Awarepreneurs template - Ange Matthews

Hi. This is Paul Zellizer, and welcome to the Awarepreneurs podcast. On this show, we dive deep into wisdom from some of the world's leading social entrepreneurs. Our goal is to help increase your positive impact, your profitability, and your quality with life. Before we get into today's topic, I have 1 request. If you could hit subscribe and do a review on your favorite podcast app, it. It helps more people learn how to have positive impact through values based business. Thank you so much.

Today, I'm thrilled to introduce you to Angie Matthews, it, and our topic is how to become a successful investor based on your values. Angie is an intellectually driven entrepreneur, an investor who is passionate about disrupting traditional ways of creating wealth by developing strategies and multidimensional financial solutions for everyday people. With she is a founder and investment coach at Happy Investor Method. Angie, welcome to the show.

Thanks so much for having me.

It. You're doing great work, and I'm really excited to introduce our listeners to what you're up to. But before we get into what things look like now, Andy, just give us a what would somebody who's listening, doesn't know who Andrew Matthews is, what would they need to know a little bit about your backstory to kinda get a sense of the context or the foundation of the work that you do now.

So I created a company called The Happy Investor Method, and I created it because Wealth wasn't a conversation that I grew up around. And initially, when I started investing, I had $40,000 in debt. With Nope. I was making $40,000 a year with 6 figures in debt. And I knew off the bat that I wanted to be an entrepreneur, and I knew what the stats with for being a person of color and receiving outside funding would be, so I decided that I had to start thinking about money in a different way, and I did. And not only did I start investing, but I was able to use my investments to not only pay off my debt, but really increase into a 7 figure net worth with by investing in things that I truly believe deserve to exist on the planet. And that's pretty much how I started, and now I am dedicated with to teaching people how to become wealthy on

their terms. One of the things as I was doing my research, Angie, on your website, it says, with our clients choose to be wealthy. Our clients choose to be wealthy, and it's not just about the money. This is really it it's both about what that opens up, but there's a deep dive you've done on why, especially the folks who are your clients, it matters when your clients and people like them become wealthy. Tell us a little bit about that part of what you're doing.

But I do think a lot of things that we do with are based in choice, and sometimes someone might not want to be wealthy. They may not choose it based on the apprehensions that they're coming to the table with. Maybe they think you have to be evil in order to acquire wealth and amass wealth. Perhaps they think that if they acquire wealth, They are now indebted to the world or maybe they think that they just can't have it because it's taking away from someone else. So it's really powerful to with Enable someone to have the power to choose it and what it comes with it. So I do think with great power comes great responsibility, with And my goal is to build an awareness in people from jump that, hey. If I'm going to help you build this wealth, It's to not only lighten your burden, but to really lighten the burden of the

world. So before you got into this focus on impact and investing, you did some work in more traditional places like Goldman Sachs. So what did you see where maybe impact and values weren't quite as robust it as what you're doing now. Like, why is that such a focus, and how is that different than what might be happening in the impact I'm sorry, in the investing world in general.

It's really interesting because when I started at Goldman, I thought it. I was gonna learn how to make a lot of money because, supposedly, they're the best folks at making money. Right? Number 1 investment banking Institution in the world, and this was also right prior to the last recession and the great collapse of the banking system. It. And I actually like to think that I'm making up by teaching folks how to do more aligned investing for regular people. With Because I'm sure when I was at the big bank, I didn't know who I was working for or what agenda I was pushing. And it was really all under the guise of, hey. With You wanna make money, and we're hiring you to help our clients make money.

And it was really interesting because I knew what I was doing to my core it. That maybe it wasn't the best of interest to the masses, but I didn't understand how to prove it. And, also, I was in a very vulnerable place. I was in my with Early twenties, and I didn't really understand what cog I was in the bigger picture. Versus now, I do think that It wouldn't be possible for me to do what I do now back then because you didn't have institutions like Robinhood or Fidelity Or, you know, accessible investing is so much more popular now. And so with access comes opportunity. And I like to think that I earned with My hard chops back when I went to Goldman just to see what the promised land could look like. What does it mean for someone to To really have multimillions and 1,000,000,000 of dollars under 1 Social Security number or one LLC or one with Business, you know, EIN.

I didn't even think that was possible until I got there. So for me, seeing was believing, and now I take that site and I help other people to see, No. It's not okay to stop at 6 figures. You can keep going. You can keep pushing because the more you keep pushing, the better it is for

everybody. Yeah. And I think a lot of our guests have had that experience. I know my 1st career in community mental health, like, I was trying to care for everyday people, but there were some larger forces at work that was working at cross purposes. And and yet that time in community mental health settings allowed me to have experience of how people were falling through the cracks, particularly people from marginalized communities it that helped me say, I wanna shift something here. There's something not working so well for communities I care a lot about, and we need to do something different, but if I didn't have that more traditional experience, I'm not sure I'd be where I am right now and be able to understand what some of those issues were. I had to kinda go into the system to understand, oh, this isn't working for a lot of humans. Is there some is that at all resonate with your experience back

then? Absolutely. It's one of those things you have a feeling with Deep down inside and you try to logically push it out. At least I did. I tried to think, it's okay. I'm a woman of color. I'm changing things in my own way just by existing here. With And after a while, I think when you have a counternarrative to what you wanna do and who you wanna be in the world versus a narrative that's being pushed on you, it does wear away with After a while. And so for me, similarly to you, I realized early on that finances were directly correlated with health care and mental health.

