[00:00:00] Hala Taha: Hey, everyone. Welcome to the show. We've got an exciting episode in store for you today. We are live in an Airbnb location, which is coincidental because we actually talked about Airbnb in this episode. Today, I'm interviewing Jenna Kutcher. She's the host of the Gold Digger podcast. She's a bestselling author, and she's also an entrepreneur.

Of many different businesses. So we're going to talk about all the different ways she makes money from her courses to affiliate marketing, to podcast sponsorships, to hosting a property on Airbnb. I absolutely love this conversation. Jenna is one of my close friends and she's so smart. She's so brilliant.

I can't wait to share it with you all. So without further ado, here's my conversation with Jenna Kutcher.

 welcome to Young and Profiting podcast. 

[00:02:01] Jenna Kutcher: Thank you. I mean, let's talk about money, but money is such a taboo topic, especially with women.

And so we're going to kind of dive off the deep end together. 

[00:02:08] Hala Taha: Yes. 

[00:02:09] Jenna Kutcher: Let's do it. 

[00:02:10] Hala Taha: So, first of all, tell me, what was the first way that you started to make a lot of money? When did it all start to really come together for you? 

[00:02:19] Jenna Kutcher: So when I was 23, I worked in corporate America and I had a great job, but I very quickly realized that climbing the corporate ladder was just not for me.

And it is an amazing option for a lot of people. It just didn't resonate with my soul. There was just this feeling of I've got to figure something else out. So I started as a wedding photographer. Most people know my story. I bought a 300 camera on Craigslist. ended up starting a wedding photography business, taught myself everything.

And within three years, I was earning six figures, which at the time was more than I had ever even dreamed of, right? In my corporate job, I was making 50, 000 a year. I felt so rich making six figures felt like this. amount that was impossible. And when I was growing my business, I was also experiencing burnout and I had grown so quickly, which was such a blessing.

But I also just hit this place where I was like, I can't imagine doing this for the next five, 10, 15, 20 years. There's gotta be a different way. And I committed to figuring out a different way through loss. And I shared this story many times, but. When my husband and I finally decided that we wanted to start a family, it didn't happen as easily for us as it does for other people.

And I know a lot of people experience this, but we went through two miscarriages. And I was planning my pregnancies around my photography business because I was shooting in the summer and I had to figure out how is this going to work? And when I had my second loss, I had to show up and shoot a wedding the next day.

And I was like, there has to be a different way. Like, I I built this amazing business, but if I don't show up and shoot, I don't get paid and there's got to be a different way. And so I committed then in there in this moment of agony of, I will figure this out. And I remember around that time I heard this statistic, the average millionaire has seven revenue streams.

And at the time I had one and I was like, how do we figure this out? Like, what could this even look like? It felt so crazy. And so I started many different side hustles. Do you want to dive into that? Okay. So my first side hustle was I became a watercolor artist. Did you notice? So my mother in law was an elementary art teacher and in the basement of her house, she had all of these art supplies.

And in my season of burnout, I was like, I need to do something to connect back to my creativity. At first, my photography was my creativity and then it became my job. So I went home with all these watercolor supplies. I started painting every day. I forced myself to sit in a chair and paint for 20 minutes a day.

And I started sharing these paintings on the internet and people were like, Can I buy that? 

[00:04:58] Hala Taha: Amazing! 

[00:04:58] Jenna Kutcher: And I ended up figuring out a way to scan these watercolor art prints and sell them online. And pretty soon we were paying our mortgage. With the print revenue, 

[00:05:09] Hala Taha: your first sort of passive income revenue stream, 

[00:05:12] Jenna Kutcher: totally, because that was what made me realize I could create something once and sell it a bunch of times.

So it started as a joke and it turned into something where I was like, wait a minute, we're onto something. Also around that time was when I had realized after hitting six figures that I was happier when I was working less. And I had hit this point. And I think a lot of entrepreneurs. Hit this point where in the beginning you have to trade time for money.

There's really no other way around it. That is the hustle that is required. But at some point when you start to get the money, you recognize that I will spend money to get back my time. And I'd hit that point in my photography business. And I was like, you know what? I will go back to earning 50, 000 a year if I can have a life.

