really began to notice that talking about personal finance in the way that I was required a lot of effort and I just hit a breaking point.
What’s Next?
Is Michelle is Money Hungry dead? No! I still really love this project. But, how I want to work on it has completely changed.
- I’ve decided to take a minimum of 3 months off of recording podcast content for that show. I need a break after working on show since around 2017 it’s now 2023.
- Before I produce any future special seasons, I will find a brand partner prior to production. This was actually becoming a major issue or sticking point for me in the past year. I got tired of finding brand partners after I worked on the content. It created a lot of friction and stress behind the scenes. I love getting brand sponsors prior to the creation of unique content-it just makes things so much easier because I’m already paid.
- Working on SEO focused written posts. The Michelle is Money Hungry podcast took over my website and I completely stopped writing SEO specific content. The type of content that I was getting paid the big bucks for for well-known financial companies and brands. The type of content that would generate affiliate and ad revenue. SEO content also increases page views to the website. Something that had dwindled in the past couple of years. Yes, I’m close to 1 million page views on that website. But, I’ve had it since 2013.
- I will also be working on SEO content and the occasional podcast for my Square State Colorado website. This website, in particular, is so easy to work on and grow. My goal is to qualify for Mediavine ads with that website by July 2023. I will just quietly work on content from a coffee shop patio and publish when done. That’s the only strategy.
The Brand Building Lab
Moving forward you will see me positioning my content from the Brand Building Lab. I’m so excited to talk about how to make money with the content that you’re creating online. In particular, the podcast content that you’re creating. I’m very aware of the moment that we’re in historically and it’s my goal to help unique audio and visual content creators to begin bringing in income that helps to sustain and pay for the work that they’re doing-it’s so important.
Since announcing this pivot it’s felt like a weight has dropped off my shoulders. I’ve also noticed that my productivity has shot through the roof again. The enthusiasm is back. It took me a year of evaluating and paying attention to how I was feeling about the work that I was doing. I’m excited to see what happens next.
One thing that’s important to bring up. This feels like an evolution of the work that I’ve been doing, a natural change versus something forced. And I think that’s really important to point out.
Pivoting can be scary, but it’s a part of building a business. Things change as you grow and evolve personally and professionally.
Don’t forget to grab the Do It Ugly tool kit that’s in the show notes. Done is always better than perfect. I hope you enjoyed this episode please subscribe, review and share this episode with other creators that may need some encouragement and support.
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