With And in my head, I thought I was doing justice by being there, and I don't regret it. I think it was necessary for me to be who I am now. With But I think when you realize these things, you do have to make a plan to exit at some point, or else it'll take away out your soul.

Absolutely. So this kind of intersection of values and impact and money and wealth. So I can imagine our listeners like, alright. I think Angie like, I got a sense of who, with, talk who who's leading this conversation, who's who's guiding this to us into this terrain. It. So where do I even start? This is sort of like a complex mix of values and investing and money, and I wanna do better. I I'm starting to see the light bulb go off about I can have some scaled impact by, being more intentional about my money and creating more wealth and then thinking about the, the impact that that wealth happening is having, but I'm kind of at a loss to where to even start. What do you say to that person?

For me, I'm one of those folks where I if I there are too many details, I get bogged down, and I don't know if you're like this too. It can get really overwhelming. So unlike a lot of other strategies out there, they start with and they start throwing you stats on this is what you need to do, and these are the interest rates that you need to, you know, consider, and these are the fees you need to consider. And after a while, it just gets with so overwhelming that the average person who is typically in a position of power or feels as if they are pretty great and smart, they get with bogged down, overwhelmed, and they don't start. So I don't actually start with the technical things. What I like to start with is what we start with with any dream that we have, it. Whether it's a dream for entrepreneurship, whether it's a dream for a relationship, I think about it in terms of what is the dream that I have for my money? And I recommend that what you do first is you visualize, and visualization is such a powerful technique with that a lot of us have stopped doing it. We've stopped using our imaginations, and I think it's one of the best tools that we have.

With And so what I would recommend is you start by just visualizing what do you want your world to look like, and what do you want the world to look like, and how is this world going to with be financially created. So for me, when I think about a a visualization, I think of me living my best life. With There are palm trees around me. I don't know exactly where. Maybe it's California. Maybe it's the Caribbean. Maybe it's both. Who knows? But I just let myself dream.

With I I dream about having clients come to me and say, so this is how much, you know, I made with my investments, and this is what I'm doing with my investments. With And so what I want you to think about is how much do you wanna make to create the impact that you wanna have in your life and in the world? With And then I want you to come up with a number or a percentage about, well, I'm willing to make this all my money, and then I'm willing to make some of this actually other people's money, which is investing. You're with Utilizing other resources to make your money grow. And so think about it in terms of hiring. How much are you gonna actually do in the equation of your day to day with Business activities versus how much are you gonna have your team do. And when you think about money and investing, well, investing is just your team. With And so if you get a clear vision of what that looks like and then you think about, well, I want my money team to handle this part. It.

Well, now we can start thinking about what are the tangible things we could start attaching to that, and that's how I recommend folks starting. So you visualize it, And then after you visualize it, then we could come up with tangible things. How involved do you wanna be with your money? Do you want it to be like a 2nd job? Do you want it to be more passive? With Do you want it to give you money every single quarter or daily, or would you rather it come back with this big, with you know, lump sum to help you every couple of years. So once you start thinking about that, then we can start putting a Strategy together where we match your investments to your lifestyle and your

goals. I love that question. What is the dream I have for my money? So listeners maybe jot that down and start playing with that. Oh, what a great tip there, Angie. So we have, in general, 2 buckets of listeners. There's more, but to keep it simple, we have the social entrepreneurs and the early stage founders who many of whom are up and running, but they don't have, like, ginormous product market fit. They're getting by, but they probably have less on a month to month basis to invest. Right? So that's, group number 1.

And then we have group number 2 who are the leaders of social enterprises at scale. They're already got product market fit, pretty significant audiences, and they're thinking about really impacting the world it in a major way. If we wanted to get technical, we could call the 1st group about 55% of our listeners and the 2nd group about 45% of our listeners. So so give our listeners in those different positions, one a little earlier on the social entrepreneur journey and maybe has less overall to invest after they have this conversation with themselves about the dream they have for their money. One of them 1 group has more to invest, more to leverage then the other. In in those 2 scenarios, what would be the next step for each of those groups that you would recommend?

Absolutely. So let's with Call, and I'm not sure how this term resonates, but I have something called a wealth stack, and it shows you what you have to do as a person on your wealth journey matched which to what level you are at your wealth scale. And so let's call the 55% the hustlers, because they're really out here just trying to make it work. You're you're trying new things. You're putting your pedal your foot to the ground. You are making connections. You're talking to your people. You're doing all the things.

Typically, that's what happens when you're in the early stages of your business. And then the 45%, let's call them the strategizers. Because at this point, it. They know what works, and they're just trying to tweak how they can optimize. Does that sound like a fair assessment?