And so I committed to booking half of the weddings that I had been shooting. And I said, I'm going to figure something else out. And so that's when I started learning about online courses and I had scaled a business from zero to a hundred K in three years. I knew something that a lot of people didn't.

And so I started mentoring other local photographers, having them come into this little condo we lived in and I would walk them through pricing, marketing, social media, like all the business stuff. Cause I'm like, These people are so good at their craft. They don't know how to like sell it. Yeah. And so I started coaching and then I started looking into online courses and that's where the business that people see today started to form.

But it was years in the making. 

[00:06:31] Hala Taha: I love that. It's so inspiring. So, in terms of your courses, how did you first figure out how to go from one to one to one to many? Because that's really the secret. It's how do you take what you do to individuals and then make it possible that many people can take this course.

Like, how did you first start to figure that world out? 

[00:06:51] Jenna Kutcher: You know, it's kind of funny because I don't know if I've ever drawn the parallel of making a watercolor print, scanning it, figuring out one to one or one to many. 

[00:06:58] Hala Taha: Yeah. 

[00:06:59] Jenna Kutcher: And that is exactly what online education is. And it was so funny because I ended up coaching five local photographers and they all had the same questions.

And all of a sudden I found myself, I'm like, I am a broken record. I'm teaching them the same things. I'm showing them the same pricing guides. I'm walking through the same things. And that was when I really started to discern there are trends and questions that everybody has. And that is the type of content you want to put into an online course.

And I am so grateful that I took the time to sit down with people face to face, hear their struggles, understand, well, what am I actually doing different? Because I think that so often we are so close to our own genius that we think everybody knows this. Yeah. Surely this is easy for everybody. And so when I started to identify these trends, I was like, Oh my gosh, I can teach branding and I can teach social media and I can teach pricing and I can teach email communication and all of these things.

And so I created my first online course after taking an online course. So I was like, I'm going to buy an online course and figure out, okay, how did they deliver it? How was it recorded? How was it like spread out over the week? Yes. My secret sauce is like reverse engineering. I see an end result as a wedding photographer.

I would see the finished shot and I would think, well, how did the photographer pose these people this way? What were the cues that they gave them? What was the lighting? And I reverse engineered course creation because I was like, I can figure this out. I know I can. The people that can take apart a car and figure out how to put it back together.

I can't do that, but when it comes to digital stuff, I'm so good at that. And so online courses cracked my life open in such a beautiful way, but it did, it allowed me to reach people outside of where we lived in this tiny village in Wisconsin. And it allowed me to connect with other photographers who are struggling with the same thing so that they could really focus on the art and their craft.

[00:08:47] Hala Taha: Yeah. So I really resonate with us because I started my first course a year ago and at the time I I didn't really realize that I had a course under my belt. I have a social media agency and it's very expensive to work with us. You're actually one of my social clients. And so it's like 10, 000 a month minimum to work with us.

And I'd have lots of people coming to me being like, I really want your help, but I can't afford your services. I really want your help, but I can't afford your services. And then I realized that. This agency that I'm building in order to get more clients. Every time I get three more clients, I have to hire five more people.

And I don't want to have like a 3000 person organization. That's a lot of stress on me. So I was like, what can I do to sort of lay it all out? And the same trainings that I give my team, the same checklists I give them. How can I take what I give my team to service my clients and then turn it into a class?

And then I did that and I just used everything that we already had So the course was very fast to put together because I think a lot of people don't realize that if you have an agency You probably have a course because whatever you're doing You can package it up and teach other people how to do what you do to service your clients And I feel like a lot of people don't Realize that the other thing with courses is that it just gives you so much content to then create an audience and attract an audience.

So for example, I have like a two day masterclass on LinkedIn and my team literally just goes to the slides that I created and then creates posts. You know what I mean? Because they have all the content I've created. Written it all down. So I'd love to understand how did you end up becoming an influencer?

Because you've got like a million plus followers on Instagram. You're huge on Pinterest too. How did that piece come about? Was the podcast the first thing that kicked that off? 

[00:10:35] Jenna Kutcher: It all grew super organically until it didn't. When I was a wedding photographer, I realized really quickly that there were a million wedding photographers in my area.

That were really talented. And the only thing that made me different was me because we were all delivering a very similar finished product. And so even in the early days, and I, I mean, this is like, Oh, gee, Instagram, we're talking here. Like when we used to use those weird Valencia filters, I would just share my life and I would just share who I was and what I was struggling with.

