You're listening to cubicle to CEO, Episode 191. Hi, welcome back to our quarter 1 2023 income report. My name is Ellen Yin, I am the founder of cubicle to CEO. And I have been publicly sharing my income reports for my business since 2019. So this is our fifth year now of reporting exactly what our business makes spends and profits every 90 days. And if you're new here, you can catch up on all of our past income reports at Ellen yin.com/income report. But if you're not new here, then you know, we've been doing this practice for so many years because we really believe that financial transparency is the future and that we all benefit when we collectively share our insights and our data. And we don't gate keep this really important information. So this is part of our advocacy work as a media platform that creates content through a financially transparent lens. So if you have been around for years and listening and following along with the journey, thank you for being here. Thank you for sharing and taking part in this important conversation. And I hope it inspires you to be more transparent in whatever way makes sense for you in terms of money conversations, so let's get into the numbers for quarter 1 2023.
Welcome to cubicle to CEO the podcast. I'm your host Ellen Yin. I quit my job without a backup plan and bootstrapped my first $300 freelance project into $2 million in revenue by age 28. On the show, you'll hear weekly case study interviews with leading entrepreneurs and CEOs who share one specific strategy that successfully grew their business revenue. Skip the expensive and time consuming learning curve of testing everything yourself by borrowing what actually works from the best and brightest mentors. You'll also get a front row seat to my founders journey through transparent income reports and behind the business solo episodes, subscribe now so we can grow together every Monday.
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Alright, so this quarterly income report covers the months of January February and March of 2023. And for privacy reasons. As a disclaimer, I will not share the exact dollar amount like down to the dollar. But I will share pretty darn close to that. So we're just going to round up or down to like the nearest 100. Just for again security reasons but overall you're going To get a pretty accurate picture of exactly what our past three months look like. So overall, for revenue in this first quarter, we generated 194,500, and some odd dollars in sales, our expenses were at 9500, and some odd dollars. And then our profit was 104. Actually, if we round up $105,000, we're just shy of that by a couple bucks, really. So our profit, as you can see, is nearly 54%, which I have not seen numbers like this since probably 2019, when I was still providing done for you marketing services, and operating primarily as a service provider with a small agency team of contractors.
So this profit margin is absolutely insane to me, because for the last number of years, our target profit margin has been 30% pre tax profit, and we've more or less stayed around that amount over the course of the year, for the last three or so years. So again, this huge profit margin, I think can really be attributed to one key thing. And it's that our ad costs, the money that we have spent on advertising and marketing. So far this year has been so nominal compared to prior years, just for reference. And you'll know this if you've listened to past income reports. Typically we have spent anywhere between 25-35% of our gross revenue. And we've allocated that percentage amount to our marketing budget. So in the past, we've run a lot of ads for selling courses and our programs. But with the shift to being a media business and having this different business model.
Now, a lot of our revenue is actually generated through brand partnerships or sponsored content. And that type of clientele, we are able to secure and book those campaigns through direct one to one pitching to our brand partners. So we're not really relying on ads to bring in a large volume of customers like we were prior. Instead, we're building deep relationships, one on one with representatives of brands that we want to work with. And we are organically pitching them through emails, right. So it's not exactly an apples to apples comparison to prior years because we're again in a different business model. But it is really interesting to see how greatly that has impacted our profit margin.
So like I said, in the past, we would spend anywhere between 25 to 35% of our sales generated on marketing and advertising. So far year to date, we have only spent 5% of our total revenue on advertising, marketing. And most of that has been toward a freebie that we've used as an opt in to grow our newsletter, which is a huge part of our strategy, because as a media company, your audience is really your primary asset. And the more engaged and the larger your audience is, the more attractive you are to brands when it comes to partnerships. So we have still consistently been spending in ADS. But it's been much much lower than when we were optimizing for a conversion like a direct sale for low ticket or for high ticket products. So it's been interesting to see that play out. However, I will say I do anticipate that later this year, our advertising and marketing costs, I do expect to rise again, I don't know if it will rise to our usual 25 to 35%. But I know it will be significantly more than the 5% we're seeing here. Because we are planning to bring back some low ticket offers. And we haven't really actively run ads to any paid offers since last summer when we retired my coaching program. So I do expect to see those numbers rise a little bit but I'm not sure by how much so that'll be interesting for us to track and quarter to when we should have at least one or two paid products that we are driving ads to to look and reflect on.
