I’ve spent over $100k on things that didn’t help my business grow, here’s what I learned…

There was a time where I would have written that I wasted $100k on things that didn’t help my business but I’ve learned too much about the value of struggle and my ego to not give credit where credit is due. So chalk that up as a win! While these investments didn’t help from a financial perspective, I received a LOT of invaluable lessons.

The list of things/people I have invested in that didn’t move the needle financially looks like…

I’ve hired multiple freelancers to help build and scale ad campaigns, social media and website support. None made an impact on driving more leads or sales. One group literally drove sales to a complete halt. $25k

Invested in a “pay per click” agency that manages your ads across google and meta. Despite being a “platinum partner” to google, this produced no change to our sales. I also found out after that these companies sometimes plant “click bots” on your site to make it seem like you’re getting more clicks. Yikes. $25k

Invested in an AI company who created a widget to streamline UX (user experience) journeys on my website. Over a year no one who booked a retreat with us said it was because of this feature. $10k

Invested in a custom website builder who was referred by a friend. They missed two deadlines and never finished the site. We missed two retreat dates and I lost deposits totaling over $20k.

Invested in a PR agency, or so I thought. It ended up being a scammy pre-recording “coaching program” that TAUGHT you PR and mostly had contacts in the dying TV news industry. $15k

Invested in a ROAS (return on ad spend) agency. A young guy who was very kind and very well intentioned but not very skilled. After one year we didn’t see any converted sales on the ads that were run. $5k

Invested in a coaching business who helped build and scale specifically coaching companies, also using meta ads, sales funnels and VSL’s. Over $10k spent on them and ads, didn’t produce a single lead.

What did I learn along the way? Most importantly, that my vision and my heart has been and must be the guiding force for my business. I left corporate and became a yoga teacher to help make a positive impact in the world. I was following my joy, my desire to feel better and to share that with others. Retreats became an extension and evolution of that. Of course I loved the travel and needed to make an actual liveable wage, but the mission statement was always to be a beacon of positivity and try to help others. When that has been my north star, things work beautifully. 

But what about the money side? Let’s face it, it’s the game we all play, it’s the rules we all buy into. Like it or not it’s a system that made us more civilized. It drives us to try hard, to innovate and in a lot of ways it keeps us from complete lawlessness. Money means safety, it means freedom, it feels good when you have it, and, it can also be an evil vice and a psychological killer. 

For me, the promise of an answer to my sales struggles and my self-imposed cash flow inadequacies led me to drink the Kool Aid with all of the entities listed above. Frankly, I wanted a quick fix. I wanted an easy button. I wanted that same feeling we get when we substitute what’s convenient for what’s needed. Like picking up your phone for the quick dopamine hit instead of doing some breathwork, meditation, a workout or hopping in the cold plunge for the sustained and holistic benefits that come from something hard that requires effort and focus.  

If I’m honest I also wanted help and to feel supported. I wanted to believe someone believed in me and would help me get where I wanted to go. This also stems from not trusting myself enough and a long history of not getting validations I craved, more on that later. 

I know why most businesses fail within the first five years, it gets really hard to put so much of yourself into something and feel like the universe isn’t meeting you anywhere close to half way. It’s hard to see people in similar spaces as you thriving, especially if you don’t like how they’re doing it. The feeling of rejection when it’s not for everyone can also feel devastating. When you work for a company and you don’t make a sale or things don’t work with a client you feel it. But when it’s YOUR company it feels like someone said your baby isn’t good enough.

It also gets lonely. You spend a LOT of time alone and you spend that time toiling over the best ways to put yourself out there. I find myself asking so many questions. How does my website look? Should I try this sale? Should I go with this logo? Should I go to that event? Do I need business cards? Hats? Blogs? Social media? Sell a kidney? 

Have I been duped along the way too? Sure. I’ve literally had my programs and materials stolen from me (someone even duplicated the “digital detox” retreat name with the same branding in San Diego!) But I have also met a lot of folks who genuinely wanted to help. What didn’t work was I was measuring my success in the wrong ways. I forgot about following my joy. I forgot the mission was to help people thrive.

If I look objectively at where I am, it’s pretty damn impressive. I moved myself to San Diego where I knew no one, created a business from scratch and scaled it to something that actually allows me to live with insane freedom in the most expensive city in America AND I get to travel to some amazing places. I’ve employed a bunch of folks and helped them share their gifts and make money. No one looks over my shoulder, I have time to workout, play hockey, cook for myself and spend time with my dog. Back when I was teaching 20 yoga classes a week at $30-$40 a pop and ramen noodles made up a big part of my diet, this would have seemed like a monumental achievement. So why doesn’t it feel that way sometimes?

