How to Prioritize Your Freedom and Lifestyle Goals in Business

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Building a business is more than just marketing strategies and finding financial success -- it's also about building a life where your freedom and lifestyle are in the forefront of every decision you make. In this episode, business expert Tyler J. McCall guides us on how to run your business on your terms through his four-part vision framework.

Tyler J. McCall is the founder of OnlineBusinessOwner.com and host of The Online Business Show podcast. Since 2015, Tyler has helped thousands of entrepreneurs start and grow thriving online businesses they love through his digital products, virtual workshops, coaching and consulting, and in-person events. Before going full-time with his digital business, Tyler worked as a community and political organizer and non-profit director. He is based in Chicago, IL where he lives with his husband, Eric.

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The episode:

Katrina Widener: Hello everyone, welcome back to the Badass Business Squad. My name is Katrina Widener and I am your host, and today I have Tyler J. McCall joining us. I am really, really happy that he's going to come on here today because he has such great information to share with all of you. But before we dive in Tyler, if you wouldn't mind sharing a little bit about who you are and what you do with everyone listening, I would really appreciate it.

Tyler McCall: Yeah, of course. Thanks for having me Katrina, I'm excited to be here and chat with your listeners. So my name is Tyler J. McCall and I'm the founder of Online Business Owner.com and host of the Online Business Show Podcast since 2016. I've been in the online business space first, running a digital agency, then running a coaching business, then running a membership, then running a course, then running another membership -- I've kind of done it all in the online business space. And these days at Onlinebusinessowner.com, we are passionate about helping people start and grow thriving online businesses that they love and we do that through content like our free weekly newsletter called the Online Business Digest, our free podcast, and our Online Business Owner Blog which is launching very soon. Maybe at the time of episode airing, we may have a blog at Onlinebusinessowner.com. Yeah! That's what we do.

Katrina Widener: That's exciting because Tyler and I are going to be talking a little bit today about creating an online business that really prioritizes your freedom and what you want out of life, which for everyone listening you know that alignment is literally I think the keyword in every single podcast episode I do. I love that that's going to be the topic that we're focusing on today. So Tyler, I wanted to start off by asking, we're going to be discussing very specifically how to craft this vision for your business. So where do people even get started?

Tyler McCall: Yeah. I like to think of crafting a business vision as something that has four main parts. I'll talk about each one of those. And the reason I break it down is because I think a lot of times when people think about starting and growing their business, it's really focused typically on one of these four areas. And what tends to happen is if we're giving too much attention in one of the areas, I like to think of it as a circle. And if we start to give too much attention into one of the areas, the circle kind of starts to get a little bit deformed and may have a little piece of the circle that kind of juts out a little bit. That's maybe a little bit more square or that's a little concave, cause we're not paying attention to that enough. And then our business can't run effectively. It's like wheels on a car. If they're not all circular, the car is not going to go. So I like to think about it that way.

Really it starts with thinking about why you're doing this. Why you wanted to start your business. What entrepreneurship means to you. Why entrepreneurship is something that you've chosen to pursue, and really understanding that. I think sometimes we start our businesses or we get into business because it's this fun, exciting thing, or everyone's doing it, or we feel like we should do it, or we're like, "Oh then I can work from home. I can make more money." Whatever that may be and all of that is totally true. That's why I love entrepreneurship and in particular online business, because it's so affordable to do it. There's so little overhead for what we're doing. However, if we aren't really clear on why we're doing it and the vision of what we want to create, it's really easy for our businesses to get away from us.

That's a topic I've been thinking a lot about lately. When our businesses maybe start growing or changing, or we're working toward a financial goal or a goal of hiring, or maybe a goal of reaching a certain level of awareness or notoriety in our industry or space, it's really easy for that to get away from us and what we had envisioned or intended in the beginning. And I think that is where we can get into some trouble. That's where we can start creating offers that aren't aligned with our values. That's where we can start making decisions about partnering with people that aren't a good fit for our business. Taking on clients that aren't a good fit for our program or our product, and really losing sight of the humanity of our clients and our contractors and our team and people we're connected with. So if we don't have this vision in place, it's very easy for our businesses to get away from us. And I've had this experience before so if you're listening and you're here right now, or you've had that experience, you're not alone, I've experienced that. Katrina, you probably have clients that they come to you in those moments of, "The business has gotten too far away from us!" We kind of have to snap out of it and say, "Oh wow, okay. Now I have to reel this back in and make some changes." And what I see now, as someone that's done this for awhile now, I feel like it's much easier to start with the vision as the foundation and make decisions based on that vision, as opposed to trying to clean it up later, and then restructure everything that you've set up. Does that make sense?

