“I’ve been really good at self-care for the last couple of years. I can’t pour from an empty cup. When I look after me, my team is happy, my partner’s happy. My kids are happy. I know that the more that I am full, it radiates out of me. It just has a really beautiful knock-on effect. So make sure you take time and look after you.”
Clare Wood
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Managing your finances as a family is hard. And then there’s your business to consider.
Once you’ve gotten over your money mindset issue – which are often passed down from our parents.
Then there’s budgeting to consider.
Profitability.
Expenses.
It can feel overwhelming especially if you feel you’re not a numbers person or that you’re financially illiterate.
The Six Figures in School Hours book digs into all these issues of course, but today I wanted to bring you a money expert to chat through some common problems I see business parents encountering.
We’ll also be sharing some tips on how to overcome them.
Tune in to learn:
- How Clare’s family runs
- Why Clare started her business
- How Clare’s business evolved over the years
- What challenges business owning parents commonly face in their financials
- How to prepare your business for financial success
- Why keeping separate accounts for your business is so important
- How Clare keeps sane, and what self-care looks like for her.
Listen to the podcast
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If you like what you’re hearing on Six Figures in School Hours, support the show by taking a few seconds to leave a rating and/or comment on iTunes or Spotify. Thanks.
And big thanks to utftutf from Australia for their lovely review:
“This will not disappoint – going by Kate’s previous podcasts and pretty much anything Kate produces, it’s going to be well worth taking the time to listen to.
She oozes experience and advice and is always more than generous in sharing her thoughts and business knowledge. Very much looking forward to tuning in.”
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About Clare Wood
Clare Wood is a money mentor, author, speaker and podcaster. She’s a qualified accountant (a CPA), but she’s not your average bean counter… she uses her money-making mentoring powers for good.
Clare helps service-based businesses to scale, while creating a lifestyle they love. Clare Wood runs The Profit Academy, an online school created to help business owners increase their profits exponentially.
Connect with Clare Wood
Buy the book
Transcript
Kate Toon:
Managing your finances as a family is hard. And then there’s your business to consider. Once you’ve gotten over your money mindset issues, which are often passed down from our parents, then there’s budgeting to consider profitability, expenses, it can feel overwhelming, especially if you feel you’re not a numbers person. Or like me, you’re somewhat financially illiterate. The Six Figures in School Hours book digs into all of these issues, of course, but today, I wanted to bring you a money expert to chat through some common problems we see business parents encountering, we’ll also be sharing some tips on how to overcome them. Hello, my name is Kate toon, founder of Stay Tooned, busy business owner and okayish parents and today I’m talking with Clare Wood. Hello, Clare Wood.
Clare Wood:
Hello.
Kate Toon:
Gosh, I stumbled over that intro my poor editor James will have some work to do. I’m in the process right now of recording the audible version of my book. And it’s so hard. Just reading your own stuff. And then you go through it and you will see all the mistakes that you’ve made. So Clare knows how this feels. Because she has just published her own book, tell us about your own book before I do your bio, tell us about your book.
Clare Wood:
Well, my book is called Intentional Profit. And it’s basically about how to build your business profitably. But do it with intention. So I know we’re going to dive into this later in the interview. I won’t go into the nitty gritty of it too much. But I just wanted to say with the audio book, My God, I feel your pain. I was posting on Instagram being like, I feel like I’m stabbing myself in the eye right now. And when you read your book out loud, what the hell, you read it and read it and read it. And then when you actually have to read out loud, I’m like, that doesn’t make any sense.
Kate Toon:
It’s awful. And also like I obviously have ridiculous expectations for myself. So I was like, Yeah, I’ll do like six chapters a day. I do one chapter which takes me about 35 minutes, but not really because it’s about an hour and a half by the time you stopped and started. And by the end, I’m a broken person by the end of it. Why is it so hard to read? I don’t know. Anyway, I’m now going to try and read out your bio. So let’s see if I fluff this up too.
Clare Wood is a money mentor, author, speaker and podcaster she’s a qualified accountant, a CPA, but not your average bean counter. She uses her money making mentoring powers for good. Clare help service based business to scale while creating a lifestyle they love. Clare runs the Profit Academy, an online school created to help business owners increase their profits exponentially. I love it.
Clare Wood:
You got a 10 out of 10.
Kate Toon:
That was pretty good.
Clare Wood:
You even got money mentoring, you nailed it.
Kate Toon:
I put my teeth in. I know, la la la, lu lu lu. So like you and me have been friends for ages. But I guess you know, I obviously I stalk you on Instagram as well. But for those people who don’t obviously they wouldn’t know this. This is a weird way of asking this question. Let’s talk about your family. Claire, what’s your setup? You know, how many how many sprogs Do you have? How involved is your partner? Do you have a partner? Tell us a little bit about that? Just to give us some context?
Clare Wood:
Yeah, for sure. So I’m happily married, I can say. And I’ve got two boys, they are aged five and seven. And I have only run my business. So I actually started I got made redundant when I was on that life with my first son. And I’ve only known business as a mom.
Kate Toon:
Same here. So I started my business when I was five months pregnant. Because I was working as a contractor. So there was never going to be any maternity leave or anything like that. So yeah, I’m the same. I’ve never not had my two babies, my business baby and my actual baby at the same time. So that’s has its own challenges. Does your partner have his own business, does he have a real job? What’s the deal there?
Clare Wood:
Yeah, so. A real job. So he runs his own business as well. He’s got three full time employees. He runs a recruitment firm.
Kate Toon:
Wow.
Clare Wood:
Where are we actually at, we can dive into this later. But basically, we’ve moved We now leave, you know, near the beach in our waterfront home. But the waterfront home is a shack. So my husband and I now share a three by three office. We sit next to each other all day, every day. He’s evacuated just for this recording, but generally, we are like living on top of each other.