Now. Another thing that I want to mention here is with brand partnerships, so like I said our sales were just shy of $195,000 this first quarter, right, like I said, 194,500 and some odd dollars. And of that almost 70% of that revenue came from brand partnerships. So we actually banked $132,375 directly from brand partnerships and sponsored content this quarter. But what's interesting is we actually booked around $205,000 in campaigns. So this is across 22 different campaigns. We've booked about 200 I'd 1000. And what I mean by that is, in the contracts that we've actually secured, we have booked about two and a $5,000 worth and brand campaigns, but some of our brand partnerships, the payments are spread out over multiple installments. So not all of the money has been received in cash yet. And so therefore, that's the difference between booked versus banked right booked is like what you've secured in contracts like what is owed, but banked is the actual cash collected. And we do our accounting on a cash receivable basis. So we don't do on accrual basis, which would be more of that, like, here's the revenue anticipate or the revenue booked. Instead, we do it on a cash basis, which is we actually have received the money in the bank. And that's just the way we've always preferred to run our business, both forms of accounting can work well. But I just find it gives me personally a more accurate picture of where we're at in terms of cash flow.
So what's interesting about this is of the 205,000 books, if we've only banked 132,000 and some odd dollars, then that means we actually if I do the math real quick, we have about give or take $75,000 in outstanding invoices yet to be collected, right. So over the next quarters over the remainder of the year, that $75,000 is going to be collected or banked at some point in the year. So that's exciting because that means that really, in this first quarter, if we were to fully account for everything that we have secured in terms of sales, the more accurate picture or portrayal of that would be somewhere around, let's see $270,000 in gross revenue booked for this quarter. Now, like I said, That's not cash collected. So we are basing our income report on cash collected. But that's pretty exciting, right? Because if we're looking just on secured contracts, this is our largest quarter ever in our business. Previous to this, our largest quarter was in q1 2021, I believe, where we made a little over $250,000 in that quarter. And that was cash collected. So a little bit different here. And if you're looking at it just on a cash basis, that is still our largest quarter to date. So this quarter doesn't quite exceed that. But if you're looking at based on just sales generated that we know we're anticipating payment for at a later date, then this was actually our largest quarter...
Which I just want to say I'm so proud of, especially my team, because we all really took a big risk together when we decided to switch business models in the summer of last year. And for the back half of last year, our revenue was really, I mean, it really plateaued and even took a huge dip and quarter four, because we were building up foundations, and just setting ourselves up to have this momentum in q1. So I just say this as encouragement that when you make a big decision or switch, sometimes you don't see the results of that right away. And you really just have to have that patience. And that legacy mindset which I talked about, I can't remember in which episode, it might have been the vision casting episode, I'll put that bonus episode in the show notes just in case that was the one but it's this mindset of if you're in this for the long haul, if you're planning to build your business for years to come, then you should really anticipate that every single month or every single quarter is just going to be this linear growth, right? There's going to be lots of ups and downs. But you have to have the foresight to be able to look into the future and go okay, if I make this decision here today, how will that impact me six months from now 12 months from now 24 months, or even further beyond that. And if you can see that positive pattern or positive cycle, then sometimes it makes sense to take that temporary step back to spring forward. So this is like a real life demonstration of that. And if you you know listened into my quarter three and quarter four income reports last year, then it's kind of cool to see the full picture of how the last six months have played out, or I guess nine months if you're listening to quarter three from last year.
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Okay, so that's kind of the big picture of what happened in this past quarter. A lot of us have asked like, what does a brand partnership look like? Or what does that really mean, since that's such a big part of our revenue model now. And really, I mean, a brand partnership is very different for each brand that we work with. We customize all of our packages based on a brand's needs, their priorities, their goals, and to an extent their budget. Of course, we have minimum rates that we require to be able to work with us and those budget needs will adjust based on what their goal is. So for example, if their goal is purely just brand awareness, we're able to put together a package for a lot less than if their goal is to drive immediate sales. And they want to see that instant ROI. Like okay, we've invested, you know, $10,000 in this campaign, and we want to see at least double that return, right? That's a totally different ballgame. And the the budgets required for that type of campaign is much higher, because we have to create a much higher volume of deliverables and also give them you know, our primary placements on our media channels to make that goal possible.