Katrina Widener: Oh, 100% and I'm really glad that you brought that up. I really appreciate the whole train of thought that you just went on. Because I can even see it again, with my clients or with myself. When you were saying, "I've done this and I've done this and I've done this and tried all of the things." I mean, that's how businesses operate. We evolve and we change and we make things better and we innovate and we get closer and closer and closer to kind of this final goal. Which is ever-changing right? The "final goal" I feel like I should say. But sometimes if we're going back to that circle analogy of it being the wheel on the car and sometimes like, "Well, the wheel just fell off and it just kept rolling on its own. And where did we end up? We got to go find it and bring it back, reel it back in."

Tyler McCall: Yeah. It's like if you have a dog or something and you're throwing a ball or something like that, and they don't realize that, "Oh, it's going to roll down that hill. You have to go after it." And I feel like there's a lot of horror stories and online business and creative entrepreneurship. I'm sure you've heard them. I hear them. I'm working on some content right now talking about this. And I feel like more times than not, when someone comes out of a program or product or course or experience whatever it may be and they're dissatisfied with what happened, I truly believe that most people that are making those mistakes, they're not bad people. They're not out to cause harm. Just because they're not out to cause harm doesn't mean that they shouldn't be held responsible when they do it. But I don't think people are trying to hurt others. I think what happens is the business gets away from them. The financial goals, the monthly expenses, because of the size of the team, the lifestyle, right? People start making some money, they elevate their lifestyle and then you're kind of stuck because you're like, "Wow, I have to continue to make this money to support this now elevated lifestyle that I have." And I think there's so many pieces that go into this, but that's when I think the business starts to get away from us.

So that's why this four-part vision is so important because this is the foundation, this is kind of the guiding light for everything that we can do. And then as we're making decisions, I think this is another important piece of this because as entrepreneurs we're making decisions all the time. And I think sometimes we reached that decision fatigue of like, "Oh my goodness, I cannot make another decision right now." This is a helpful tool that you can use as a filter for those decisions that you want to make about who to partner with, or who to hire, or who to take on as a client. If you have a better understanding of your vision for your business, it makes it a lot easier to do that.

Katrina Widener: That makes so much sense first and foremost, but also I just love the fact that no matter where you're at, you can always go back and revisit this and then audit through and be like, "Okay, what are the things I'm currently doing? What are the things that are coming up on my plate? Let's run it through this filter and make sure it's all still really aligned with who I am and what I want out of my business and what my goals are. Really that core values, core idea of what I want my business to be, and who I want to be as an entrepreneur." So, we can probably wax poetic on this for awhile.

Tyler McCall: For sure.

Katrina Widener: So when we're working on this four part vision, where do people start?

Tyler McCall: Yeah. So let me tell you about the four parts and then we'll kind of dive into each one. And I'll give you some examples and things to consider. So the four-part vision for your business includes your lifestyle goals, your income goals, your impact goals, and your leadership goals. The first one, the most important one is the lifestyle piece. If we are going to start an online business, if we are going to pursue entrepreneurship, for many of us we are pursuing building a lifestyle business. A lifestyle business being a business that allows us to make the money that we want to make, to afford the kind of lifestyle that we want to lead. For many people that is a lifestyle of more time or money or location freedom, so that we can work when we want from where we want, and we can make however much money we want to make. Whether that's for you to spend more time at home with your kids, for you to spend more time on the road traveling, if you're navigating a chronic illness, whatever it may be. Choosing a business model that makes the most sense for the kind of lifestyle you want to have.