Kate Toon:
I love this. I want to talk about your beautiful house because we’ve talked about this before I’ve actually got a question about it towards the end, but I did that too. So when when I you know started my business me and my son’s dad shared an office almost back to back like, you know, to kind of go like that not to touch each other. And my God, he breathes so loudly and he types loudly like you know, you just be sitting there going and I remember ordering of Etsy or somewhere some kind of screen to give me, you know, those foldable screens to give me some division, drove me mad. So that’s when I built my little toon cave in my back garden. And you know, I think that was a good move. So there’s lots of challenges. But the good thing for you, I guess, is that he gets it, he gets running a small business, he gets the pressures, do you feel that that’s really helped?
Clare Wood:
Oh, 100% Like, he’s my biggest fan, my biggest supporter. And, you know, I’m not the easiest person to live with. And the fact that we, you know, been together 10 years, and we still get along so well, I think is a testament to his patience. And probably mine as well, let’s be honest.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, it’s a two way thing. You know, I’m sure he’s not easy to live with, either in certain ways. I love that. And I think, you know, I often not that me and my ex didn’t get on. But I wonder what it’d be like to have a partner that was super supportive now have that I now have an amazing partner who has his own business. And it’s so great to be able to talk about things and in similar challenges and get it. It’s great. So I love that for you. That’s fantastic. So let’s talk about the other side of things. So you are an accountant, kind of good background for what you’re doing now. But, you know, so you mentioned that you got made redundant when you’re on maternity leave, which is always fun. Great. Thanks very much. Awesome. Tell us about what’s happened since then. So that was seven years ago. What’s been your adventure since then? How’s your business evolved?
Clare Wood:
Well, pretty much I was helping my husband and his business. He started his business when I was seven months pregnant.
Kate Toon:
Awesome.
Clare Wood:
Yeah. Cool. So I was, I was the sole breadwinner, and we were living off my mat pay, and then my redundancy pay. So it’s actually a blessing in hindsight. But I was helping him with his business, and you know, bossing him around, which is what I love to do. And he was like, you are actually really good at this. He’s like, people could pay for this. And I was like, oh, yeah, I don’t know. And we told his auntie and she referred three people to me, the first week.
Kate Toon:
Wow.
Clare Wood:
And that is how my business baby got born. And I you know, I don’t want to pretend it’s been an easy road. Because let’s be honest, this business game is bloody hard. But I have honestly, I haven’t looked back. I had one time. A couple of years ago, I had a disastrous launch. And I was like, screw this. And I was on Seek. But aside from that, I you know, I’m so so glad to run my own business. I love it.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. And you know, your business services have evolved. And when you got those first three clients, what was your What was your financial offering what you’re offering back then? I mean, was it just was it coaching? Because obviously, you’ve now got a bit of an empire going on, you got the book, you’ve got the podcast, you’ve got the Profit community that you run, you got you got fair few things. But back then what were you doing? Mostly?
Clare Wood:
I was doing anything, like, let’s be honest, I will. And to be honest, my first first three clients were free, I didn’t charge any of them. I was just getting runs on the board. I had product based businesses, a service based business, I did anything I was doing to, you know, if people needed their accounting, like I was doing anything. And then over time, I sort of niche down niche down and really like, what’s my big passion? And I realized something that I do that not a lot of business coaches do, is I love financials, like I actually love running reports, doing budgeting with people, and I’m like, why don’t I just own that instead of shying away? And so I’ve really stepped into that space. And now, you know, I want to be the person who people go to if they need help with their money.
Kate Toon:
Well, I think you know, it’s getting to the point now that when you think sort of profitability, you think Clare Wood, and that’s the goal that many people would want to get, you know, to get to, throughout the money coaches, you focus on things like mindset and whatever. But you know, I love the fact that yours is all about profit, because I feel that’s one of the most underestimated part of the whole financial game and something that I didn’t get for a long time. So let’s talk about that. I do want to talk a bit more about you and your business. But, you know, you obviously have worked with countless business owners. I know that, you know, maybe the majority of your clients are women, but you also work with men, and I guess a lot of them are parents. Tell us, you know, what do you think are the biggest challenges facing parents who also run a business from a financial point of view?
Clare Wood:
It’s just juggling all of the things like juggling the time and juggling the money because the thing is, as you would know, you know, I had both of my children but one in particular was very unwell when he was younger and we spent so much time in hospital and you trying to keep up this facade online, you know, I didn’t share a lot of this publicly at the time and be like, Oh my be and behind the scenes, you’re like, holy shit, I was in hospital rooms, you know, doing my coaching calls, trying to find a white wall somewhere –
Kate Toon:
Oh god.
Clare Wood:
To coach against and you know, and let alone the money side. I mean, childcare, I don’t know what it’s like in the rest of the world. But here in Australia,
Kate Toon:
Ridic.
Clare Wood:
it is unbelievable, and when you’ve got two kids in childcare. It is a full-time salary. I mean, I honestly don’t know how low-income earners do it.And you know, that was probably our biggest biggest challenges in our early days of business. You know, I had my husband with his business baby, my business baby to actual babies. Um, we, you know, we have some really, really tough cashflow times, like, we’re getting eviction notices from our house because we were falling behind a rent. And you know, and that’s very real. And that is a very, very real struggle.