So it really ranges generally speaking, I would say, unless someone's running just podcast ads, like if someone's like, I just want to run an ad on your podcast, I don't want any involvement in any of the other media channels that you have. We do have podcasts ad packages starting as low as $500 a month, right. And again, even within podcast ads that can range quite a bit depending on the placement. So embedded ads are going to cost more than dai dynamically or D. Yeah, dynamically inserted ads, those are going to differ, right? Also, a mid roll ad is going to be more expensive, then say a post roll ad that comes at the end of an episode. So even within podcast ads, our ad amounts can range quite a bit. But you know, on the very, very low end, it could start as low as $500. But when we're looking at our more holistic campaigns, which is typically how we work with brands, very, very, very few brands actually come to us and only desire a podcast ad right. Like most of the time, we're looking at all of our channels available and leveraging them in some way to help them achieve their goals. So if a brand comes to us and says, you know, like, hey, we'd like to do a virtual or digital event with you. And we would like to see let's say 500 registrants sign up for this virtual event. Then we kind of have to reverse engineer that goal and say okay, what the end goal is that we are driving 500 signups for this virtual event, what sorts of deliverables and what frequency of deliverables will we need to be able to produce to have that result. And that's kind of how we build that campaign and then price that campaign.
So when I say our different media channels or different media assets, our media assets that we leverage currently are our podcasts. So what you're listening to right now, our newsletter, so that's your email list, our social channels, our primary presence is on Instagram. So between my account and cubicle, the CEOs account, we have a combined 40,000 reach there, approximately. And then we have some, you know, other peripheral social channels that were on YouTube as a main focus for us this year that we're trying to grow. And our channel is still small right now. But we have been making measurable progress month over month, and we're actually over 800 subscribers now. And our 365 day rolling window, our watch time, has increased dramatically over the last year. So that's been really exciting to watch. But anyways, most of the time, when brands are partnering with us, they are focused more so on Instagram, if they choose to use social media as a channel for distributing the content.
So like I said, we have our podcasts, our email, and our socials, those are the primary three ways that brands will work with us. But of course, we also can produce events, we can do a virtual event, we can do a live event with them, which is a whole other different arm. And all of these are bespoke campaigns. So again, like let's say, let's go back to that example that I gave, like, let's say a brand decides they want to do a virtual event with us. And they want us to drive, you know, 500 registrants to this event, we're going to look at our available assets or email or social or podcasts and say, okay, of these three channels, which one is the most likely to drive leads to an event. In this case, most of the time, it would be email, emails or strongest conversion channel.
So for more conversion, heavy metrics, we're going to lean more heavily on that platform. So we might build them a package that says, Okay, we know from our own experience, and from past case studies that if we're looking to drive that result, we're going to need at least let's say, three solo emails to our full list, we're going to also want to supplement that was some newsletter ads and our weekly free newsletter that goes out to our community. And maybe we'll want to amplify this event on social as well with a reel, and a couple stories, let's just say. And if that were the package that we built for them, then we price based on that package. But that's going to look different for again, every single brand because every single brand has a different priority, a different goal, and a different budget. And we have to work within that budget to help them figure out which deliverables to prioritize, to best meet their goals based on their budget. So it's kind of like putting together a puzzle, there's a lot of moving pieces. But it's really so fun, because I get to flex my creative brain. And figuring out how to build the best package for someone to make it a win win win across everyone involved, right a win for our team, a win for our brand partners, and then a win for our community. Because ultimately, at the end of the day, whether a content is sponsored or not sponsored, we want to ensure that the content we are bringing and putting in front of our people are benefiting their businesses.
We exist to serve women entrepreneurs who are running self funded companies making between 100,000 and $100 million a year. So that sweet spot that 678 figure self funded business, we have to always be thinking through what types of resources, what types of content, what types of deals, would best serve that woman. And we are always thinking through that lens. When we're partnering with people, how can we get our people you all the best deal possible? How can we bring to you the tools and resources or education or access or mentorship or whatever that looks like to drive the best results for your business. So ultimately, every brand campaign has to pass that test before we even go forward because we're not going to waste our time and our limited resources and content inventory and energy on creating or working with brands that don't serve you as the ultimate end consumer. Right.