The reason this is so important to think about this first is because so many times people come into their business with the idea of, "Oh, I want to have more time freedom. I want to work less. I want to be more present with my partner or my children or my family." And yet the business gets away from them. It grows in such a way that they lose that lifestyle that they had intended. And I think starting with lifestyle is so key because it allows us to really filter out the kind of business we want to have, the kind of clients we want to work with, the kind of expectations we want to set for our clients or customers so that we can ensure that we're protecting that lifestyle goal.

So as an example, if you're the type of person who wants to work just a few days a week, a few hours each day. Maybe you don't love email, you don't love phone calls. That's not something you really want to do. Then starting an agency may not be the best option for you and your business. Because if you're running an agency doing marketing or consulting or financial, anything like that, you may attract clients or work that has a sense of urgency to it. People want to hear from you. You need to respond to people. People are expecting your presence or whatever it may be. Maybe that type of business model isn't the best fit for you. Maybe a business model where you are doing something for someone, maybe more project-based or more timeline-based may be a better fit for you. Or doing more consulting could be a better fit for you. It's just important to think about that. So for example for me, my lifestyle that I want, I want three-day weekends all year long.

Katrina Widener: Me too.

Tyler McCall: So I don't work on Fridays.

Katrina Widener: I am right there with you.

Tyler McCall: Okay, perfect. I want to take at least a week off every couple of months to just do whatever the heck I want. And I want to have the ability to travel. I want to work remotely for long periods of time. And I want to be able to go places when I want to go. It's taken time, Katrina. It wasn't perfect at first. I made lots of missteps. I also don't love having recurring things on my calendar. For some reason that just like triggers all my corporate nonprofit alarm bells. I like, "I don't want it." Right?

So I'm at a point now where I've kind of structured my business in such a way where I don't have those things. I have one meeting a week on my calendar. That's with my core team, that's it. I'm able to take time off. I don't work on the weekends unless I want to. So I've been able to build a business that meets that lifestyle. So the coolest thing about having your own business is that you can make these rules. You can decide what you want it to look like, starting with the lifestyle. So that's the first piece.

The next piece is the income piece. Again, this is where I think a lot of people focus primarily, or they spend maybe too much energy or too much time. I think as we think about money in our businesses, we have to consider how much money do I need to make to support my current lifestyle? And then what is a more longterm lifestyle goal that I want to work toward? You know, it's very common in the online business space for people who are marketing programs or products that are going to teach you some strategy or secret to building your business or marketing or whatever it may be, to sell you this kind of image of wealth and financial security and success. And I think it's also very easy for us as humans to buy into those ideas and to maybe get a bit distracted by those things.

And I really want to encourage folks who are listening, think about your money in a way of, "Okay, what do I need now to cover where I am right now? And then what am I working toward? And on what timeline do I want to get there?" Because what tends to happen with a lot of online business owners is maybe you're kind of chugging along right now with two thousand, three thousand, five thousand dollar months. And you feel like, "Okay, great. This is working, this is cool," and then you have a $10,000 month, which is so exciting and so thrilling. And the biggest mistake you can make after having that $10,000 a month is then elevating your lifestyle in your business to a $10,000 a month type of life in business. Because you made $10,000 last month. That's incredible. Congratulations. That's a huge thing. But you just made $10,000 last month. You have to do it again, and again, and again. And time and time again, where I see entrepreneurs getting in trouble is they have the $10,000 a month, so then they hire the VA that they've always wanted to have on their team and now their expenses have gone up. So they're taking home less, they have the $10,000 month and they go ahead and decide to upgrade their apartment or upgrade their vehicle. Or they decide to go buy the fabulous Louis Vuitton bag. Which like great do that, #treatyourself, do whatever you want. And at the same time, understand that just because you did it once you're not guaranteed to do it again.

So that's why I think it's really important to think about the income piece, and take this from someone that did it. My business was going well. I built the business. I was hitting the goals. I had the $10,000 a month, the $20,000, the $30,000, the $40,000, the $50,000, the $60,000 month. It was working. It was going. I hired the team. I built the business, I got the office. I bought the house, all of that. And then things change. Facebook ads change. A pandemic hits the globe. Things change, it's different, and then those months of making that money and being profitable in business, those can shift, right? So it's really important just to consider what you're doing there from the income perspective so you don't get yourself in any trouble.