Kate Toon:
It’s very common. I mean, again, you know, already does my husband started his business at the same time, brilliant. He had one client, he was teaching French, one student so that’s like $45 a week. And so it was all on me, you know, we were renting a flat in Sydney, which as you know, is like, you may as well just sell a kidney, we actually made the decision to move to the Central Coast, which for people who don’t live in Australia, or people who do, it’s about an hour away from Sydney, and I remember Clare walking into the local childcare place, my son wasn’t in childcare there because I couldn’t afford it. And I went in, and I said, do you have any places, you know, obviously, nowhere has places now like, yeah, it’s like, well, I was like, How much is it a day. And I think they said it was like $47, and the price in Sydney was $128. And I think that’s really hard, especially for a lot of mums. For some reason, it doesn’t seem to affect dads so much. When you look at all the costs involved in you having work and you’re like it doesn’t, the ends don’t justify the means. But they do. Because you need something for your sanity, you need to be able to have time away from your kids, you’re still a person, you know, like you had a proper job beforehand, where you are doing things and whatever. And then you become a parent. It’s like, oh, no, you’re just supposed to parent all the time. So even though that gap between what you’re earning and what you’re spending is small in the beginning, I still think it’s important, don’t you, for your mental health, right?
Clare Wood:
Oh, 100%. And look, I know not everyone’s cut out for this life. Love to be around their children all the time, bless them. For me, I you know, I’ve always been someone who’s really, you know, passionate about making a difference and having to your point something for me. So, yeah, we go through and like, I’m so glad that we stuck through it. And to be honest, like, on the flip side of, um, I don’t know how I would have held down a job .
Kate Toon:
Well that’s it.
Clare Wood:
What do people do?
Kate Toon:
You know, all those hospital visits, you know, at least you’re your own boss, and you can let yourself take them off. Imagine if you had the guilt of saying, I need another day off, please.
Clare Wood:
Yeah.
Kate Toon:
So I think it’s hard either way, whether you have a real job. I know I say real job, I’m being facetious. Obviously, our jobs are real. But um, I also like your honesty, about, you know, I say in the book, The first year is just shit. Let’s not be- it’s just shit, whatever you put on Instagram, it’s just shit. And yeah, two and three are pretty tough. Wasn’t really till about year three, that I began to think, Okay, this is a viable thing I can, I can do that. But you also talked about the challenges of it all just being a mess. And I think one of the big challenges I see is when parents who have businesses or have jobs, just have all the money go into one account, you know, and then and then they spend what they have, and whatever, there’s no organization at all, do you see that with sometimes with your clients? Like it’s all one big account, and it’s all a big mess?
Clare Wood:
Do you mean like business and personal?
Kate Toon:
Well both, you know, so like, I know, people who are sole traders, you know, who they get their income, it just goes into the joint account and their partners when it goes into the joint account. So when tax time comes, they’re scrambling around in their joint accounts to find the money for their tax, their GST, and it’s they’re never clear on what money is actually theirs. Do you find that?
Clare Wood:
Yeah, 100% it’s one of the very first things that I do inside my courses, I’m like, let’s set your accounts up properly. Everyone, you have to have a separate business account. And for me, because you know, I come from an accounting background, it was something we’ve always done from the outset. But I also am very, like, people get really embarrassed about it. And like, it’s okay, like, you know, if you kind of had a look at my copywriting, you probably got like, it’s an absolute frickin disaster, Clare, the way you structure things is a nightmare. But, you know, everyone starts somewhere. And I’m just like, the point is, is that you want to set things up. So you get to the point where your taxes put aside, your supers put aside, you don’t need to stress about money as much because you’ve got your systems in place. So you know, if you are in that boat 100% Take Kate’s advice. separate it out.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, I mean, you know, I’m a big fan of Profit First. I know, I know you are too. And really, for me, that was the light bulb moment. So that didn’t happen till about 2016. So just to give anyone listening, that’s like eight years into my business before I got my shit together. I got myself $50,000 in debt to the tax office because I had a really good year, but I didn’t really keep track of it. And my I had an accountant. But I think another thing that is often people put their trust in accountants and bookkeepers who obviously want to do their best and you know, they have professional guidelines and whatever. But you cannot just wash your hands of your finances. And that’s what I did as oh he’ll sort it out. And at the end of the year, got my tax return. It’s like you owe this much. And I’m like, holy crap. I’ve spent that I don’t have it. Do you again, do you find that people just blindly trust accountants and bookkeepers and just don’t think either lalalalala put their fingers in their ears? Do you find that too?
Clare Wood:
Oh, 100% like it’s the biggest thing that comes up for people when they they’re like, I thought my accountant was doing this or I’ve got a bookkeeper and I think when like people are coming into my course, and they’re like, oh, cool, can I get rid of my accountant? I’m like, No. And they’re like, why am I paying you for a course and I still need an accountant, I still need a bookkeeper. I’m like, because now you’ll actually know what the hell is going on.
Kate Toon:
That’s it.
Clare Wood:
And I’m like, you can’t just be like, Oh, they’ll take care of it. This is your bloody money. And unfortunately, I just see too many people, like, it’s the primary reason 95% of businesses that fail do so because of poor cash flow. And because people aren’t taught these skills, like you start a business, no one sits you down and says, Okay, here’s how it works. And unfortunately, most accountants kind of assume that people know. And then most people aren’t even meeting with their accountants. They catch up with them once a year and then they’re like, be accounts I didn’t as if you thought you didn’t have to pay tax like it wasn’t all free.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, but you passed the GST threshold four months ago, you do realize that and you’re like, No, what? Yes. Yeah,
Clare Wood:
So you know, it’s just we’re not trained in this stuff.
Kate Toon:
We’re not.
Clare Wood:
You know, I even I, when I left school, I was a straight A student, I hit first year unit, I failed introduction to accounting. Now, obviously, I’m not bad at accounting, I’ve gone on and done, you know, two degrees in done my post grad qualifications. But the way that things are explained by a lot of accountants is like gobbledy goo.
Kate Toon:
Do that again. Do that again.
