In this empowering episode of Money Talk With Tiff, Tiffany Grant welcomes the dynamic Brieanna Lightfoot Smith to delve into the crucial topic of strategic spending for small business owners. As a seasoned entrepreneur, Brianna brings her insightful approach to making smart investments that fuel business growth without breaking the bank.

Brieanna kicks things off with a counterintuitive tip that will have you rethinking your startup strategy – hint: it involves your business website and what you really need to focus on instead. She then unveils her transformative framework that categorizes business expenses into essentials, opportunities, and aspirations, guiding you through financial commitment stages as your business evolves.

Whether you're a product-based business owner eyeing inventory management or a content creator looking to upgrade your tech game, this episode is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone aiming to make prudent financial decisions while chasing their business dreams.

Remember, it's not just about spending money; it's about investing where it counts. Let's get to the money!

About Our Guest

Brieanna Lightfoot Smith believes a peaceful home and a purposeful brand can coexist. As a business owner, productivity coach, and systems strategist, she loves helping women, especially fellow moms, gain clarity and confidence. As someone who passed out in her car at 7 months pregnant, she's extremely passionate about helping people create a life they love without burning out in the process. You can connect with Brieanna on her website at brandsbybrie.com.

Connect with Brieanna

Instagram: @blightfootsmith

B. Light Podcast: http://brandsbybrie.com

(Use code 'aspirations' for a special discount)

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Website: https://moneytalkwitht.com

Facebook: Money Talk With Tiff 

Twitter: @moneytalkwitht 

Instagram: @moneytalkwitht 

LinkedIn: Tiffany Grant

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Copyright 2024 Money Talk With Tiff

Intro/Outro: You know what it is. That's right. It's time to talk

money with your money nerd and financial coach.

Now tighten those purse strings and open those ears.

It's the money talk with tiff. podcast.

Hey, everyone. I am so excited because I have

Brianna Lightfoot Smith on the line now. Brianna is here to talk

to us about something that's really interesting and something

that small business owners or aspiring business

owners kind of struggle with at times, and that's making sure

that you spend your money on the right investments, so

making sure that you're purchasing things that have

some lifeline to it and not just throwing money in the

wind. So, hey, Brianna, how are you?

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Hey, Tiffany, how are you? Thank you so much for

having me.

Yes, my pleasure. So let's just hop right

in. First and foremost, let's just talk about

some of the things that business owners spend on

when they first get started, that you're like,

no.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Yes. I tell people it's

ironic because,

when I first started my company, I was doing

website development and I was also

doing social media management. And I think

that something that's so ironic is now

I tell people, I'm like, hey, you don't need a business

website to get started. You just need a way

to, accept payments from people, and you need to

be able to track the people that are coming

in so that you're able to manage those leads. Right.

So I'm like, okay, you can really get started with something like

acuity. You can get started with just PayPal

invoicing. the reason I say that is

because after having worked with

dozens, if not hundreds of small businesses, what I

saw was that a lot of times people would hire me

to develop their websites, right? And

then their business model would change. They

would do maybe an accelerator program

where they were able to get more clarity around their ideal

customer, or they would do,

kind of an intensive. Maybe they work with a

coach. especially in New Orleans when I was,

working with small businesses, a lot of them would participate in

these incubators. And by the end of the program,

whether it be eight weeks or twelve weeks, their

business model had completely shifted. But they already

invested this money into

a website that talked about this offer that they no

longer have. So I really believe

that, your website is so

essential when you get to a point where you know

for sure what it is that you offer. But if you're

just kind of experimenting with some things,

save your money in the beginning, get clear on what your

offer is, and in the meantime, in between

time, use things like payPal invoicing, use

stripe, use calendar, schedulers to

be able to accept you.

Gotcha. And that makes so much sense. And as

someone that loves to dabble in

tech and spend way too much money

in doing things and redoing things, I can

definitely resonate with that. There's so many

half finished projects that I have out there that I

was like, oh, I want to go this direction. And then, oh,

actually, never mind.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: right, domain names purchased for days and you're like,

what was this one even for? I don't even remember.