I would share working from home with no makeup on, like this is the reality of it. And it was so interesting because when I first became a wedding photographer, I just hid behind my work. It was like the safe spot. I figured surely everyone only wants to see my work. And I remember years and years and years ago, polling my audience of like, what are your favorite posts?

And it was all personal. And I was like, what is this? Fast forward a few years, we went to Hawaii and I wanted to do an experiment and I love experimenting. I am like a huge experimenter. And so I said for 30 days, I'm going to only post me. And this is at a time when I'd been hiding behind my work for years.

And my engagement skyrocketed. My confidence in myself grew. My connection to my audience grew. And I was like, so fascinated by it because I was like, this seems like the least interesting thing of what I'm doing. I was just sharing my life. And it really made me realize people need to connect with people.

And I never set out to be an influencer. I really wanted to just continue to grow and share. And I really have realized over the last few years, my dream is help women build businesses. They don't hate and build lives that they love. And I have been taking people on this journey, not as I have figured this whole out, but like, I am still learning.

I am still growing. I'm still figuring this out. And so When I started doing social media collaborations and social media promotions and different things like that, it just felt so natural because I am the kind of person where I'm like, Oh my God, have you tried this new lip gloss? Or like this skin cleanser is life changing.

Like when I go on a girl's date with my girlfriends, by the end of the day, I've dropped 10 links of things that I'm just telling them about, because I'm like, if this works for me, this could work for you. Like I just love not gatekeeping, whether it's business or beauty products or whatever that is. And so that was just such an interesting facet for me to realize people care about the business.

Yes, but they also care about what's happening behind the business and like what's fueling it. And so that was interesting. We did have a viral moment. So I grew very organically. I felt like I knew every single follower. Like I just, it felt that way. And we had a moment go viral. And it was a photo of me and my husband on the beach in Hawaii.

And I was talking about body image. It was the funniest post because I just, I never expected it to go viral. I think that's what happens with viral posts. And I was clapping back at someone who had said, how can a woman like you get a man like him? And my husband is very fit. He's very in shape. At the time I was curvier.

I had been going through miscarriages and lost. My body had been through so much. And I was just angry. And I was like, who are you to say this? We have been together for a decade. He has loved me through every pound, every pimple, like everything. And that post blew up. And overnight we got hundreds of thousands of followers and blessing and a curse, right?

Double edged sword. Wow. This is amazing. But also like, who are these people and why are they here? 

[00:14:00] Hala Taha: Yeah. 

[00:14:01] Jenna Kutcher: And what are they watching? 

[00:14:02] Hala Taha: That's when I first found out about you because I was starting to podcast and I was growing popularity in podcasts. And then I remember hearing about Jenna Kutcher and your likeliness was so tied up with body image.

And so like you were the body image girl that was spreading body positivity. And that's what you were known for. Was that hard to sort of. Get out of that box because now you're out of that box. 

[00:14:27] Jenna Kutcher: Well, it was so confusing because I had talked about body image for years. I think it's a lifelong journey to learn how to love yourself.

And I don't think it ever ends. And so the fact that one random post goes off and then here I am running a business, teaching entrepreneurs, and now all these people are following, commenting about my body, wanting more of that content that I'm not monetizing because I didn't want to monetize it. 

[00:14:54] Hala Taha: Yeah. 

[00:14:55] Jenna Kutcher: It was very confusing.

And again, it was such a blessing and a curse because so many people resonated with the message and it connected with them and they felt seen and they felt understood. And at the same point too, as a creator, it's like, what do I do with this? And as a business owner, where do we go from here? Like, I'm not going to sell a course about body image.

And so it was a really interesting time. And I think that I just did my best to like, stay very true to myself. Stay very grounded in the message to be clear of like, here's what you can expect if you stick around here, because this isn't going to become this type of account. And so, yeah, it was very interesting.

 I want to dig into the course thing and how it lended itself so nicely to you doing affiliates. Cause something that a lot of entrepreneurs don't realize is that once you figure out how to promote something, well, you can then just take that and replicate it in a million different ways. And I was even talking about this yesterday, me and Jenna were at the IAB upfronts.