A 100%.

Okay. Perfect. So for our hustlers out there, one of the things you wanna think about is a lot of people go wrong by thinking, I am going to wait it till this time to start investing my money. And they think my business is my biggest investment and my truest investment, so I'm gonna put everything into my business. And the reality is for a lot of us in our businesses, the numbers don't look too good, friends. We know this. Most businesses fail after the 1st year, and with The numbers go down, and I'm not trying to say that all of us are going to fail or most of us will. I think that the average entrepreneur, They start probably about 8 businesses in their lifetime.

So I do think the statistic is skewed. Right? And so about half of our businesses will fail. With Yeah. That sounds about legit. And so what I want you to start thinking of, though, is because you don't have a actual employer, with And for a lot of us, we are doing this full time or we're hoping to leave our full time gig. Our employer takes care of our retirement. Our employer builds the safety net called a four zero one k. Our employer builds a safety net called, you know, tax education credits and all these things that come with Working full time.

Typically speaking, entrepreneurs are so slow at starting that and maintaining it. In our head, we have this hustle mentality thinking that if something happens, we're just gonna hustle extra hard and make more money. The reality is that if something were to happen, with You're not gonna have the wherewithal to make the best educated decision, and you're gonna wish that you had taken a moment in the past it. To create something, to have you be present in the problem versus trying to figure it out on multiple levels. And what I want you to do is I want you to start small. I want you to say that for every, you know, portion of money that comes in through your business, yes, we're reinvesting for the with Yes. We're putting it back into, you know, our own paychecks, but I want you to say, hey. I'm gonna put 10% for future me.

With And that's the way I did it. Even though I knew that I wanted to reinvest in my business, even though I knew that I was really stretched thin, I always thought to myself, with How would I feel in this moment if I knew I had an extra 6 figures laying around an investment account? This moment would feel a lot better. It. What can I do to help my future self create a future moment like that? And it would be 10% of everything I earned, I'd start investing in it, it. And I'd invest in the things that I used, but not just that I used on a basic necessities level. I mean, of course, deodorant and toilet issue will always sell, but what I did was I started investing in the things that made my business possible. So if we're running Facebook ads, I invested in Facebook. With If I had a PayPal account to receive money, I invested in PayPal and Visa and Mastercard because people pay me through Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal.

It. If I was doing my taxes, I'd invest in Intuit. And so that's a bit of a deeper level strategy that you can do. With And for some of us, we might think that we don't have enough to invest, but you can use platforms like Robinhood with And, stockpile or stash to buy partial shares, which again was not possible when I started working at Goldman Sachs. This is that part about accessibility. So with So if you're hearing this, I don't think it's by chance, but you can just start small, $100. You know, I actually go on TV and talk about you can start an investment strategy with $100 or less, it. And I fully believe it because that's what I started with when I was making 40 k or more.

Nice. So that's the 1st group. What about the 2nd group that what has more resources and has a business that's also, oftentimes, if they were to get it evaluated, that number would be very significant.

Absolutely. So for our strategizers, I don't want you to strategize and outthink your way of how to make this possible. With A lot of times when we're at the strategize level, we have a lot of pent up emotion about, man, I wish I did this sooner. And it's like, man, if I knew what I did, I I wish I just did it sooner. When you finally sit down with someone and they go through your numbers, it. They're gonna tell you, oh, well, this is how much you'll have to invest now to catch up. And you're gonna sit there and think, man, I wish I did it sooner because they're gonna say, you could have invested half of this with Had you just started earlier? Of course, none of us have a time machine to go back in time, so that might leave you feeling deflated, and what's the point? And so for our strategizers, I know that we can always strategize on our business, but I want you to start thinking about you are at the point where you probably realize you cannot keep this up with Forever. Your business and your business endeavors has taken a lot of sacrifice, and you're probably coming up on that moment where you're thinking about either starting a new business, with a new calling or just taking time off to enjoy the fruits of your labor.

But somewhere in the back of your head, you might be thinking, but who's gonna go work? How is this money coming in when I'm not on? So for our for our strategizers, I want you to start thinking about the same thing that we said for our hustlers, with But for you, I want you to start thinking about it on a grander scale. I want you to start thinking about how can I use my power and influence to create my investment decisions? And I'll give you a quick story and a quick example of how this works for me. So I never recommend someone even if you have the disposal income. You know, I've got clients who come to me with a 100 k or 200 k in savings, with Just savings, not earning any type of decent interest, and they're like, I'm ready to go. I'm gonna put a 100,000 in this. And I say, well, hold up now. Let's not do that Because that's like you trusting an elementary school person with a whole house. Why would you do this? You already know the condition of the house you're gonna come back to.

With Crayons everywhere, chocolate everywhere, not a good idea. This is how you are in the beginning phases of your journey. You're almost like a baby giraffe is what I call it. It. So don't even though you have the money, don't spend it just yet. What we wanna do is we wanna start small. So if you can trust yourself with example a1000, Well, then you could trust yourself with 10,000, a 100, so on and so forth. So what I want you to do is, and again, sample the story that I'm bringing in As I recently started thinking about what would happen if there were people who can be impacted by my work without having to necessarily purchase.

