Page 150 - The $100 Startup_ Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love

having a hobby, but if you want to call it a business, you have to make
money.

Naomi is right: On any given day, there are all kinds of things you can do that
have nothing to do with making money—but you should be careful about those
distractions, because without the money, there is no business. Many aspiring
business owners make two common, related mistakes: thinking too much about
where to get money to start their project and thinking too little about where the
business income will come from. Fixing these problems (or avoiding them in the
first place) requires a simple solution: Spend as little money as possible and
make as much money as you can.

Part I: Hang On to Your Wallet

Inspired by her second child, Heather Allard invented two wearable baby
blankets that became a worldwide sensation. The blankets were featured on
Access Hollywood and sold in more than 200 stores, and it was all she could do
to keep up. After the birth of her third child in 2006, Heather sold the products to
a larger company in order to spend more time with the family. Success! She
wasn’t done with entrepreneurship, though; the next step was to help other
women, especially mothers, learn to do what she had accomplished. She started
her next business, The Mogul Mom, with the goal of mentoring busy women
who wanted to create more independence through a small business. The baby
blanket business was highly successful, but it also became a high-spending
operation as the product took off. On reflection, Heather realized that she would
need to run her second act differently:

I had gotten into a ton of startup debt with my product company and spent
thousands on things that I absolutely did not need (big advertising
campaigns, a custom e-commerce website, a publicist, etc.), and I definitely
did not want to do that with The Mogul Mom. Therefore, when I spend
money on The Mogul Mom, it’s for things that will continue to build my
brand and boost my sales while allowing me ample time with my family—
things like Web design, payments to a small group of contributors, or a new
computer.