Clare Wood:
And this uni lecture, I was like, What the fuck is he talking about? Sorry, if you need to beep that out. But I literally found my first subject I’d ever found in my life. And this is, I share this story. Because when I hear people say, I’m not good at accounting, I’m not good at numbers. I’m like, I want to tell you, I failed intro to accounting and I’m now going on, I’m a numbers, girl. You know, I’m a qualified accountant. And I can, I can let you know that it’s not that you’re bad. It just hasn’t been explained to you properly. We’re learning just need to learn.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, I mean, you know, math at school, you learn, you don’t learn practical accounting, you don’t learn the basics. And, you know, I started my own business, and also moving from an employed job to a business, as we all know, and it’s cliche, you have to wear so many hats, you know, I was good at the marketing thing. I was good at the client thing. But the money thing I was terrible at. And, you know, like you, I mean, I’m I now I think, I have a really great grasp of my financials, I’ve, you know, I’ve learned and it’s taken me a long time, like, I’ve had my account, explain things to me, dozens of times, and then all of a sudden, it clicks, that may be the eighth or ninth time and I consider myself a fairly smart person. And you know, I know that money mindset, I used to be a bit funny about mindset, I was so woowoo. But in the process of writing the book as well, I realized how much my mindset was governed by my parents. So my parents for background work, you know, pretty working class, my grandparents are coal miners, my dad’s the first person to go to uni, I’m the second, very much never borrow, credit is bad. You know, saving is good. You know, pleasure delay all of that. And that sounds brilliant. But actually, what I did was go to the opposite of that, like, get all the credit cards. So do you find that people’s mindset is often governed by their parents and their, you know, we’re not taught it in school, but equally, we’re not taught by our parents, either.
Clare Wood:
Oh, yeah. And it can come from anywhere. I mean, it could come from, you know, having a conversation with someone who turns around and says to you, you know, you should get a credit card to buy this course. And that might influence your thinking. And I guess I don’t really believe in a right or wrong about these things. I just want people to understand why you think like that. Why do you think like that? Is that serving you? And if it’s not there, maybe you need to start to go well, I’ve got to change something here. And the way that I think about mindset, a lot of it’s just rooted in, like the way that you think like, what are the stories that were told to you again, and again? And how does that then play out in your life? And it can kind of swing like, I came from a family with no money and I went from being a massive time asked when I was younger, to then when I got my first six figure job at 25. I was like,
Kate Toon:
Woohoo.
Clare Wood:
Let’s live and you know, it’s just kind of always been conscious, like, why am I doing this? Why is this serving me? Is this what I want to be doing? Is it aligned to the life I want to build?
Kate Toon:
And it’s, you know, sometimes you need someone to ask you those questions. Especially you know, when you’re a parent, it’s early on in your business, your kids are up all night in it very hard to cognate full stop, but to separate me, myself and I and go, Oh, look at me doing that. Why am I doing that? You know, and I realized that when I started my business, I did not want to spend any money. So we’ve talked about this before. I’ve never had a coach. I’ve been in one membership briefly. I’ve never I don’t buy any business books. I’ve never done a course nothing. Because I’m not I’m not gonna waste money on that. I can just work it out myself. Now. It served me in the end, maybe I would have gotten where I got to a little bit quicker. But I also took that no money spend thing in terms of staff, so I would never hire anybody. And really, I’ve got to be totally honest. It wasn’t till about 2017 that I embraced the idea of other people working for me and that’s when my business went boom.
So it does hold you back and I had to go, why do I not want to spend money? It’s because my parents and my dad’s business went bankrupt. And me, me, me, me. And Dustin, it definitely plays into the halo. We’ve talked about the negative. All the bad things we’ve done. What what give us some top tips like if you if I’ve just come to you, not me, necessarily, but Sue, pick Sue. She’s come to you. She’s starting your profit academy or you’re doing some one on one coaching with her? What are some of the top tips you would give us a top three tips you would give anybody who’s considering mastering their finances?
Clare Wood:
Well, I’m gonna assume that Sue’s a mom, because we’re talking about your parents. Yeah. So the very first thing I always do is sit down and say like, what does success look like to you? Because I know that sounds really cliche and people earn. But it’s so different. Yes, so different to everyone, because I can help you build a you know, a million dollar a year business. And if so, is like, I’m friggin miserable. I’m working 60 hours a week, I never see my kids. I’m burnt out, blah, blah, blah, well, she’s not going to be like, Oh, that was great. Thanks for that. So I really, first of all, go, what do you actually want? Like, what does success look like to you? And once we get really clear about that, then it’s like mapping out. Okay, well, how are we going to get there? And I use financials to get there. So I’m like, Okay, what kind of team members will we need to hire? If you only wanted to work three days a week? Okay, well, we might need to take that off your plate, take that off. Okay, that’s gonna cost you approximately this much. And I actually correlate it back to a financial plan. So I’m a big fan of budgeting, bring it back to the game plan, and then map out what revenue would look like and what investments you need to make to support that revenue. So I’m quite practical in the way that I go about it. And really, like so much of it is uncovering, I would say, like 95%, the work that I do, even inside the Academy, which is, it’s like Foundation’s course, is literally just like Profit and Loss reports, cash flow, so much of its mindset, because people are like I don’t want to do that. And so I have to break down those stories with them. Why don’t you want to look at your financials? Because they’re boring? Why do you think they’re boring? Is it is it fun to be living in this cycle of fear and running out of cash all the time? No. So I think, you know, I think back to the stories,
Kate Toon:
Yeah, totally, and you know, I think which I say a lot in the book is a really good successful business often is quite boring. You know, because it’s regular, it’s reliable. There’s no peaks and troughs, you know, the good days come great, but you don’t get too excited about them. And then you don’t get too depressed about the bad, you know, good businesses without reliable recurring income. We are so on the same page, because I start with the why. And I think people don’t really they all say their why quite quickly. And then you go, but is it, though? Why is that your Why? Why do you want to do that? Like, I want to have a six figure business. Do you though, do
Clare Wood:
Yeah.