Katrina Widener: I wish everyone who's listening can just see me, cause I'm just sitting here just like smiling and nodding and like "Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes." Because in reality I see that happen so often. Both that lifestyle piece and especially the income piece. You get excited. You're like, "All right, I got this figured out. I got this figured out."

Tyler McCall: Yeah.

Katrina Widener: It's like a trick of when we get it figured out, it's almost a guarantee that things are gonna change. It reminds me of when people are like, "Oh, I know what I'm doing with parenting. I got this figured out." And then all of a sudden your kid will hit a new milestone or start changing their habits or whatever it is. As entrepreneurs, we talk about our businesses as our children or our babies all the time and it happens just the exact same way where it's like, "All right, I'm doing something and it was working. And then you know what, maybe there's like a global pandemic and things get a little shaken up." We have to adapt. And really coming at that from a very grounded place is what I feel like you're talking about. We're not saying don't have big dreams or don't be like excited when you're making that money. But it's just staying grounded in where you are now and what the reality of the situation is. It's just so important.

Tyler McCall: Yeah. It's so important. And I read an interesting piece recently about Finland and how Finland is consistently rated as one of the happiest countries in the world. Right? And what that really means. And this article, I think it was from Vox or the Atlantic or somewhere like that, was saying Finland isn't really the happiest country in the world. The study that is used to make that statement as a study around satisfaction. And what they found year after year, time after time, is that Fins tend to be the most satisfied with their life, their lifestyle, their home, their relationships, their job, all of that. And one of the reasons why is because in their culture and this kind of Nordic approach to living, there's this idea of not wanting for more than you need. Not wanting for more than you have. Not having these ridiculous, crazy, ambitious goals that may never actually happen, right?

Whereas as Americans, we're taught to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps and now in this age of hustle culture and toxic positivity, we're taught that you can be anything you want. You can achieve anything you want. You can have anything you want if you work hard enough. But there comes moments when, you know for me a chubby little boy in the middle of nowhere North Carolina who had glasses from sixth grade, there kind of comes a moment when it's like, "You know what, Tyler? You're not going to be an astronaut one day. Cause you have to wear glasses." You know? Like let's be a little more realistic here, you know? It sounds crappy and a little bit of a bummer, but it's an important realization for us as business owners.

You know, for me I had the realization of, "Wait a minute, I don't want this like multiple seven figure business with all of these employees and all of the stress and structure. I want a business that makes, I don't know, $500,000 a year. That pays me a salary of a couple hundred thousand dollars a year. That allows me to save for my retirement, to have a beautiful home, to buy the things I want to not have to stress about what I'm buying at the grocery store and go on some vacations and buy gifts for my family and friends." That's it. That's all I want. Right? So I just invite people to think about that. To consider.

Katrina Widener: It's funny because one of my most popular Instagram posts of all time and then I ended up recording it as a podcast, was this idea that you don't have to have a hundred thousand dollar business in order to find personal satisfaction, or personal success. I'm not saying if that's something that you've sat down and take the time to actually think about and feel grounded in that that's not a great goal to have, but that's not the indicator of whether or not you are a "official business" or "successful business". Because I did some research and it's the median upper class salary in the United States is around $80,000 a year. That's the median upper-class salary. The median middle-class salary is something more like $58,000 a year. And when we enter this entrepreneur world, there's all of this pressure to be like "Six figures, six figures, six figures!" And the thing is, "What do I need? For the lifestyle I want, what is it that I actually need?" A lot of people, you don't need that million dollar business. You don't need that six figure business if that's not the lifestyle that you're looking for.

Tyler McCall: Yeah. And for many people not only do you not need it, but if you really thought about it, if you really understood what went into starting and running that kind of business, you don't want it. You don't want the headache of that. And there are people who say it doesn't have to be stressful. It doesn't have to be hard. Sure. Great, fine. I'll believe it. I'm buying into it. It. I know you're trying to sell me something. And at the same time, it's not a walk in the park.

Katrina Widener: Right.

Tyler McCall: You know? So it's just important to consider.