And for some of us, yes, I have, you know, automated classes and boot camps, with But to work 1 on 1 with me, you know, it's serious. And so if I want to build your wealth and have it increase, you know, 30, 40, 50 fold, it. It's a commitment, and I wanna see that you're committed. But I thought about $40,000 inch would no way would she be able to work with me right now. With And so I've been thinking about a bigger picture. How can I approach this? And so I've started working with organizations to create community initiatives it. That can start teaching what I have to teach. And the organizations that I work with, an example would be, I'm I invest in funds.

And if you're not familiar with funds, with They have a hodgepodge of things that you might not necessarily think to first invest in, but they're there. So one of the funds that I invest in, with It has really great companies and companies I'm not really that that much of a fan of, but here we are. One of those companies it. Happens to be McDonald's. It's in the fund. It's a top performing company. I can't get out of investing in it because it's a byproduct of a bigger fund that I do enjoy. With So now I have to think about how do I karmically balance this out? So now I'm gonna go to McDonald's.

Yes. I own it as an investor, but now I can go to McDonald's and say, hey. With To people of color and folks who are part of a socioeconomic class, you guys are a little bit predatory. You know? Not the best word, but It's true. That's who their true demographic is. That's who will pay for food like that. Well, how can we show them that we appreciate them and love them with and create an investment program for them. So now I'm actually making McDonald's do better work, making me feel better about my investment, with and also being a part of the bigger picture.

So you can actually create this when you have more power. You can start navigating these deals. You can start investing in investment deals to put with properties in disadvantaged communities and give them fair housing practices that are actually fair, and you can do that with your money. With And while you're out doing your own regular 9 to 5 thing, your money is impacting and creating the legacy that you actually want. And so for the strategizers, with What I want you to do is start thinking about, if I don't have to do it all and my money can still create the change I want, who can I invest in to make that change happen?

Wonderful. I love that you're talking about that, Ant. And one of the things that I have been learning about, this is a little bit besides, outside of this topic, but I'll just reference it. Recently, I got recruited, and I said yes. And I'm doing some consulting with a group here in New Mexico called New Mexico Angels. It's the largest, and in some ways, it's kind of the only early stage investment. Think of the term angel investor. It's where people who are interested in high growth, high return investing gather in New Mexico.

And it's been a fascinating learning journey because I've been on the entrepreneur side for 16 years, and suddenly I am in these networks and in these conversations on daily basis with people who have a lot to invest and are looking for return. So I'm just referencing that to say a conversation that's having that's happening is when you have these resources and you wanna invest them it, and the funds, the places where it's oftentimes kinda pooled resources. Some of the things you might find are connected to your values and some of them aren't. You use the example of McDonald's. That's a really complicated situation as an investor. It. So a couple of questions related to that, Anj, is, 1, first of all, how do you find out when you're in a pooled resource like a fund, who's even in it? And in addition to that example of McDonald's, when you find companies that maybe aren't as aligned with your values as you want, how do you balance return on your investment that you're looking to get. And that values thing that are so important to our listeners, sometimes there's some tension there.

Any suggestions about that attention in addition to that great example of, like, how you might push back on McDonald's.

Mhmm. This is a great question, and I love it because this is, with I think something that we have in the narrative all the time. So when I think of values versus return, with because I think this is what we're talking about. I think about the role of what my money has and the multifaceted role it can play. With And I think about this money that I give here, is this for Charity Impact Philanthropy? With And is this money that I give here for an investment? Now this is really going down to the expectation. Because when I give money towards Charity Impact Philanthropy, the expectation is that I don't actually get anything in return. It. When I give money towards an investment, the expectation is that I do get a return because that is the fundamental basis of an investment, And so I treat the 2 very differently.

So if there's something that's gonna be, you know, my 3rd rail, then heck no. I'm not even touching it. I'm not touching prison. With You know, I'm not touching these certain things that I just I can't. It's just a part of me that cannot contribute to that picture. With I'm not even gonna touch it. If I look into a fund and I see that it's there, and you can look into a fund and just simply Google, Holdings in blah blah blah fund. You'll see it.

So an example would be holdings in SPY, and SPY is a fund that tracks the s with The S and P 500, and it'll pull up a list of the 500 companies that it's invested in. And it'll also show you the percentage of how much they're invested in with compared to, say, another bigger part of the slice that they're invested in. So Google is really one of our best friends for any type of investment research. It. And then based on that, you can decide if you still wanna be a part of the fund or not. But back to the point about values versus return, I think to myself, well, I can invest in something that I'm not necessarily tied to it in the sense that it is completely values aligned, but I'm also not it. Horribly disappointed in it because it's a part of our life. Right? I'm gonna buy clothes at some point.