Kate Toon:
And you’re willing to make the compromises to get there? And you’re willing to do this? Because do you really want that? Or do you just want to be happy? And what does happiness mean to you? So exactly the same? And then I’m the same as you like, whenever I do my masterminds or anything, the first month is always about money, money, how much do you want to earn? Let’s break it down. Well, how much time do you have? Okay, what’s your hourly rate gonna be and what you spending on this and stop going to personal development events when you’re earning $200 a month that you can’t afford that yet, necessarily? You have to plan for that. So I’m totally with you there. So you look at their why you start with a financial plan. And then I guess the other thing that you must struggle with as a coach is making people stick with that plan. Yeah, like keeping people accountable. Is that hard?
Clare Wood:
Well, I have like a process which I use for myself, I use it actually, I use this exact same framework that I teach in the course for my personal finances as well. So I actually do, it’s a bit dorky, but I do cash flow forecasting, we do an end of month meeting with our bookkeeper for our personal finances, as well as our business finances. And I sit down with my clients, and we actually look and we’re like, Okay, why is that not happening? And the reality is true. So people schedule budget, because they like, what if everything changes? I’m like, what, everything is going to change? This is why, and then we change that we can change the budget. Or we can say, Okay, well, why did you not fire the person that you said you were going to hire? Why did you freak out and put the price down on your course or your offering? And we can dive a little bit more into the psychology behind it as well. But, you know, I kind of have to be it’s kind of a little delicate dance, as you would know, when you’re mentoring people between giving a bit of tough love, but also being empathetic, you know, I can’t just come in and be like, Well, you said you’re going to do this and you didn’t. That’s obviously not going to be effective in cultivating and inspiring people to change. So it’s kind of finding that balance.
Kate Toon:
The balance,
Clare Wood:
Bit of tough love and also saying, Hey, I add something I always remind people I used to do this in corporate world as well. Oh, we missed ourselves. Target was me. I’m like, Dude, you said it. I said I was there cheering on going, Hey, can we make it a bit bigger? You’re the one who agreed to it, you signed off on it. These are your numbers. If you’re not hitting them, you’re accountable to yourself. At the end of the day. It’s not my business, it’s your business. So it’s keeping people fired up and on track.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, it’s fun. It’s something that I do when I take people on my mastermind actually is a massaging
analogy because I used to be a masseuse, I tried to be a masseuse, I broke away from advertising, trained to be and masseuse realized I didn’t like it. And it’s really hard work came back to advertising. So I asked them if they want firm, medium or soft. And some people are like, Yeah, I want, and they want to be really. But you know, again, budgeting is something that probably I’ve only started doing the last three years and to a degree, the first year I did it, it was a work of fiction, you know, but then after the first year, then I used the first year to map out the second year I can I know that January is low, I know that February is high. And you can see that. And I wish I might show it to Clare afterwards, I just shared in my group because I share all my financials in the Digital Marketing Collective everything I earn every launch that I’ve spent totally transparent. And I got my little budget and the line for the plan. And the line for iron is spot on. And that’s taken three years because I know my business. But again, I love what you said there about you set the figures. No one else cares, man. No one cares if you’re a six figure business, no one cares what you’re doing. We all worry that everyone’s looking at us and thinking but no one gives a shit. Really, we’re also self-involved. So this, for example, this year, I set my budget for $100,000, less than last year, because I didn’t want to put too much pressure on myself, I will probably exceed it. And for me that’s more motivating to set a lower figure than and beat it than set a higher figure and come in just under and that’s to do with my mindset, right? Like, I don’t want to push myself too hard, because that makes me miserable. So it’s again who the person is and what motivates them, as you said, right.
Clare Wood:
Oh, 100%. And what’s the point in writing down a number in your budget? If you put something down and right from the outset, you’re like, I’m never gonna hit that. I mean, what’s the point? You don’t try? Because you’re gonna think was so ridiculous. It’s so high, I’m never gonna get it anyway. So, yes, it’s good to stretch yourself if you’re wanting to grow your business, but also don’t do it. If it doesn’t feel good, because it’s your bloody numbers.
Kate Toon:
And it’s your life.
Clare Wood:
Yeah, exactly.
Kate Toon:
I’ve, you know, I like to do, you know, I have a goal, I have a stretch goal. And then I have, ooh, la la goal is what I call it, you know, I mean, so like, you know, the goal is, you know, bare minimum what I need to cover costs. And while our stretch goal is and this would be nice, and ooh la la, right, I can go out and get a new pair of leggings, because I don’t spend much money on things. So that can work as well. But hey, look, I want to dig in a little bit to six figures, because obviously, my book is called Six Figures in School Hours. And I was a little bit uncomfortable with that title, I must admit sounds great. But what does it really mean? So in the book, I break it down. And I think you can look at six figures in lots of different ways. I’d love your opinion on this. So first one is six figure salary, you know, you’re taking home six figures before tax, you know, so then you want to get to six figures after tax, then you may want to get to six figures, gross profit, and then six figures, net profit, and then six figures revenue you know, revenue, it’s all different at scale. So when people say six figures, it’s very broad, isn’t it? You know, it can mean a lot of different things. And also it can be $100,000 or $999,000. Do you know what I mean? So when people say six figures to you, what does that really mean to you?