So that's kind of a glimpse into the world of brand partnerships. I could go on and on and there's so many nuances within this world. In fact, I've been asked by some of you privately in DMS if I would ever host a workshop about this and it's such an in depth topic that I feel like if I ever did something on this I would want to do it actually in person and only to a handful of individuals who are really feel like could take what we have learned and run with it. So if I ever decide to do that, I will let you know but if you are someone who is out actually interested in this space. If you already have a somewhat established audience, it doesn't matter the size but you know, a somewhat established audience or community. And that would be an event that would interest you that intimate style workshop, where you get to really dive deep with me on this topic of brand partnerships and learn all of my best tools and secrets. Then, DM me this week @MissEllenYin and tell me hey, I would love if you ever did a workshop, like put me on the waitlist, and I want to be the first to know I want first dibs. Send me a message, something like that. So I can make sure that I keep you on my radar if that thing ever happens. So anyways, I digress.
Hey, we're taking a quick pause from the income report to thank our sponsor who makes this income report possible. My friend Haley Burkhead is the founder of the disrupter. And podcast host of recurring wealth, which is one of my all time favorite shows has been for years under many different names, but currently recurring, recurring wealth. And I highly, highly recommend you go subscribe. But Haley has just been one of the most supportive people in my life. And I'm so grateful that the disrupter is sponsoring this episode and allowing us to continue our advocacy work of financial transparency. So, Hayley, welcome back to the show. You've been on the show before, but welcome back.
Yeah, thank you so much, Ellen.
Okay. So Haley,you have been building this incredible movement, the disrupter movement. I want to first know, like, why your heart behind this? What is the disrupter movement? And what does wealth mean to you? Because I think that term can be so convoluted, sometimes people make it mean things that it may not mean, or they believe it's not attainable for them because of the traditional ways in which people have created wealth for themselves.
Absolutely, I totally understand that. So wealth is the ability to receive income from one or multiple streams of income that do not rely on you. And that's the difference between a business versus like an entrepreneur route of income, right? You're pooling income from your business, but your business relies on you to be successful or not successful. Absolutely nothing wrong with that there's so much I mean, I love business, you love business, we all love business. There is just another side to redefining how we make and grow money as women, but really, as anyone in this world, and that is through the power of investing, and investing. It's really just the art of growing money. And it's super fun. Imagine it like you're a farmer, but you know how, you know your parents always like money doesn't grow on trees? Well, what if you could grow money trees, like, let's start asking questions that are really fun and creative.
So that's what the disrupter movement is, it's basically women on a mission to disrupt the limiting narrative around wealth by creating recurring wealth for herself and joining this space. I think that a lot of us have been told, by mean even just I mean, society, and the government, even less than 50 years ago, a woman couldn't even get her own credit card without a man like her husband or a father signature. And look at how much progress we have made in the past 50 years. And what I want to do is redefine how we can make and grow money. So the next 50 years, people are going to look back and go, that was the movement that was the wave of women that completely changed how women got in the space of wealth they did on their own terms in their own way.
Oh, chills, okay, I hope you all feel that calling that drive to want to be part of a movement and to continue to empower other women to create their own legacy essentially, right money gives you options, it gives you resources. And I think that it's so inspiring to see what you're doing by making this information accessible to people and helping guide them through those first steps into their investment journey if this is something that's new to them, so talk to us about the three different wealth systems because I know that there's there's many different entry points into building wealth. So talk to us real quick, what are those three different options?
So to have wealth, like I was talking about receiving those income from those one or multiple streams, what are those streams? I call them moneymakers. And it's just something that makes you money but it doesn't rely on us. So what we're gonna do is we're going to create a collection of moneymakers. You know how like you collected things as a kid I collected Pokemon cards. I was on geared nerd like that. And now my husband runs a retro game store so I get to live in my nerd state of collecting but that's what we're gonna do. It's like the entrepreneurs version of collecting you're going to collect moneymakers. So what this does is this builds a money machine for your wealth that just sends you these paychecks.