I have kids. I have, you know, with New things that I wanna do. I'm gonna buy clothes. I'm not really happy about it entirely, but I do feel really good at it. You know? It makes me feel really great. So I'm gonna buy the clothes, with And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna invest in that company that I think will do really well, and then without example, Lululemon. And then I'll it. I'll take the earnings that I made off of that, and then I'm gonna dedicate it to a cause that I actually want to put in.

That is going to be my philanthropic charity giving bucket where there are no strings attached. And so that's the way I look at it. I think that if I'm responsible with my money, with there are certain investment vehicles that you can do for tax benefits where you create an entire investment vehicle, and you can have it as a tax benefit, and you can distribute it with 2 not for profits and charitable organizations, and that's what I do. And so I have more power with With my investments and my money growing, I think of it as average not for profit. They don't have the ability to invest and use strategies to make their money grow. I'm a little bit better at that. With So how about I do it on your behalf, and then I'll give it back to you with the

interest that I earned? Love that. So I hear, like, 3 categories. 1 is, like, with no way. Hard stop. Not going there. Use the example of, prisons which are in a lot of funds. Many people don't know that. It.

For me, it would be also like oil companies. Just, nope. Not doing it. Right? There's the, like, okay. Maybe not as much which values here as I would like, but it's I can live with this, and then the super highly, this is really exciting values aligned companies. And when there's maybe a little bit more of that middle bucket, then you are would like with to really think about looking at those returns and how can you take some of those returns and really think it into impact in a very robust way. It's such a great, strategy there, and thanks for sharing that in. So let's do this.

With In a moment, I wanna hear what happy investor method looks like right now as a company, some of who you're working with, where you're going, some of the things you've learned doing this work for so long. It. We're gonna get to that when we come back, but for right now, I just wanna take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsor. Are you facing 1 or more important decisions in your impact business? And you'd like an experienced thought partner to develop a plan with about how to proceed in the complex times we're living. But you don't feel the need for an extended coaching or consulting contract that's gonna cost you many 1,000 of dollars. You're looking for an affordable, targeted, and time efficient type of support. With through paulzellizer.com, I offer a strategy session package. These packages are ideal for entrepreneurs who are facing 1 to 3 immediate decisions, it, like how to increase your positive impact, fine tune your marketing strategies to get more results for less effort, launch a new product or service successfully, it or refine your pricing structure so it's both inclusive and provides you with a great quality of life.

You can find out more by clicking below, with and thank you so much for listening to this podcast. So welcome back, everybody. And to the 2nd part of the show, we like to talk about, joke about putting on our social entrepreneur glasses. So if you just put on your social entrepreneur glasses and just look at happy investor method right now. What's on the ground? Talk to us about team size, maybe some of the programs you we have number of clients you're serving, just as much information as you're willing to share to our very, you know, detail oriented audience.

You should see the smile on my face right

now. You know, people tease me. Listeners write in. Paul, you know, you only said the word granular 3 times in that this

episode. Yes. It's it's almost like come into my walk in closet and look at it. And you all know what our most of our walk in closets look like or just closets, period. A hot mess. And so it's not a hot mess, with But I do think that we're always more pressurized on ourselves, and so the Happy Investor Method has been this company for about with We're going on 8 years. Now this isn't my 1st company. It's probably about my 3rd or 4th.

One other company still is in existence, and the other is just, you know, with Took too much out of me and sunset. And this company got founded off of the premise that when I started investing, I had no idea where it would take me, with And my investments eventually, took care of myself and my dad when I was his caretaker, and he was ill, and he did eventually pass away. And And that's when I was just like, holy crap. I didn't know that I'd need these investments. So at the time, I was talking about social media. And, you know, when you know a truth and It's like a real truth, and it feels as if I need to let people know about this because it just matters so dearly. With I couldn't talk about social media and tech anymore. I had to start shifting that dialogue to, no, we need to own this stuff because we don't know when we'll need it at with Some point, it's so real.

So I started the Happy Investor Method while I had another business, and I thought initially it was gonna be a hobby product project. With And then I realized that I thought I was the only one who grew up, you know, disadvantaged whose parents didn't talk about investments. I thought I was the only one out here trying to figure it out. With And then all of a sudden, other folks started standing up saying me too. Can you show me too? And eventually, the happy investor method it. Started making more revenue than the social media. And I think one of the reasons why is because the method, it incorporates with a little bit of that visualization, logic, common sense, and I don't over complicate things. And because I am neurodivergent, I've got with ADHD as well as, multiple forms of dyslexia.

I need things to be crystal clear, so I explain it in a very crystal clear way. With So it's been really fun because you have coaches, and you hire people to help you make this thing grow it. To the vision that you have for it. And I do have this vision for, you know, our company to grow into a multibillion dollar company or a very high millions. With And, eventually, I do want it to get acquired because to me, this is my asset, and I'd have other work in the world to do, but I want it to be acquired by the right company, a company that moves 1,000,000,000,000 of dollars, and they don't have an investment arm. And so this is kinda me speaking it out into the existence, and if you are that company, with Let's talk. But after a while, it gets hard. You know, running a business, and I am in the 1% of women, people of color to have businesses that make what we make, and it's hard.