Clare Wood:
When you think of that in your head? Well, I am one of those people that I take that with a grain of salt, because I see people on Instagram who are like, I made this much. And I’m like, Oh, that’s nice, like how much I have seen because of what I do. I have seen behind the scenes of enough big profile businesses that I am like, I know people who are making a million dollars a year touting about it on Instagram, who literally can’t afford their tax bill and who are drawing almost no money out of it. So I think for me, I’m just like, I like to dig a little bit deeper. And I talk about this in my book is I’m like, Okay, what period of time is that over? Whenever, because I’ve also seen someone who shared that she’s got a $5 million business and I might, and then when I do the songs, I’m like, Oh, she mentioned 5 million over 10 years. And I was like, some people might think she makes that much money a year in revenue. Are people disclosing a revenue or profit number? Are people talking in American dollars, or Australian dollars or Rupee? I don’t know.
Kate Toon:
It’s so- but this is it. And you know, one thing I love is you encourage transparency. And I, I may have mentioned this in the book, but one of the one of your episodes of your podcast I love is with our mutual friend, Steph Taylor. And she was talking about one of our amazing launches. But she was honest enough to say Yeah, and I spent this much on ads to make that money.
Clare Wood:
Yeah.
Kate Toon:
So then when you break it down, also the time that she spent, whatever her personal time, which has a cost, you know, it wasn’t I love that transparency. That’s something that I really try to do as well to be real about it. You know, I can go Oh, my course made three and a half million. Yes, it did over six years. And it’s a lot of work. Do you know what I mean? And that doesn’t include what I spend to make that money. So I think there’s not enough honesty and why do people share that stuff? I mean, if you’re a money coach or you’re you’re trying to sell yourself as a great mentor, then you want to show that you are able to make money because if you’re making $20 a month, you’re not going to be the best business mentor. But other than that, why people waving that about like, does it we should talk about money more, but transparently, I think it’s often just an ego thing. You want people to be impressed by you want to be loved and adored. But most people aren’t impressed. I don’t think I don’t know.
Clare Wood:
Well, I mean, I love that people talk about this stuff. Because the fact that you’ve come out and said that you, you know, I came to a conference where you guys were all talking about how you make a million over a million dollars. Yeah, yeah. And I’m like, that’s super inspiring for someone like me who’s not quite there yet. I’m like, Okay, I’m, it’s normalized by other people. I love that. But what’s kind of happened in small business world is that it’s become common to talk about revenue.
Kate Toon:
Yes.
Clare Wood:
And it’s also become common to use, like, there’s no parameters around it.
Kate Toon:
No.
Clare Wood:
Whereas like, for someone like me, who came from corporate, it’s always the profit number that people say, Oh, we made this much profit. Oh, and we made this many sales, like the sales is a number that kind of sits below and supports it. When I came to small business world, I’m like, What the hell
Kate Toon:
What’s going on?
Clare Wood:
Like what is going on over here? And this is a big part of my book, like, I want people to say, yes, share your sales, or share your 6 figure out, you know, and it doesn’t have to be a big number as well, like, just share and celebrate. Because even if you’ve only made $10,000 In a year, there are people who are looking up to that there are people who are in their jobs thinking, Holy smokes, I could make that in a side business, maybe I can start my business. So I do think we should be empowering people to celebrate. But I personally have drawn a line in the sand. And when I share numbers, I really always where available, try and share the profit, the time period, the investment that went into it, to empower other people and say, Hey, do you know what year I had a six figure launch, but actually, I’m going to make that revenue over the next six months.
Kate Toon:
Yeah.
Clare Wood:
So I don’t have $100,000 magically sitting in my bank overnight.
Kate Toon:
Yeah exactly. Now I have to deliver the program.
Clare Wood:
Exactly.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, now I have to deliver this bloody program for the next whatever. But I love it. Let’s talk about profit a little bit more, because I think it’s very much misunderstood. You know, so, in the book, I talk about this as well, I don’t have a whole book on it, I have a chapter on it, you know, so talking about, you know, you sell this piglet jumper for $50. Right, but it cost you $25 to make. So you’re making $25 per jumper, you sell these piglet pajamas for $100. But they cost you $75 to make. So currently they’re both making the same money. Brilliant, but they’re not making the same profit margin. So I find profit margin the most useful stat for me and you know, I’ve just googled, because I like this question, what is a good profit margin? And it says, As a general rule of thumb, a 10% net profit margin is considered good. Can you just for the listeners who haven’t read my book, go and buy it, explain the difference between gross profit and net profit.
Clare Wood:
So I work a lot with service based business owners. And when you like, for us, we don’t usually talk about like net profit and gross profit. Because usually when you talk about, you know, your cost of goods sold, that is the cost of physically buying the piglet jumper. And when you’re a service based business, it’s it’s pretty rare that you can allocate a specific cost to a specific amount of sale. So that’s kind of why it’s not, I actually say in the book, I’m like, Look, you’re not you’re pretty much gonna hear me talking about about profit as net profit,
Kate Toon:
Net profit.
Clare Wood:
Because in service-based land, it’s not really a commonly used phrase.
Kate Toon:
Not as interesting, is it? And gross profit is kind of its deceitful in a way because COGS or cost of goods sales, you know, what you decide to put in there is kind of up to you in a way. So for example, I could put my Active Campaign subscription in there because to sell, I need to have that every year, I have to pay for it, regardless of whether I sell 15 or 17. But I can’t tie it to an individual product, I can’t do that cost allocation. You know, PayPal fees. If I’m not selling stuff, I don’t pay any PayPal fees, so it gets a bit blurry. So I really feel like net profit is the figure that’s important. You can have the two figures and zero and all most accountants will show you both. But as you said, especially for service-based businesses, net profit is the way to go. But even for ecommerce, at the end of the day, with all that cost of goods sold at the end, that is your net profit that what you take out of the business that is the vital thing, right.