Okay. So lifestyle and income are the first two and the last two are impact and leadership. So the impact piece is what kind of impact do you want to create in the lives of your customers, your clients, your team, your contractors, and the people that are touching your business? How do you want to leave them better than you found them, is how I think about it. And I think it's important to get clear on that impact because that can then influence the products you create. For us in our business these days, we create content. We have a newsletter, we have a podcast, we're launching a blog. We're a media company. That's what we do. We monetize our business through sponsorships and ads and partnering with brands and other businesses that want to get in front of our audience, right? That's how we make our money. So I decided the impact I want to create is by giving people access to free content, free insights, free industry news. That's what I want to do. I want it to be accessible and affordable for anyone and everyone. And I'll figure out how to make my ends meet and how to pay my team by connecting with brands and people that want to get in front of our community.

That's the kind of business I want to have. That's the impact I want to create. I was just having a conversation earlier today with the online business owner and she was saying she went through a promo, she was promoting this thing for a program, and she got to a place where she had six people in it and they were the six right people. And she kept promoting it for a bit and no one else was coming into it and she was like, "Oh wait, these are the six people that this program is for." Like that's it. Doors closed. No one else can come in. This is it. Because she was so focused on the impact she wanted to create for these six women that were joining her program.

So I think that's really important. And again once you get clear on the income, then you can start to understand, "Oh wait, I don't have to rush to a monetize this part of my business." Podcasts for example, I don't have to rush to get podcast advertisers because that's not an important part of what I'm doing for my business. Whereas for me, podcast advertisers are vital because that's how we pay our team. Right? So podcast advertising as part of what we do. For other people it's like, "No, I just want to create a podcast and get in people's ear holes and talk to them and help them in their lives and businesses. So I don't care about that," right? And the coolest thing, Katrina, is that all of these paths, all of these business models, all of these strategies, they all work. They're all valid. I think that's the best thing. There's no one right way to build a business. There's one million and one right ways to do it. Right? And you get to decide the one that fits the best, and what you are creating. And that's how I like to think about the impact portion of this.

Katrina Widener: Yes. And It is just really that testament to knowing your goals and knowing yourself and being able to say I can differentiate between what is right for me and what is right for what I want out of life and what I want out of this business. And good for you, good for me, right?

Tyler McCall: Yes, exactly. Yeah. We can all celebrate each other's wins and we can all support one another and be there for each other when it sucks at the same time. And not have to make the other person wrong for your business model, or the way that you build a team or whatever it may be. You know? And there's so many funny conversations about this online. The one that I've seen the past couple of years is "High ticket is the way to go." Like if you want to build a successful business, you have to go high ticket. And I built a seven figure membership that was $75 a month. I made millions of dollars and the highest price thing I ever sold was $750. It's just so interesting to me because both can be right. Both work, you know?

Katrina Widener: Yes.

Tyler McCall: People say low price products don't work. Well tell that to Scrub Daddy. I think they're worth over like $30 million now since they were on Shark Tank selling a $3 kitchen sponge. They both can work. Right?

Katrina Widener: Exactly. Yes. Yes. I can't snap my fingers, but if I could I would be snapping right now. Snaps. Imagine there are snaps happening.

Tyler McCall: Yes, imaginary snaps. Okay. The last part of this is the leadership portion of your business. Again, this is one of those things I think where it's very easy for us to get distracted or overwhelmed by the content brainwashing that occurs online around what kind of business we should build. There's a very common, consistent pressure in online business around hiring and building a team. And I think for many people getting support in your business is vital. I do think there are people who wait too long to get the help that they need, because they're anxious about doing it. They feel like they can't, they shouldn't, they're not allowed to, whatever it may be.

And if that's who you are, I'm not really speaking to you right now. If you know you need help, but you're just holding out from doing it for whatever mental garbage you're sorting through, this isn't really for you. The person that I'm talking to you is the person who knows they don't want a team, nothing in them wants to hire an assistant or an operations person for their business. Yet because they're in programs, they've read blogs, they've listened to podcasts that say you should do this, or you're not a successful entrepreneur until you've built a team, they're feeling pressured to do it. This is your permission to not do that. You don't have to do it. You get to decide how you want to lead your business.