Exactly. So let's go

into your framework because I feel like it

is, very important for these business owners

and aspiring business owners to kind of categorize these

expenses in a way that will best benefit them.

I love your approach, of let's get to the money first.

So when they're thinking about these expenses, how should

they categorize them?

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Yes. So whenever I have a class

called building a business on a budget, right, because we've

all been there, and especially if you're somebody

who maybe you're married, right? And your spouse

is like you doing what with what you need to be

able to say no. Okay, listen, it's not going to take a lot for us to get

started. So I like to categorize things into

three categories. I like to share with my

students that you should look at your business expenses

as essential. You should look at

opportunities and then your aspirations, right? So

your essential things are what do you need to actually

be able to make money from this? sometimes that's going to

be tech, right? But it doesn't have to be expensive

tech. We have computers as

phones, right? So people who are even saying, oh, I want

to start a YouTube channel, baby, let's get consistent with your

phone first. Before you say I need the latest

Nikon or I need the latest canon, this is really going

to be the thing that makes my content top tier

because you want to be able to get consistent first.

Then when it comes to your opportunities, as

you're starting to gain that traction, that's where you might say,

okay, we're going to upgrade to maybe a better

camera. not because I'm trying to

become like a short film producer,

but because I'm m even maxing out the storage on my

phone, right? So it becomes an opportunity. And then once

you've, matched that and maybe now you're at a place where you're

monetizing your content for a YouTube channel,

now you're looking into the aspiration section

of your finances where it's like, no, I can actually invest

in not only really great equipment, but now

maybe I'm going to start investing in a

editor to,

take my YouTube videos and also

export them for different formats

for TikTok or for Instagram.

Right. So I gave a specific example because I'm the kind

of person who I'm like, okay, show me what

that looks like. And so to use the example of a

YouTube creator, your essential would be, you need some

way to film. That could just be your phone, and you're already paying

that monthly bill. Your opportunity may be, okay, I'm going to

get a camera that is either used

or, it's just not as expensive. Maybe I'm going to

look out on those. Like I know a lot of people did for Black

Friday and Cyber Monday. Right. I'm going to grab one of those

cameras. And then your opportunity, I mean, your

aspirations would be, now I'm going to get the best equipment

that I can get, and I'm also going to invest in a team.

Yes, I love that. And now that you put it like that,

I'm thinking back towards the money talk with Tiff

podcast. And when I got started, it was a

$20 mic from Amazon. and then I just

worked my way up to this $1,000 set up

that I have. But it took time. It took at least

two to three years or so to get to that point.

And I have an editor now when I was editing my

own episodes, so I can totally relate

to how that kind of comes

about, as you grow and as you learn more about

your business. Had I waited until I was able

to get $1,000 set up and all of

this and all of that, and then started the podcast,

it probably wouldn't have made sense just in case I

didn't like it. What if you get all of that

equipment and you don't like doing the podcast or you don't like

doing whatever it is that you put all this money into?

And so I completely agree with you there.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: That's awesome. Yeah, that's a perfect example, too.

Yes. So let's talk a little bit, because

I know we have a variety of different business

owners out there, so I also want to give

a product example, too. So how would this

look in a product based business, if they wanted to

do this framework as well?

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: That's a great question. So when it comes to

product based business, my husband actually has a product based

business, and he does apparel

and for him, when it came to

essentials, that's one

area where I would say having a website

probably makes sense very early on, but it doesn't have to be an

expensive one, right? So you need a way to sell

your products. People may say, oh, well, you can just

start with pop up shops. But the things that people, I feel like, don't

understand about pop up shops is that you're going to need that

inventory typically on site. And so

you're going to have a higher cost

of goods right in the beginning if you're trying

to have at least 25 products at your

first pop up shop. So what's really nice

for, a product based business is that you can do something like

drop shipping, right? there are websites

like printful and printify that

will allow you to

upload your designs directly into their platform,

and then they'll ship the items out for you.