Clare Wood:
100%. And a question that I know people commonly ask, is that percentage, like, what’s the percentage everyone wants me to give them the magical percentage. Now, I vary a lot from Profit First on this,
Kate Toon:
Yeah.
Clare Wood:
But I don’t believe that there is a you know, you have to make this margin for your business. I understand that businesses like restaurants make a 1% margin, which is mind blowing to someone like me. But you know, at the end of the day, I think it’s about establishing what works for you and are you doing it with intention? Are you actually is it just like you get to the end of the year and you’re like should I only make 1% Or are you going I always knew that was the game plan. I mapped it out. That’s my industry. I really wanted to sell my product at that cost. I have things that I sell and make no money off. We were talking about this book before that actually cost me an arm and a leg.
Kate Toon:
It’s a soul sucking thing. It’s ridiculous. But yeah.
Clare Wood:
But there’s other things where you can make a massive like, it almost feels, you know, when I sell things, my courses passively, it almost feels dodgy because I’m like, I didn’t even do anything. And someone just found it and bought it. Now I’ve got a couple of $1,000 sitting in my bank account. So it’s really about working out, you know, what’s right for you, your industry. And, yeah, and just having a plan. And that’s my big thing that I urge people to do.
Kate Toon:
That intentional thing, I think that’s so important. You know, I’m actually I’ve got my little account here, I’m gonna show it to you after this. But I’m looking at my, you know, profitability and how much it’s varied over the years. And as long as I understand why that’s varied, so, you know, I’m not looking at my revenue, I’m looking at my net profit, you know, and it was good in 2019, 2020, it was even better and 2021. Good in 2021. And this show is half what it was last year, my net profit is massively down. Why is that? I know why, the book has cost the fortune, my conference cost a fortune, and I earned the income for it two years prior, because COVID delayed it, but people didn’t get ask for a refund. You know, I’ve spent a lot on Facebook ads, because the market has gotten a lot difficult to sell stuff. But also what I like to do with because I have multiple lines of business is look at each product and see which has the best profit margin. For me, it’s the Recipe for SEO Success course. It’s a ridiculous profit margin. But do I love it not as much as my retreat, which has a falling net profit. So it’s also about choice and into as you said, intention, and having a business that you enjoy, we could all sit here and make all the money in the world if we’re willing to compromise our time with our kids work like loonies, you know, burn ourselves out. But it’s about that balance, isn’t it? It’s not just about a percentage on a spreadsheet. It’s about your life intention, right?
Clare Wood:
Oh, 100%. And what makes you happy, like, at the end of the day, that’s the whole reason that you want to do this is to live a life that you choose, and a life of freedom. Like what what’s important to you?
Kate Toon:
Yeah, totally. Well, look, I think that was a fantastic thing. I’m going to ask you some quickfire questions. Now, just to wrap up the episode. You’re quite a productive lady. I think you’ve got a lot of things going on. What is your number one productivity tip? How do you stay productive?
Clare Wood:
Outsource.
Kate Toon:
Outsource, okay.
Clare Wood:
One word.
Kate Toon?
So what does that mean for you, you’ve got lots of people working for you?
Clare Wood:
I’ve got a cleaner, who comes twice a week, and for any mum in business, and I know this is really triggering for some people, because they’re like, Well, I can’t afford to the cleaner twice a week, I get that. But when I first got my cleaner, she was coming like two hours a month. And I was just like, I’ve just got to cover. I think my first plan was $25. Now, So way back then it was like $50 a month, and she would just do the toilets and scrub the bathroom, which are my most hated things. And then over time, we’d built up to the point where you know, our cleaner helps with laundry folding, and a lot of things that freed us up, my husband and myself to work on our businesses. So that’s one thing. And my assistant, my beautiful assistant, God bless her soul. I don’t know how she’s put up with me for so long.
Kate Toon:
Let’s give her a shout out what’s her name?
Clare Wood:
Her name’s Sally. She’s amazing.
Kate Toon:
Sally, you’re a legend.
Clare Wood:
You’re an absolute legend. And she you know, I sent things- tasks to her, because if I was trying to do all the admin in my business, I would collapse. So, you know, having the support.
Kate Toon:
It’s good that you’re honest about that, you know, I talk about cleaners in the book and I talk about, obviously, it’s feels like a privilege, and it does feel like luxury. But at the end of the day, I would sacrifice a lot of things before I would sacrifice my cleaner. You know, I would eat you know, beans for a week before I would sacrifice my cleaner. So it’s not necessarily about having a lot of money. It’s about choosing what you spend your money on, you know, and then again with the assistant, I think from the outside, it looks like it’s just me doing everything I do. I got 16 people working in my business, not full time Geez, that really horrific, but bits and bobs of different people. And that’s built up over the years. It’s not like a day dot, you know, you build up from nothing. So I love that. Lots of other people have said time blocking and whatever. But I love that you brought up the people factor because I think that’s so important. What does self-care look like to you? You know, you work hard. And I hope you don’t mind me mentioning bit had a bit of an accident earlier this year this year. And you know, it’s been a struggle, right. So how now do you look after Clare Wood and make sure that she’s at her best?
Clare Wood:
So yeah, it was about it was nearly 12 months ago now.
Kate Toon:
Wow, is it that long?