So there are three different types of approaches to build these money machines, which is a collection of moneymakers. Okay, so these are three approaches. Number one, the $0 investing approach, your business isn't at zero. But the available money for creating wealth is, this approach is great fit for those who have inconsistent income and want wealth, but don't really know where to start. And I just want to say, I was actually telling Ellen, before we hit record, I have business investments that are going to pay me around $60-$90,000 a month in paychecks starting next summer, and I put $0 down for any of that equity or profit share. So I just know that even me that does have the cash, sometimes cash isn't the best thing to trade in terms of investment.
Okay, so now the second approach is hands off approach, your business makes extra money every month. And this approach allows you to use a passive money machine to let it grow thoughtlessly on your part, you can pull paychecks from this when the amount starts to grow. This is everyone's favorite. When they start learning about everything. They're like, Oh my gosh, hands off passive, thoughtless. Absolutely, yes. And this is where we can really leverage your business structure, it can affect your profit, however you want it to be, you kind of have more control over how that looks like.
Okay, now the third approach is the visionary approach. Your business makes extra money every month. And this approach has a lot of room for creativity. This is my personal favorite. This approach is for visionaries that are interested in not only growing their money, but expanding their resources through acquisitions, and equity. So those are the three approaches. And if you are interested in diving more into what those look like details behind each, episode three on the recurring wealth podcast is where I dive into each of those approaches a lot more,
it is so helpful, I highly recommend adding that to your queue right after you play this episode. Actually, I listened to it recently. And while system number two that passive hands off, one is the one that I'm currently investing in, thanks to Haley's help. That really is that more traditional kind of like when you think about investing in the stock market and building a stock portfolio, that is what that vehicle looks like more, but one in three are super interesting, especially if you fall into category one where like Haley said, maybe your business is making money, and it's making you an active income as an entrepreneur, but your profit margins aren't large enough yet, where you can actively pull a sizable amount of money out of your business to fund let's say, your stocks or to put into some other sort of investment vehicle. So let's actually talk about that real quick.
Because I know some of the people listening may be thinking, Oh, my goodness, like, I want to start my wealth journey. I want to join the disrupter movement, and start creating my future this way. How much money do you think someone realistically needs to be able to pull out of their business profits to start investing? Or conversely, if they're not at that stage yet? How can you help their business get to that recurring consistent profit inside the disruptor? First, so that they have some of those funds to leverage?
Absolutely. So I would say $3,000, a month of profit that you can put towards your wealth in business is the part that unlocks the hands off approach for you. And the visionary approach as well. But more so the hands off approach the passive side, and that also includes the fee, you would pay a wealth manager as well. So $3000 dollars a month total, nothing extra on top of that.
Now, I invest in quite a few online businesses. And so the way I get paid is through profit, if they're not making profit, I'm not getting paid, right. So it's super important. This is where I created the predictable profit model. And I go through this in the disrupter, go to the disrupter.com, you'll see it's $75 a month, you can see exactly where to get access to what I'm about to talk about. But the predictable profit model. It's a comprehensive business system that I plug my investments into. It's heavy on marketing that's infused with soul psychology and a sell system that is high converting, so we're getting consistent buyers in the door. So that is the business system. It also includes operations, but it's just a heavy focus on marketing and sales. And this is what you can plug your business into as well.
My goal is that every single woman that is listening to this that once wealth, it's accessible to them right now, right here. And in order to do that your business I mean, there's a lot of secret advantages that you have as an entrepreneur that most people don't and it's not talked about at all, it's crazy. Most of what you've heard is actually meant for nine to five employees when it comes to wealth, you've probably retirement right 401 K's you've heard all these things. You have no idea what's available to you as an entrepreneur when it comes to creating your wealth. And it's so exciting. It's so liberating. There's so much freedom to that. And so I just want to make sure that number one your business is in the Ways that you want it to be. And most people are actually surprised they don't eat near as big of a business as they think they do. When it comes to creating, I mean massive amounts of wealth, when you think seven figure multiple, seven figure net worth, you don't need a million dollar business to create a million dollar net worth. There's so many strategies that the government depending on what government you're in, but especially in the US, you're rewarded heavily for taking the risk of being an entrepreneur, and I want to make sure that you are collecting and reaping those rewards.