And the leadership piece I think is threefold. It's in terms of the team, what you want to lead in your business. Then leading your clients, your customers, people that have already trusted you that have come into what you're doing, leading them in the right direction. And then lastly, how you're leading your broader community. How you're leading in your niche or in your industry or in your space. And all of that is totally up to you. It's your decision and with what you want to do. If you don't want to be a thought leader, if you don't want to be a podcaster or YouTuber, or a blogger, you don't have to do any of those things if you don't want to. You can build a very successful business just by having an email list or having an Instagram account. You don't have to do all those other things. If you don't want a team, you don't have to. But if you do, you totally can. And inside your programs, if you want to be the only coach or only person in your programs, you can. If you want to build a coaching team, you can do that too. It's just really important for you to consider what best suits how you like to lead, how you like to show up. How you like to connect with other people and create your leadership vision for your business from that place, instead of setting yourself up for disappointment or frustration by doing the leadership-y the things that everyone else says you should be doing in your business.

Katrina Widener: I want you to know, I really appreciate that. And I also really appreciate everything that we've been talking about because again, there's also value in kind of zooming out and looking at the forest instead of the trees and being able to say, "I know exactly without a doubt, whether or not every single piece of what I'm doing in my business is aligned with what I want to do in my business. And whether that's what I want to do for myself, what I want to do for my clients, what I want to do for the community that I'm in or the industry that I'm in" and really being able to say, "I know that, and I can have a way to check myself or check in regularly." There's a power in that. And there's a sense of clarity and really having this concise feeling of being in control of your business. Which of course, none of us are really in control of our business, but we can be in control of our business in some ways. But being able to have that feeling of "I can step into my own power as the business owner and know what I'm doing."

Tyler McCall: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And this is why the four-part vision idea is so vital. Right? Because we can define this. We can get clarity on this now, so that when those moments come when we have to make difficult decisions, when we're trying to decide the direction we want to go. When we're trying to figure out how to pivot our businesses, because y'all it's inevitable. I hate to break it to you, but your business is going to pivot. It's going to change. It's going to evolve. When that happens you can come back to this. The other beautiful thing is that this is up for change. Your four-part vision can evolve with you as well as you grow, as you learn, as you see.

You know one of my favorite things to do, and again it's not to make other people wrong or feel bad about themselves, but to see things in business and be like, "Oh my gosh, I don't want to do that. I don't want that. I don't want to experience that. I don't want that kind of business. I don't want that kind of risk." And as you go through that, you can make those changes and it can evolve with you.

I think the biggest thing I hope people take away from our conversation today is that you get to do this on your terms. You are ultimately the decider of what you want to focus on and where you want to go and you don't have to take on other people's "shoulds" or beliefs about how to run your business if you don't want to. You're in control and you don't have to take that on.

Katrina Widener: Thank you so much. I really, really appreciate that. I am 100% all in on that message and absolutely, absolutely am very grateful that that's what we're sharing with everyone today. Because I do really feel like it's very, very important for business owners at really any level to be able to sit back and say, "Okay. I know what my vision is. I know where I'm going." So, thank you. Thank you.

Tyler McCall: Of course. Yeah. Thanks for having me. Thanks for letting me share my ideas with everyone.

Katrina Widener: Yeah, definitely. Really quickly before we jump off, I just want to ask you where people can find you after they listened to this episode.

Tyler McCall: Yeah. I'll give you two places where we can connect. One is through www.onlinebusinessowner.com. So every Monday I publish a podcast called the Online Business Show. It's out wherever you listen to podcast, or you can go to onlinebusinessowner.com to check it out. And also every Monday we publish a newsletter called the Online Business Digest, where we bring together industry news insights, social media trends, everything in one newsletter. It's totally free. You can go to onlinebusinessowner.com right now to subscribe and get that newsletter every Monday.

And then every Thursday I write a letter from me. It's called Behind the Online Business. I share what I'm learning, what I'm experiencing, things that I'm considering in my own business. So if you're interested in more conversation like what Katrina and I had today, you can go to www.tylerjmccall.com and sign up for my weekly Thursday newsletter. I'm also on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, everywhere just search for Tyler J. McCall. And I'm out there on these internet streets. I've always got something to say, so come hang out.

Katrina Widener: Well, thank you again so much for coming. I've really appreciated our conversation and I think everyone listening is going to find it very, very valuable.

Tyler McCall: Yeah, thanks for having me.