I don't think on the outside How people realize that this is like a quarter by quarter commitment. And it's like every quarter, you're doing it, you're doing the marketing, you're doing the strategizing, you're making sure that People you're delivering a quality product that people paid for, which is, above all, my biggest priority, and then you're also combating, the market. So when the market goes down, with Our numbers go down even though people don't know that's when the best the best gets the best. That's when you're getting all the sales. And so to honestly combat with that, with I've shifted to doing more corporate contracts and then doing b to c. Before, it was a 100% b to c out here for the people. With Then I started realizing that, but wouldn't it be amazing for corporate for me to be brought into corporations and start creating change from inside with And having that ripple outward, how can I do that for having corporation sponsor community events? And so right now, we're looking at 50% b to c, 50% a to b and how do I write a book to, again, empower the masses. And so this is what the company looks like.

There's heavy investments, it. To get traditionally published, which is what I wanna do, and I have to pay for, an agent to help me find an agent with Because I don't have the connections, and sometimes that's what we have to do. Right? And so I'm always in this tug and pull of, what am I doing for the business? What am I doing for future Anj? It. I'm currently working on the year 2025, and so everything that I do now, I'm thinking it's falling into place so that 2025 can be this epic year. With And everything that I have right now, it's because Ange from 3 or 4 years ago thought about, what am I doing in 2023 and 2024? It. So right now, I'm working on 2025 for the business and personal, and I'd like to say that it's all roses, but it is roses. With There are beautiful fragranced, flowers, but I will say it definitely has its thorns.

That transition from I certainly relate. I'm doing more corporate consulting and organizational consulting as well. With that transition from a 100% b to c. If you're new here, b to c means business to customer, and now you're 50% b to b. That translated means business to business or consulting with businesses or organizations, instead of focusing on 1 client, 1 consumer at time. What what what was that transition like? What did you learn? What were some of the, like, oops, ground the gears here? How if if somebody's listening and they're like, I wanna do that, or at least I wanna consider that. What what did you learn in that

process? Oh, I'm still in it, so this is definitely a

Good. We like the messy. Right? You know, as opposed to, Yeah. I've been doing that for 50 years, and it's all smooth. That's boring. Right?

Yeah. I mean, true. It is boring because you're like, okay. Lucky you. Magic wand. It. And so I actually fell into it because I did my numbers. And so this is where it's important to look at your numbers, and I did my numbers from last year and the year before.

With And 25% of my revenue came from corporate clients, whether it was universities, small businesses with who are entrepreneurs who wanted to train their teams, and they decided to train their teams. And I do this bundle where it's like, if you go out for your team and train your team on personal finance, it. I'm gonna do you even better and, do a personal strategy for you, and it's all a tax write off because it's all business. And so that happened where people just started coming to me, it. And it was organic. So I learned from after starting this company that if a lot of people start coming to you for things, you should make it a actual thing. With And then I started putting intentionality to it. And I thought that, hey.

25% of the business came me doing nothing. With I can totally make 50% of the business come in the same way. Right? A market wants it, and that's where I was hugely mistaken. I would love to say that the assumption was correct, but once I started investing and I bought the corporate client coach, I had, like, 2 or 3 of them, to be honest, because I really wanted it. With And then I realized that there are the higher ups that be that take forever to approve a contract, and, with You know, a client will say, here's my credit card, or I wanna work with you. Let's do it now. Right? But for corporations, with 1 person might feel this way, but you really need to get 5 people to feel this way, and that can take time. And so that's something I wish I knew initially, it.

That when I started out on this venture in January, that, you know, over months months later, it does not look where I want it to look. Like, there are things in the pot, with But sometimes they'll go, sometimes they want. And of course, I'm, like, super excited about the prospect, but I had realized that I do have to hold the energy of with vision a lot stronger when going to corporate because you put so much with Emphasis on what your work can do for an organization, and if it happens, that's amazing. But if it doesn't, with It's even more than what you put into the vision for just 1 client. It gets amplified 20,000 times more. With And so that's something that I actually have to grapple with, and I have to stay with my commitment. Because it could be really easy for me to, right now, go back to 70% b to c, But I still stand with my commitment of people get to have access to this through their employers, and employers get to offer this not just for the tax benefits, with But to also let their know their people know that they care. And when their people care and when their people know that they care, business runs more smoothly.

With You know, people think about finances more than any other thought during the day. So what do you think your team is doing? You think they're thinking about you and your business, or are they thinking about them and their personal finances. So when I get into those moments of I shouldn't do this anymore, I think back to the commitment, and then I Hike up, you know, big girl panties on, and then I go and I send that pitch. I go speak at a conference. I meet the sponsors, with And I talk to them about this is what we get to create together. So I'm in it, and as you can hear, my voice tone change is a little shakier, But this is real. This is what it's like.