What's really nice about that is that you don't have to manage

inventory, right? You don't have to

worry about like, oh, I ordered too much of

this. You're able to just kind of have, okay, I

got one order in and I'm sending one order out. So the

essential for a product based business would absolutely be a place where

you can sell your products. And typically, it

would make sense to start with a

website just to make it ease of use. But what's

also really awesome is that we're in an age

now where Instagram, makes their

posts shoppable, right? And you can upload products directly

into Facebook marketplace or

know their platform, in order for you to be able

to purchase things that way. So that would be an

example that I would give. The aspiration

would know, potentially your own store

at some point where you're like, okay, I've done this on my

own and I'm going to expand. I even think about

a, friend of mine. She has a, I guess you would just call

it a sweets business, right? She does cookies and she does

cakes. And when she first got started,

she, had it where she would just send you an

invoice for your product,

for your cupcakes or your cookies.

You would pay the invoice, and then she had it where you

could pick the items up directly from her, or she would ship

it to you. And then the nice thing was, as she's

grown, that's when she really developed out her

website. And then now she's looking at getting a

flagship store, by 2026.

So she's really had some awesome

traction. But she was willing to kind of,

there's a scripture that says, do not despise small beginnings.

And that was really her. She was like, listen, I'm going to send

you this invoice for this half a dozen order of cookies, and

then we'll keep growing from there.

That is amazing. And congrats to the friend, if you're

listening. Congrats to you. but I love

this framework, essentials, opportunities, and

aspirations, because we talk a lot on the podcast

about budgeting, and it is very

similar in how we break down our budget.

When you think about your essentials, you're thinking about

the roof over your head, the food in your

belly, all of those things. And then your

opportunities, those might be like your cell phone bill. So

it's not like stuff that are essential to live,

but it's stuff that you might want. And then the

aspirations might be when

you're looking at, oh, I want to go out with

my friends or those types of things. And

so I definitely see how there

is a congruency there between

your framework and not only applying it to

business, but also to your personal, expenses

as well. So I really appreciate that.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Yeah, my pleasure.

So let's, talk a little bit, though,

about your course that you had

mentioned. because I want to give people a little sneak

peek of what they may get, before we wrap

up, of course. Don't give it all away, but, just a little sneak

peek of what they would get with your course.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Yes. So, inside of the build

your business on a budget course. And it's really short,

y'all, because, listen, just like. And I know tiff keeps

her, podcast episode short. It's the same thing

with that training. It is not longer than an hour,

and it's very hands on. And so I walk

you through those essentials, through the opportunities,

and through the aspirations inside of it. You also

get, a budget spreadsheet

that has those categories broken out. And then I give some

examples, because, as I shared with you all, sometimes it's like,

I don't know, what's the difference between the essential and the aspiration

and the aspiration and the opportunity. And so I have

those things broken out by category.

I also talked about the power of

bartering in that, training,

because sometimes we're out here like,

okay, well, I can just spend this much,

and you could actually have to spend nothing. One of the

examples that I give inside of the training is that I got,

photos done, which we all know a good

photo shoot can run. You quite

a bit if you're moving into more of that

opportunities and aspirations category. Right.

and this particular photo shoot was about

valued at about $500. And I just knew I

didn't have that to invest. I was like, sis,

I know that your stuff is quality. I've

seen your stuff before, but I'm just in the very beginning

stages of my business. But what I did have at

that time was, a podcast that was reaching

the exact demographic that this woman had because she was

primarily targeting black women who

were in business or wanted to start a business. And so

I said, here's what we could do, or here's what I can

offer. And I did not know if she would say no or yes, but I

said, I have this podcast, and what

I could possibly do for you, if you'd be interested,

is record three,

ads that I can put at the beginning of the

episodes, and people can use a specific promo code

to sign up. And I don't even know if I made the promo

code a heavy discount because I was like, well, if we discount all

your services, this is not really the best thing for you.