100% I think that's one of the things I've learned over my years in investing in my own financial education is that the the US tax code was really written for entrepreneurs, for business owners, because small businesses are the backbone of the American economy. And so I think to Haley's point, if you are just new to this, even this concept of wealth building, I think the disruptor is such an amazing place for you to start raising your own financial IQ so that you at least know what options are available to you to start building wealth in a way that makes sense for you in a way that leverages your current situation. But it is so encouraging to hear that if you want to go that more passive route of that more traditional, like a stock portfolio that having even $3,000 of profit that you can pull out each month is enough to get started. I mean, how encouraging is that?
Seriously, I think if you're listening to this right now, and your mind is like opening and expanding, because you didn't realize, oh, wait a second, like my business can sustain that to Halley's point learning these things have freed me from this arbitrary goal that we sometimes get wrapped into, in this online industry of, oh, I want to get to seven figures, I want to get to seven figures. And oftentimes, people don't even really know why it's like, I just want to get there because it sounds like a good thing to have or the other people are doing. But when you really look at your numbers, and when you really understand your own unique wealth plan, then you understand Wait a second, maybe I can have a really thriving business making, let's say $200,000 a year to under $50,000 A year and it gives me enough profit to retire and I say that in quotes because in entrepreneurship land right and Haley you are proponent for this to retirement isn't really an age.
It's not like when you're a nine to five employee. It's like okay, retirements when you're like 65, and your Social Security kicks in right? As an entrepreneur retirement can really be whatever age you want it to be. And then you just have to reverse engineer work backwards, to find a plan to get you to that financial milestone, by whatever age you've selected for yourself. So anyways, we could go on, but Haley will be back in future income reports this year to share more about wealth building. But for now, I want you to go to the disrupter.com. And also go subscribe, go follow Haley's podcast, recurring wealth podcast.
And one last thing, Haley, before I let you go, I just wanted you to kind of be the kickoff to a mini series we're going to be doing on the podcast all about this concept of retirement, but specifically for entrepreneurs. And like I just mentioned, retirement isn't an age, it's a financial independence marker that you have decided, like, I will feel financially independent, meaning I no longer have to actively work to receive income at this point in my life, whatever that financial milestone looks like. And it's going to be different for every person, depending on what your lifestyle needs are. But if we're looking at retirement from an entrepreneur's angle, one thing and you've already alluded to this several times in our conversation today that I find really interesting about you specifically, is how you are receiving equity and multiple different people's businesses through a profit sharing model by coming on as either a chairman of their company or an advisor in their business. But you're doing it in such a unique way. Because you're often not investing actual money, like a traditional investor is right? You're not going hey, I'll give you a $50,000 paycheck if you give me 10% in your business. So it's not quite like Shark Tank, right? So tell us like, how are you uniquely going about approaching these businesses? How are you structuring those deals? How does all this work?
Yes, I think it totally depends on the business. So when you think about receiving equity and a profit share or revenue share, there has to be a value exchange every time that is the rule. What I like to figure out is the rules that I respect, and the rules that I'm like, Oh, how flexible is that, though? You know, so the value exchange rule, I respect that I value it, I honor it, I want to keep that. Every other rule, I break it. So if value exchange is the rule that I want to follow, then what value am I bringing to the table? Now sometimes money is the answer. That's going to be the most valuable.
So in that scenario, it would be they're having cashflow issues, but their cells are about to like skyrocket, but they're gonna have to, and that's probably not an online business model. If an online business model has a cashflow issue, that's an entrepreneur issue probably. But if it's like a heavy operations for instance, in agents See, right? So when you get a bunch of cells, and you have to hire costs, but you haven't hit that second sales spike, okay, I'll put money into that, because it's a data proven growth, right. But most times, that's very rare money actually just accelerates or amplifies the problems that are already existing in the business. Because money is typically associated with whatever habits the entrepreneur has. So the entrepreneur has bad habits, which I invest in entrepreneurs that are already past the six figure point, and I take them to over 5 million usually, that's kind of what I do. And so in that case, six figures, you haven't really established great habits quite yet, because you haven't got to the seven figure machine like business, right.
And so I don't want to put money and accelerate problems. I want to accelerate revenue, because that's what the business needs. So then that's what I engineer. So sometimes that looks like giving them an entire contract or set that I have. So I have, let's say a contractor Rolodex. And then I just pick and choose exactly what contractor package would make sense for them. And I connect them with all the contractors, I lead the vision of it, give it to them, and they lead the result. So in other time, we'll do push it through my network. So I have an agency and we did a $900,000 sales push in 45 days. So we'll do things like that. Because at the end of the day, what does the business need? Usually it sells? How can I leverage all of my resources to create sales for that business?