I so appreciate that. And, yeah, we're recording with the video off, but if with you. If I have my video on, you'd see my head shaking, because I very much have been in a similar process. This isn't about me, but the shakiness, I just wanna, like, acknowledge it. It's really different. And I've been doing it for 16 years. I don't even you know, I haven't done the math, but you've been working, you know, b to for a really long time, Anjan, and going into that more corporate, you know, I'm I'm talking to an organization it that has a 1,000 employees and a very fast growth organization. And that's a different scenario than a solo entrepreneur.

Right? It. They're both good. And at this phase of my career, there's there's a level of impact. If we get a 1,000 employee company that who wants to be 2,000 in the next 3 years. Doing certain things, the scale of the impact is is it's really hard to work with a a 1,000 solopreneurs. That it can be done, but that's complicated. So from a impact, I'm being drawn into, and yet, like, it. I don't have that kind of experience.

I've been solo or the executive director of a nonprofit with, like, 5 people, 3 of them part time for 30 years. Right? So so I've just I'm just, like, appreciating your willingness to share and that shakiness in your voice. I just didn't want you to be alone there. Like, I hear you loud and clear.

So I have a question for you. What are you gonna do?

With what am I gonna do?

And Yeah. What are you gonna do? What's the plan? Because if you you're gonna help a 1,000 and support a 1,000 plus folks, How do you approach that?

Yeah. That's a great question. Part of what I'm doing, and it's beyond the scope of this, this, but I'll share because you did. Part of what I'm doing is learning from people who've been at this a long time. Another part of what I'm doing is, it. We're about to record next week an episode with some folks who are really skilled. Other impact entrepreneurs, we're actually starting an impact podcast network, and part of that is to scale the amount of stories that you know, like, if I have a great interview with you, I can it, pass you on to some of the other hosts who are also very interested in impact and money and things like that so we can help folks like yourself, but another selfishly or or in terms of my personal mission. And part of what I'm doing is building my network.

Some of those folks have much more experience than I do consulting with organizations, so I'm building up my team in a strategic partnership kind of a way to get ready for some of these initiatives. I'm able to, mostly through this podcast, get started in conversations, but sometimes I'm hitting a wall because when you look at my resume, it's pretty, their micro businesses, solos and threes and fives and 20 person, organizations. And my personal experience consulting with thousands of, you know, employee companies is fairly small. So I'm creating strategic partnerships through something I'm known for, social entrepreneur coaching an impact podcast space, create the strategic partnerships, and then I can say, look. I got a strategic partnership with person x, y, and z listeners. It. I'm literally recording an episode next week with some of these folks, so I don't more to come who they are, but they're awesome humans with much more experience than I do. It, but I have a bit more visibility to get into the conversation.

And as a team, I think we're, you know, we're highly values aligned, but they have, more strength in places where I'm weak. That that would be one top level answer.

Strength in places where you are weak. I love that. And I think that's a principle we can carry out throughout our entire life.

With A 100%. Yeah.

Yeah. I do, actually. That's how investing works and hiring an investment coach. It's like, we got this. I need to borrow someone's strength. And when I look at someone to help me with my health, it's like, I'm not as good as this as I could be. I'm a go get someone's strength and lean on them. So I like that.

It. Yeah. And one of the things we talked about before we hit record, and I still am excited to do this, but got crazy busy. I wanna introduce you because I I'm hoping it could be. It. Fingers crossed, but a big shout out to Carbon Collective. It's one of the intros I promised you, and I didn't forget. I will do it.

Life be life

ins. But listeners, you can listen to the interview with Zach Stine of Carbon Collective. This is a I'm not allowed to say what they're gonna make in the future, but I am a scalp full disclosure. But, if you look back, I've done better with the market returns over the years of the 3 years the company's been in existence, and it's a highly climate optimized way of investing, both for individuals, but I'm a scout for more on the corporate side, and I just feel like values. Oh, if you all were to hit it it. I can't help but wonder what might happen there. I think there's something brewing there, so I will make that intro. It, but the the I I hope if it's not them, I hope there's organizations like them that can help you have a little more ease.

And when you start having those conversations, there's, you know, you don't have to reinvent the wheel that that there are likely values aligned organizations that might be able to help. I'm certainly working on that at this phase of, like, getting out of my solo and just looking at who else in the bases better at something that I'm not so good at, and how can we find win win win ways of collaborating because the world's on fire, and I wanna move needles more quickly than that solo I gotta figure it all out or make it all up myself, invent it, create it, it, build that scale of, like, I know how to work with 100,000 person companies. Nope. I don't, but I'm good at what I do. It, so I'm hoping that us as an impact space, when we get shaky, can look around and say, who knows more about this than I do, and is there a way we can create win win solutions? That's it. That's a more recent shift for me. In the past, I think I've more defaulted to solo, and I have to create it or grow it alone. With something we can learn as in as entrepreneurs even in our decades of, you know, experience.

Maybe we can learn you know, old dogs can learn new tricks, I hope. Absolutely. With so talk to us, where is happy investor method going? You've kinda hinted at it, and we're talking around it, but you hinted at a book. You you let us know that you're doing more organization and corporate consulting. Just give us a sense as you're looking ahead in 2025 or, you know, 3 years, 5 years down the road. Where is Happy Investor Method going?