I want to make sure you're getting a return on what you're giving

me. And so anyway, I did a promo for her on, three

podcast episodes. And I also said, hey, if we

have any in person events, you can come

and talk about your business there. And she was

interested. We signed up an agreement

because you should get everything in writing. We signed an

agreement, and she did my photo

shoot on, my end for free. I mean, I was

exchanging my time and my platform for

this physical product that I was able to get. And I tell

people, that was years ago, and

I still use a lot of those images, for

my website, I use a lot of the images in my social

media content. And so that's one of the things that

I talk about within that, class as well,

because, again, sometimes we put ourselves

in these binds where we're like, oh, my gosh, I really want

this thing. And then I'm too embarrassed to tell this person that

I can't afford their services instead of just looking and

saying, what do I have that's of value that I could offer this

person?

Absolutely. And I love that I have

bartered many of times, for services and

products, and it works you all, and you never know

what someone's going to say or do, and

so just acts, put it out there. So I love that you

go over that in your, course as well.

So thank you. So much, Brianna, for coming on the show

today. Now, if people were interested in

learning about the course or learning more about

you or is following you on social media, where could they find

you?

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Yes, they can go to my website,

brandsbybree.com, and that has all my links

to social. It has links to brands by Brie

Academy, which is where that building up business on a budget

class lives. and

there's also a link for you to join my email list. I send out

emails every week to business owners with just, like, a

word of encouragement because we know it can be hard out here. You're

like, why am I doing this thing? That's very insane that

no one else wants to do. I also send

resources because, again,

sometimes it's like, hey, there's this thing that you might

be about to pay for. And I actually found a place where you

can get it for free. for places that I have

relationships with, I include, like, affiliate links

where you can sign up for something like honeybook and get

50% off, or sign up for something like flow desk,

which is what I use for my email software.

And so I just try to make it like a one stop

shop for women in business.

Because, again, this is no,

I think about, the poem that talks about how life is

no crystal stare. Entrepreneurship is not a

crystal stare. Okay. But I think what I

have seen, it's not you all. So if that's why you're

signing up, maybe look at something else. But

it's a beautiful thing, though, to be able to do the work that you

love.

Yeah, for sure. Well, I will make sure that I

have all of those links in the show notes, so

definitely check those out. Thank you so much again

for coming on the show, and I'm excited. Hopefully

somebody took at least one takeaway from

this. And if you didn't, I'm going to give

you one. Essentials, opportunities,

aspirations. That's all you need to know.

All right, well, thank you so much.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: It's my pleasure. Oh, and one thing,

I will give you all a special, price on

those classes inside of brands by Brie Academy. But

I want you guys to use the word aspirations because

that's how we'll know that you listen to the end. I know sometimes people do like

the podcast name and stuff like that, but it's

kind of like looking for clues in one of those Disney movies or

Marvel movies or something like that. So, yeah, if you use promo code

aspiration on any of those, you'll be able to get a

special price on those classes.

Yes. I love that. Come on, Easter eggs. So

aspirations is the code, and

I'll make sure that's in the show notes as well, in case you're doing

something, driving, whatever, and you can't write it down, it'll be

there for you. So thank you so much, Brianna, and I hope you have

a wonderful rest of the day.

Brieanna Lightfoot-Smith: Thank you for having me.

Bye.

Intro/Outro: Thank you for listening, joining, and being a part of the Money

talk with TIFF podcast this week. You can check Tiff

out every Thursday for a new Money talk podcast,

but if you just can't wait until next week, you can listen

to previous podcast

episodes@moneytalkwitht.com

or follow TIff on all social media

platforms at moneytalkwitht. Until

next time, spend wise by spending less than

you make a, word to the money wise is always

sufficient.