I love it, you're like this magical matchmaker, right coming in and identifying what the need is, and then matching them with the right resource and solution. And I love that you've mentioned or reemphasize several times that cash or extra money is not always the best solution, both on the investment side for someone looking to bring you into their business, but also on the entrepreneur side when you're looking at how do I build wealth? Sometimes cash is not always answer. It can make things easier, of course, but it's not the only way. So, Haley, thank you so much. This has been incredibly inspiring. I'm excited to bring you back for the remaining two income reports this year. And again, you can follow Haley on Instagram at Haley Burkhead, and continue to see what she's up to with the disruptor movement there. Thanks, Haley.
Thank you.
So now that you have a better understanding of brand partnerships, and by the way, I should say if you want an even further understanding of this whole world of monetizing content as a creator, I highly recommend you listen to my bonus episode where I break down the differences between an influencer, a creator and a UGC or user generated content creator. It really breaks down what brands are actually paying for when it comes to these types of relationships. So we'll link that below in the show notes. If you're curious, it's a really short episode, but it will help you get a better understanding of this and how it plays into the media business model. There's also a bonus episode I recorded on what the heck is a media business or what the heck is a media company. So we'll link both of those resources below for you in the show notes so that you can catch up and get the full context that I'm not necessarily taking the time to break down here.
Okay, so to end this conversation today, I wanted to share some of the highlights of this past quarter. Not to say there weren't hardships as well, right. But as far as these past 90 days, I think we have been really blessed with a lot of amazing things and a lot of momentum. So I want to take the time to really highlight and celebrate these wins with you. So in January, we got to do three events, which was pretty exciting. One was virtual with my friends, the traveling blazers, who I've collaborated with before and we hosted a virtual workshop, called Let's get intentional, where we allowed our attendees to access five different mini workshops, one with each of us, and they walked away with five big wins and money marketing and mindset. And that was such a fun way to kick off the year we were all able to come together and plan what 2023 could look like for us. And really it reminded me of how impactful virtual events can really be when you plan them with no pun intended intention.
Also in January, I got to do quite a bit of traveling I was out of state twice for different speaking engagements. So first, I headed to Dallas, where I spoke at the creative educator conference hosted by my friend lelee Ahmadi. And then later in that month, at the end of the month, I went to Nashville and spoke at Elevate Summit hosted by my friend Alice Park and Dustin got to come with me on that trip and actually introduced me on stage, which was the sweetest surprise ever. If you haven't seen his opening for me, oh my god, it's such a tear jerker. So I should post send it on Instagram. So I'll link that below in the show notes too, he'll probably kill me when he hears this because he gets so embarrassed, he does not like to be in the spotlight. But his message was just so heartwarming and sweet that I just want to share how amazing he is with the world. So anyways, if you're curious, I'll drop that Instagram post below, in the show notes.
And then in February, I got to head out of town again, for another amazing speaking opportunity, this time at the Kendra Scott women's Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute's Women's Summit. And this was an Austin, the first of many Austin trips this year, which you'll soon hear about. And this was just an absolutely incredible event, I am so inspired by the programming that they have built for UT Austin students with this institute. And it really just, I think, opened my mind to dream even bigger of someday how we could bring programs like this to college campuses across the country. I mean, it was it was just such an amazing event to be part of so huge thank you to the team at KS WELLI, who have since become friends. And I've gotten to see several times, they just did such an incredible job with this event.
And then in March, a couple big things happen in March. In March, we went on our team retreat. And we did our vision casting essentially for the rest of the year, we looked at what projects we want to complete over the course of 2023. So if you're curious about that, you can catch up with our bonus episode where I recap what we planned for the rest of this year. So I know I'm referencing a lot of different episodes, but they're all going to be below for you in the show notes. So again, if you're curious to learn more about any of these things that I'm mentioning, you can just head to the show notes and click on the relevant episode. I also got to head back to Austin and march for South by Southwest week, I did not actually officially attend the event. So I didn't buy a conference badge. But I was there for a lot of peripheral events.