So right now, I do look at it as an investment, an with Investment in everything, because that it takes time for my kids, my family. It's my work and all that, but I am really great about not Conflating my identity into my business. And remember when I said that you have to think about what Has a certain purpose. You know? And so for me, I thought about it long and hard, and I said, is this company, the with The purpose of this company for me to get my validation and self worth, and it's not. And so as it's the purpose of this company is to educate with the world, empower the world, liberate the world, and also do it for myself and the people I love. So, therefore, it's an investment too. With And as a result, I'm structuring this to not just be an investment that I can one day sell, but also to make sure that I am okay outside of this with In the event that that does happen, and so I'm kind of building 2 things at the same time. And so it's really interesting because we with I wanna make sure that whatever I sell, it doesn't get diluted.

And so for a lot of our students, they get really great results with our strategies. With You know, I I had a call with one of our students just yesterday, Mary, and she's a 66 year old woman, and she has a 25% return on average, it. Which is from 1 year of learning. And when you look at what her overall performance has been, she's got companies that she's invested in through our method it. That's making 75% and 78%. So she's doing exceptional. And I also think about, well, with knowledge comes a responsibility to share it. So with So what we're doing is we're creating a certification program so a lot of our students can do that some of that more 1 on 1 work and impact their community, with The ones that have proven themselves to have really great success.

And so a certification program is on the line, in the future. The with Book is on the line in the future too. So when we approach our corporate contracts, a lot of folks, they love having me speak. It's really Empowering, and so I would love to leave them with the actual book that they can use later. So this is also why we're creating a book. Everything for me is extremely intentional. With And where the company is going is I would love for it to be a household name to let people know that there's an easier way to have more joy and grace with your money, it that you don't need to outsource it all the time, especially if it's something that is so vital to who you are in making the world you want visible. With And I'm also really excited about collaborations.

And so being an investor puts you in the room. And I just recently spoke at the Urban League Conference. And if you're not it. Familiar with the Urban League Conference Urban League. It's a social justice, for people of color, specifically black people created in 19 twenties, with Heavily involved in the civil rights movement and still around. And so I love how intentional that organization is, and I just learned this with Speaking there at this weekend on a panel on economic growth, I love how intentional it is about who can I plant in the room to advocate for us when the conversations are happening in the room? And when you're an investor, you get to be at these stakeholder meetings. You get to raise your hand and say, why are you doing this? It. So that's also a different ploy and plot.

You know? Maybe I'm investing in something that I'm not ridiculously a fan of, it. But I do know it's important for them to see me in that room and for me to use my voice in that room and me investing in it as a ticket to create bigger change. So as I'm creating this movement, it. Most of my people are are do gooders. Most of my folks realize the urgency around shifting the planet and what we're here to do, and I'm just here to give you, you know, with Another another tool in your belt that you can actually build a future with. So that's what we're doing. So definite, like, together we're gonna, You know, take over the world slash diabolical plan, but, you know, this is what I like to pontificate about at night.

Well, I love that you came on the show today and pontificated with us, and we have a lot a do gooder or 2 in our within, including yours truly. I could hang out with you all day, and then I know you're super busy and our listeners are as well. We will put it in the show notes, listeners, the Happy Investor Method site, some of the other links that we talked about today. So do know, it. There will be those resources right there in the show notes. And if there was something you were hoping we were gonna get to today and we haven't touched on it yet, whether there's something you wanna leave our listeners with as we start to say goodbye. What would that be?

Just to let you know that your money has power, and with It's a lot easier to make it work without you than to do all the work to make it work in relationship with you. And if this is a conversation that you wanna talk more about, it. Feel free to reach out. Not super big on social, so go to happy investor method.com. Get in our inbox. I send you love notes it your money in your inbox, and I'm really transparent about the journey and what we're here to do. So please feel free to reach out and let me know how this impacted you if any way at all. And best of luck.

With I need you to stay in there. I need you to keep pushing on the good fight because your voice is needed on the bigger playing field.

And thank for the important work you do, and thank you for sharing your experience with our listeners today.

Thank you for having me.

So, again, check out the show notes, folks. You know what we do here. We amplify. Tell your friends about the great work that Ant and team what happy investor method are doing. Show notes have the links below. Before we go, just wanna remind you, we love, I mean, with listener suggested topics and guests. I guess I'm one of the weird podcast host that actually likes this and constantly is asking, who do you wanna listen to? Why is that weird? I don't know. But I have talked to my colleagues who are hosts, and they're like, no.

I I never do that. It. So I'm a weirdo. I hope you will, humor me. I want you to, you know, help say this is a story that as a community, we can amplify. It. So if you have an idea of a topic or a guest that you think would be great for an interview, please go to the Awarepreneur's website. And on our contact page.

We have 3 simple criteria. We try to be really transparent about the kinds of stories we're looking for. Take a look at those, and if it feels like a fit, with send your ideas on it. So for now, I just wanna say thank you so much for listening. Please take really good care in these intense with times, and thank you for all the positive impact that you're working for in our world. It