[00:15:57] Hala Taha: We were both very integrated into this big podcasting event for advertisers. And I was telling the advertisers, Yeah, media, my network, we're all business owners. And so we understand how to promote our own products and services. And then we turn that into podcast sponsorships. So that's what I've been doing.

You've been doing that with affiliate marketing. So I'd love for you to walk through, how do you actually promote your courses? And then. What is the relationship to that and then how you started affiliate marketing? 

[00:16:26] Jenna Kutcher: Yeah, oh my gosh, I love affiliate marketing. 

[00:16:29] Hala Taha: I know, I don't do any of it. 

[00:16:31] Jenna Kutcher: Oh my gosh, people.

Okay, so we do seven figures in affiliate marketing each year. Over seven figures. If people are wondering, are you getting pennies to the dollar? Like this can be a very lucrative thing, especially if you don't have a ton of offers that you are selling on your own. Affiliate marketing is literally just recommending someone else's product and getting a commission when people buy it.

And so if you have gotten people's trust in what you are recommending with anything, and they do trust you, they will follow you wherever you lead them to in a beautiful way. Right. I love affiliate marketing, whether it is skincare, whether it is jeans, whether it is another online course, I just think it's so powerful.

And the reason why I love it. Is because I am not an expert in everything very clearly, I'm not an expert in all the things and I want to recommend things and people that I love to the people that I love. 

[00:17:27] Hala Taha: Yeah, 

[00:17:27] Jenna Kutcher: I am a natural connector. My greatest joy in life is connecting people that I love to each other, connecting people to products that they love.

So one of the things that I've realized is I can sell my own stuff. That's wonderful. But what does it look like when I partner up with brands that I love and with people that I love and help promote their business? We recently partnered with one of my dear friends who I've literally known for almost a decade and she's my copywriter and she has an amazing course.

And I was like, Ashlyn, let me talk about your course. Your work has changed my life. And so many people could benefit from this and I am not a pro copywriter and it transformed her business. It changed her launch. It made her show up differently. My audience was like there. We had thousands of people sign up for her masterclass.

And so it's like so fun for me because I get to support the people and brands that I love. I get a commission from what I'm selling and I get to kind of experiment with different marketing strategies because there's less skin in the game and I get to be more creative of like, what does this look like?

[00:18:26] Hala Taha: But go into the nitty gritty, like, what are you doing? I know you're using many chat automations. Are you leveraging an email list? And not like, just tell me, like, what are you doing? 

[00:18:36] Jenna Kutcher: Okay, you want me to give you the headline? Okay. So if somebody's listening to this and you have a podcast. A very natural way to do this is to have a podcast interview and to be able to tie it to somebody.

[00:18:46] Hala Taha: That's what we did when we did my LinkedIn course.

[00:18:48] Jenna Kutcher: Yes. And so just naturally integrating what that person is an expert in and inviting people with a call to action at the end of the podcast. If you have an email list, sending out emails about, Hey, this person that I trust, this is my experience with them.

This is how they've transformed things for me. This is why you should trust them or join their free masterclass. If you have Instagram sharing about it on Instagram. So we've basically built this almost like flywheel where we could have a guest on our podcast. We could send out a couple of emails. I could do an Instagram live with them and a few Instagram posts.

And that's honestly it. And they take care of the rest. And it's people that I trust. That are going to serve my audience well at the highest level. And then if it's the right offer for them, they'll take it. 

[00:19:31] Hala Taha: So now you've got millions of followers. Take us back to when you didn't have millions of followers.

[00:19:38] Jenna Kutcher: It wasn't that long ago. 

[00:19:40] Hala Taha: How would you promote something then? Maybe you've got a couple thousand followers, but you're really smart. You already make money doing something really well. Maybe you have a job and you do something really well. Maybe you have a company, you do something well, but you just don't have a lot of followers.

How would you then? Either sell courses or affiliate marketing. 

[00:19:57] Jenna Kutcher: I would say two channels. Pinterest is huge. 

[00:20:00] Hala Taha: And I love the juicy one. No one talks about this. 

[00:20:04] Jenna Kutcher: Y'all Pinterest is a search engine. It's not social media. And it's so crazy to me that people think that it is just a place to like plan your dream life, but not do anything about it.