So mainly I was there because I moderated a panel at Creighton cultivates Future Summit. And that was my first CNC event. I love creating cultivators or brands, I love Jaclyn, their founder and just everything their team is doing. So it was really fun to get to moderate this panel of all star women, every single person on that panel was incredibly inspiring. And I just realized how much I really love being in this interviewer seat like getting to be the host or moderator and and just have the best seat in the house essentially to learn from brilliant women. So that just reaffirmed my love for this work both behind a mic in this setting as a podcaster. But also in live settings, the energy from the room is just unmatched.
Also, since I was there for quite a while, you know I ended up being in Austin for almost a week, I got to attend a lot of other peripheral events to South by including a private creators dinner that Kajabi hosted, which was such a special event, I got to spend time with some of my favorite people on their team, as well as meet some new friends and inspiring creators in the Creator industry. And it was such a special intimate dinner that I really was so honored to be a part of. And I'm headed back to Austin actually, in May at the end of May two MC Kajabi Hero Live, which is their first live conference in years for all of their customers who they call Kajabi heroes. And they're anticipating 1000s of heroes from all over the world to come together in Austin for this incredible three day event. And I just could not believe when they asked me to emcee this conference. I've never emceed an entire conference before so this will be a new learning experience for me. I am excited to report back with you all next quarter in q2 income report and share the full details but just a little teaser into that for now.
And then also in Austin, of course, I got to meet up with the founders of Norbi which was so much fun because Norway is a longtime partner of ours and our favorite platform for community building. We use Norby for all of our text marketing. So if you've ever gotten a text from us, especially regarding the podcast, that is all through Norby, powered by Norby. Norby is also great for event management. It's great for an all in one inbox where you can seamlessly track where your people are coming from and what links they're clicking on and be able to communicate with them in one seamless inbox is just such a great digital communications platform. I love all of their team members that are just so eager to really serve their customers and taken feedback. So that was a highlight for me during my Austin trip as well.
Also, I got to go to a meet up for freelancing females. And that was so much fun to just to get to meet with other creatives, other freelancers because that's how I started my journey as an entrepreneur was as a freelancer, and we got to discuss a cool project that they've been working on, which is all about pay transparency. It's this database where freelancers have contributed what they are making, or what they're charging for different types of projects. And it's just such a great way for freelancers in different areas to actually see what the industry norm is, because this is such a wild west. You know, some of us are just like 5, 10 years ago, when no one was talking about this stuff, you kind of just are left to your own devices in terms of what you think, is correct to charge right. And not that there is a black or white, correct price or not correct price to charge for anything. But I just think it's so cool that they are contributing to a shared core value that I have around financial transparency, by creating this pay database where freelancers can share anonymously, what they're making, and other freelancers can access that data. So anyways, such a cool project. If I can find a link, we'll try to drop that below if you're curious about that, as well.
And that about sums up the main highlights of last quarter. And I am just so grateful for every single moment that we've had so far this year. I think this year more than anything, I'm really trying to take the time to pause and really sit in moments and just think about how cool it is that this is the work I get to do you know, and I'm not saying every day is easy. There's lots of days when I'm like any other human feeling like Oh, I wish I could just stay in bed all day and like really not think about it. Because there's a lot of responsibility that comes with the work that we do. But you know, when it really comes down to it, it's amazing that we live in a time and age where this can be the work that I do, and it supports me and my family full time and it supports our team members. And it supports our community at large, which includes you, of course. So thank you so much. Just really truly thank you for being part of this community. I can't express to you how much it means to me. For those of you who have been around for years as well as those who are just discovering us today. Thank you for being part of what makes cubicle to CEO so special. All right, I will catch you all in the next episode. Have a great week.
Hey, Ellen here thank you again for tuning in to cubicle to CEO. If you enjoy today's episode, follow our show on Instagram at cubicle to CEO for more bonus content and hop on the last Tuesday of each month to watch our live after show with recent guests. If you want to support our podcast, text this episode link to a friend, leave a positive review on Apple podcasts or rate out show wherever you're listening right now. Please make sure you also hit the Follow button on Apple it looks like a plus sign. Or click Subscribe on your favorite podcast player so you don't miss out on our new episodes every Monday and friends until next time, keep dreaming big.