I think it’s easy to focus on what we don’t have, this is exacerbated by the internet and social media. Part of our survival mechanism is to seek what we need. This gets twisted psychologically by a number of factors, the biggest of which I see as our inability to feel like enough and frankly not knowing who we really are or what we really want. Of the countless people I’ve had a chance to work with and learn their stories, this comes up the most often. Even people who have scaled the top of some huge mountains (literally and figuratively) struggle with feeling like enough and don’t know who they truly are. 

It’s a huge part of the wellness and self-help world, you see people preying on others with this all of the time. Heck, the last company I worked with I just let go yesterday because they kept trying to run ads for people that I knew were intentionally trying to make them feel bad about themselves so they would click a link. They told me I could have a six-figure coaching business but after spending over $10k with them I literally got not one viable lead. 

Why? 

It clearly wasn’t aligned with who I have been at my best, someone who genuinely cares about people and isn’t trying to be a salesman or use gimmicks and fear to get people through the door. I believe so strongly in alignment. When thoughts and actions align, things just flow. When I trust myself, things flow. When I look outside myself for the answers, not so much. Did I even WANT a six-figure coaching business? Frankly every time I see ads for people like that or companies promising that I throw up a bit in my mouth. 

I don’t want or need fancy things. I like my simple life and my freedoms. Some of the happiest people I have ever met traveling around the world had little more than their base needs. So what drove me to say yes to working with them?

I definitely want the validation that a six-figure business comes with, or at least I perceive that it would come with. I want my parents to not feel like they might have to support me and to be proud of me, I want a woman to love me, I want my peers to respect me. I tether all of this to financial success. 

What I realized in trying to get to the end of that rainbow with all of the investments I’ve made is that I lost the love for the journey, the struggle. I lost track of myself and who I really am. So many great people talk about falling in love with the journey, the ups and the downs. I’m finally embracing that. At the end of the day, isn’t true joy being content with your lot in life and where you are right here and now? Isn’t the greatest superpower self-awareness and not letting the external dictate the internal?

I would say so. 

There’s a lot to be said about agreements and the ability to say “no.”  This is tied directly to the self awareness and self value piece. I get a LOT of cold emails from people with the answers to all my problems. These people are really good at telling you what you want to hear. They understand deeply the psychology of sales and the pain points of entrepreneurship. They appear as friends and allies. They’ll do anything to get you on the phone and then are really good at creating urgency for you to say yes. Remember, they don’t do this for just anyone! My nature is to believe in the good in people and to be open so time after time, I’ve gone down the rabbit hole only to find snakes. 

Now, it hasn’t all been bad. I have found some amazing people along the journey who have come and helped our retreats, some even as volunteers. In doing audits on the people who I did hire, I actually learned things about website optimization, SEO, google ads, meta ads and basic business infrastructure. I’ve also helped other retreat business owners build and scale their retreats and not make some of the mistakes I did. 

I also learned how to say “no” to people who weren’t a good fit for our retreats, remembering that creating an amazing experience for people is and always will be the most important thing and the money is second. I remind myself even when retreats don’t sell out that anyone saying “yes” to this thing I created is an absolute miracle and a blessing. This was a huge game changer. I valued every single person I came into contact with with a reverence that I lost when I worked with the various folks I hired. A lot of them looked at these people as customers, not community. 

A lot of those companies and people I hired wanted to automate things in my business or spam people until they finally said yes to something. I think sometimes in the digital world we forget there are HUMANS on the other side of email addresses and social media profiles. Now I talk to 6-8 people a week who are interested in what I do. Most of them end up wanting to sign up for retreats or coaching with me and I get to have these amazing conversations all week long. I learn about their lives and their struggles and share the same. I share if I think I can truly help them. I don’t even feel like I have sales calls anymore, I just talk to really cool humans interested in holistic health solutions and I share openly and honestly myself, my story and what has worked for me. 

I give out free advice all the time, I also help people find retreats that are a better fit for them if ours don’t align. I spend a lot of time focusing on how to be the best version of myself I can be and how I can show up in the world in a positive way. I spent a lot of time asking a lot of people and my focus has shifted back to how I can help. 

I stopped trying to sell myself all the time. 

If you’re starting a business or thinking about it or if you’re feeling a bit stuck in whatever work you’re currently doing, my humble advice would be to take yourself back to the original joy that brought you to that work. Double down on doing things that bring you joy and inevitably you’ll find a way to monetize it in a way that’s perfect for you and just what you need. Lastly, I’ve developed a mantra that has served me well.

Do no harm but take no shit.