When people go onto Pinterest, they are typing in recipes with sausage. Makeup looks for work or capsule wardrobes for vacation. Like people are typing in key words. And they're typing in stuff that you have created or work that you could create. And so we get millions of views on Pinterest a month just using like the same strategies you would use for search engine optimization.

Just using keywords. 

[00:20:40] Hala Taha: That's so smart because nobody's doing that. 

[00:20:42] Jenna Kutcher: Nobody's doing it! 

[00:20:43] Hala Taha: It's basically a search engine, especially for targeting women. 

[00:20:46] Jenna Kutcher: Yes! And the cool thing about that is With Pinterest being a search engine, it's not a popularity contest. So unlike other social platforms, in order to get your work seen, you have to have a massive following because it is a search engine.

If you are search engine oriented, you will be found. 

[00:21:02] Hala Taha: Yeah. 

[00:21:02] Jenna Kutcher: And so if you are someone listening to this and you're like, great for you, I don't have a million followers or I don't have this. Pinterest is an amazing place. We use Pinterest to grow our email list. I look at marketing very distilled down.

There are two focuses. The first primary focus is growing your email list. Why? It is an asset that you own. It is something you can control. Social media is amazing. It is rented space. You do not own it. You can't control it. You are battling multiple algorithms. Your email list is a true asset. If you are somebody listening and you want to be in business three years from now, five years from now, 10 years from now, you have to have an email list.

That is the only way. Priority number one in marketing is an email list. Priority number two is any other platform that you are using, whether it is LinkedIn, YouTube, a podcast, Instagram, all of those efforts need to be getting people off of those platforms and onto your email list. That is it. And it's so funny because we overcomplicate marketing and we're like, Instagram doesn't work.

How are you using Instagram? Are you serving or are you selling? If you are selling, no wonder it doesn't work. And so your primary focus as a creator is to start your email list and then any efforts that you have, the goal should be to get people off of whatever platform they're on and onto your list because again, you own that.

[00:22:16] Hala Taha: And you get them off of the platform by serving them. 

[00:22:19] Jenna Kutcher: Yes. 

[00:22:20] Hala Taha: And then retargeting them in the DMs to get them in your email list. One of the biggest regrets I have is not starting my email list until Just a couple of years ago, I started it. And my favorite way, I don't know if you do this to get emails is to do webinars.

[00:22:34] Jenna Kutcher: Yes. Yeah. 

[00:22:35] Hala Taha: So I do these private zoom webinars where I'll do like LinkedIn training, sales trainings. I'm doing like a mental health one for entrepreneurs later this summer. And then I'll get a thousand, two thousand people registering. Boom. I got 2000 emails now and they opted in so I can communicate with them now.

And there's so much clicks and conversions that happen in email. Like it's a lot of sales are happening on email. So I love that. 

Okay, so we talked about a number of your revenue streams already. We talked about your watercoloring business when you first started out. We talked about courses. We talked a little bit about podcasts. And your different sponsorships and affiliate marketing. What other revenue streams do you have? 

[00:23:15] Jenna Kutcher: So one thing that we are super passionate about is real estate.

And I love real estate. I love property. I love looking at houses online. Like there's something about making a space, a home and sharing it, even that just feels so powerful to me. And years and years ago, Drew and I used to spend multiple months of the year in Maui. And it was after. I had had this revelation of like, I can build a business that can run while I rest.

Like, what would it look like if we spent a month on Maui and then it turned into two and three and we started to fall in love, but we were also spending a lot of money staying there and we would stay in Airbnbs each time. And we started to like ask ourselves questions. Okay. We're spending a lot of money here.

Like, what would this look like? Could there be a possibility that we could do this ourselves? And I'll never forget a trip. My parents came to visit us and there was an open house. We were walking down the beach and we're like, I don't know. Let's just pop in and look. And I started to really dream bigger.

And at the time of business was not at all the size that it is today. And I remember we went through this open house. I took the little flyer. And I went and sat in a coffee shop and I started doing math and I started thinking about, okay, how much are we spending a month when we're here? How much rent could we potentially earn?

What would the expenses be? What are the HOAs? What does this look like? And one thing that's super interesting about Hawaii is there's a lot of different zoning. So. There's apartment zoned and there's hotel zoned in the place that we were looking at used to be a hotel. It literally is zoned as a hotel.