Clare Wood:
I literally nearly died. I am still in rehab still recovering from it. A neck injury is a bit of an invisible one, unless you’d like hung out with me and you’d be like she looks like a robot. But, you know, the truth is I’ve been really good at self-care for the last couple of years. And I know that like even having a cleaner that’s self-care. I heard my cleaner say one day that Clare’s a princess and I had a bit of a giggle because to me I look after myself and I’m like, I can’t pour from an empty cup. So my things are I love to spend time with my friends, gett dinner, I get my nails done, which is just, it’s just my me-time. And one of the I was trying to look for the silver lining. You know, one of the things about this injury is that I have to regularly get massages, I have to train and go to the gym, or I literally disintegrate. And maybe for other people, they don’t have like an injury or something like that. But it’s like your mental health, it’s your being on the edge of your mental game. And it’s like, I am the most important person. And when I look after me, all the other things, my team is happy, my partner’s happy. My kids are happy. So like, what does that look like? Like? What does your self care look like? And I know that the more that I am full, it radiates out to me. Like everyone’s like, Oh, you seem happy, your clients are happier, they make more money, your partner’s happier. And it just has a really beautiful knock on effect. So make sure you take time and look after you.
Kate Toon:
Exactly, I totally agree. All right, second to last question and have to answer it fairly swiftly. Don’t think about it too much. What is the biggest driver for your success?
Clare Wood:
Ah, oh, I mean, I’m gonna be honest, money. Like I wanna be rich.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, good, I mean, it would be a bit odd. If you hadn’t said that. Since you’re a money coach. So, what does money mean to you, though, what, because obviously, the main thing that I found that was important for me is to connect connect money to a thing, or to a goal or to achieving something not just to stockpile money because it becomes pretty meaningless. So what does money mean for you?
Clare Wood:
So I really love to travel. And I like to travel nice. So I want to do you know, I’ve been in over 60 countries, and I’m not done by any means, I want to travel. And I really want to build our dream house here. You know, I want to be able to live a life where we like we’ve got a beautiful home and we’ve got money and I’m not scrimping and saving and freaking out about money, like I want to have a life of financial freedom. And then you know, beyond there, I think if it starts to become altruistic, where it’s like, okay, what charities can I support? What other things can I do?
But you know, for now, it’s really like, I want to build the dream house. I quite honest about it.
Kate Toon:
No, I love that. I love that. You know, for me, I think it’s about being comfortable. I feel like there’s a lot of security that comes with money. I mean, I know, it’s never certain. For me, it’s for me, it’s generational wealth, because I don’t want my son start with nothing like I did. You know, my parents gave me nothing they could have done, but Dad was of the school of hard knocks, you know, I struggled, you should struggle. And I do want my son to struggle a bit like, I don’t want him to have a silver spoon, and I’m not that well off. But I do want him to start a little bit better. Like my goal is that he might be able to buy a property when he’s like 20. His first property, something like that, because I was 35 when I was able to buy a property. So for me, that’s the goal. And then as you said altruism and all that. Obviously, that sounds a bit selfish, doesn’t it? That we didn’t put that first but yeah, you know, put your own oxygen mask.
Clare Wood:
Same thing, fill up own cup first. So many starving artists out there who are like, oh, and then they end up on welfare because they didn’t sort themselves their selves out financially first, and it’s like, you can actually give so much more when you’re like, I don’t even want anything more. I’ve got this is coming from overflow. And you know, and the more that you can give like when you can give them that space, there’s a lot more you know.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, you have to put your own oxygen mask on first, I think then you’re more prepared to help other people. So look, you did I love your story of your beautiful waterfront property, you always say that you bought the worst house on the best street or something like that I think you’ve mentioned but it’s also backed on to water, which in Australia is kind of problematic. Overseas listeners might not realize. But in Queensland, I do hear stories of crocodiles coming out of the water onto your back garden and eating your dog has that happened to, is that a thing where you are?
Clare Wood:
It’s happened three times to us. Crocodiles have come out.
Kate Toon:
Three dogs?
Clare Wood:
No, there’s no bloody crocodiles. We are not far enough north to have crocodiles. I think I think up like right up north.
Kate Toon:
Yeah, like Cairns.
Clare Wood:
Like Cairns. But there is in all seriousness there are it’s well known that there are sharks in the canal. So we do have this little mini beach at the back of our house and people like can kids swim in there? And I’m like, no. That’s where sharks come and lay their eggs.
Kate Toon:
Oh my god.
Clare Wood:
There are sharks in them. So we don’t swim in the water. But we do like to look at it.
Kate Toon:
It does look very beautiful. When you follow Clare on Instagram. She annoyingly shares all these beautiful waterfront photos.
Clare Wood:
It just blows my mind like this was the reason I’m like, I want people to know that I’m like, How is this my life? Like, I’m like, you know, I see the toon cave and I see the outdoor bath and, you know, go if I can do it, anyone could do it.
Kate Toon:
I know.
Clare Wood:
Like this is some stupid, crazy dream that I had. And it’s now my life.
Kate Toon:
I have a chapter towards our section towards the end of the book is actually in the conclusion and I talk I talk about astonishment. And that will for me I am astonished that I get to do this every day that I get to talk. This is my job getting to talk to Clare Woods on a podcast. You know most of my job involves posting memes on Facebook. Look at my life that I’ve made for myself. I’m not lucky. I mean, I’ve got privilege coming out my ass white middle class woman,blah, blah, blah. But I’ve worked hard and I’m but I’m still astonished. And I want to stay astonished and not become a smug cow. So I think that astonishment is beautiful. And I honestly think that’s beautiful. I think it’s so important in business and that’s a big part of my why, Claire, it’s always amazing speak to you. Where can we find out more about you and where is your book on sale?
Clare Wood:
So my book’s on Booktopia and Amazon you can’t buy it in bookstores. That’s a whole lot of painful story. But you can buy it online. Or you can come follow me on instagram as Kate said, I sort of share its share my journey over there. It’s But Clare, it’s got no I in it, c l a r e. clare_wood_coach.
Kate Toon:
So I’ve got links to Clare’s website, her Instagram, her Facebook and LinkedIn Clare Wood podcast which you can check out and Clare’s book Intentional Profit. It’s wonderful to speak to you, we’ll speak soon.
Clare Wood:
Thanks, Kate.