And I remember just thinking this is so peculiar that this was an operating hotel and they have now created it into spaces that people could own. And I sat down in this coffee shop and started running the numbers and I'm like, I think we could make this work. And I remember telling Drew, I am committed to eating ramen noodles for a year.

If we do this, because we just loved being on the Island and we loved having this space and the thought of doing it was like just so exciting. And so we ended up putting in an offer. I will never forget. We flew back to the Island. So we got this place and I've been owned by this sweet, sweet old couple for years.

And we had one week to like flip the unit and get it ready for Airbnb. And I literally thought we were going to get divorced that week because we were like painting and getting the couch in and the couch was too big. It couldn't fit through the door and all these like silly things that we were like, what did we get ourselves into?

And it's ended up being one of like the biggest blessings. We have hosted hundreds of couples over the years. We have had so many repeat guests come back to our space. And we have been able to create a community with our guests, with the team that helps us take care of our property. It's been so beautiful.

We've also been able to give back so much to the community. Like we bought a place on the island because we care about the island. And so last year alone, we donated over 30 percent of our profits to locals and to support them. We were able to help people in need when,  the devastating fire went through Lahaina.

We opened up our doors, we housed locals for over two months in our unit. And we just took care of people. We used our network of other Airbnb hosts. And we said like, open your doors. We will pay all of your expenses. Just get people in. Um, and so it was amazing to see like, yes, it is a property. And yes, it is this place where people can rent and stay, but we're also doing something a lot bigger with it.

And I, and that matters to me, anything that I do has to have meaning. 

Yeah. 

And I care so deeply about the why behind our work that like, I want to make sure that there is always facets of respect. And community built into everything that we do. And so it's been beautiful. My parents were just down there and stayed and to be able to like, see our space, be shared and loved by people we love, but also taken care of by people we love and enjoyed by people we love.

[00:27:07] Hala Taha: It just feels like this trifecta of blessings upon blessings and. I love property and I love the idea of putting together a space where people are making lifelong memories. Because when we went to Hawaii, it was like a bucket list trip. It was like someday in our lifetime, I want to go to Hawaii. And the fact that like, now we get to host people on their bucket list trips.

How cool is that?

 I love that. 

I could see like the joy exuding from you. Like it makes you so happy to host these people in your home and make your home beautiful. And something that people don't realize is that you don't necessarily need an investment property to do this. You could do this in your own home.

Now you can host a room in your house. 

[00:27:48] Jenna Kutcher: Yeah. That is something that is coming up a lot lately. And it's an amazing way for people to like supplement their mortgages or help pay their rent. And Drew and I experienced this years ago, and I feel like these people were ahead of the curve on this, but we went on an anniversary trip and we were driving along the coast of California.

And we rented a room in this bed and breakfast type house, but they owned a farm. And I was like, I want to see the alpaca. I want to check out the goats. I want to collect the eggs from the chickens. And it was a whole different life than what we were living. And I remember we like showed up and they greeted us at the door and they had a bottle of wine chilled.

charcuterie boards out. And like, we sat and talked to them. We got to know about their life of living on this farm and why they were doing it. And it was such a cool experience where it opened my eyes up of like, yeah, it doesn't have to be a whole house. You don't have to buy a condo. Like you can literally do this wherever you are and start to share your space in such a meaningful way.

[00:28:51] Hala Taha: So something else that's really popular now is working remotely. So many people can work from anywhere now. And so I imagine that if, you know, you explore it and it's possible. You can just put your apartment or house on Airbnb and then go work remotely to some place that you've never been. It's such like a win win solution because it would offset any costs of you going and working from somewhere else.

[00:29:15] Jenna Kutcher: Ran into the movie that the holiday, did you ever see that movie? Oh my gosh. They like house swap. So like one person goes to LA and one person goes to New York and they like trade houses. And I'm like, that is so genius. Cause it is true. Like a lot of people these days have a lot more freedom and flexibility to work wherever.

I know during the pandemic, we moved up to our lake house in Minnesota and our neighbors there have spaces that they rent on Airbnb. And during the pandemic, we would go on walks with them every day. And they had this huge dream of living in Hawaii. That's where they had met initially. They wanted to live in Hawaii.

They were able to rent out their spaces in Minnesota, and now they live in Hawaii. Amazing. It's like crazy because you just see that there's so much possibility there. And a little bit of creativity, which I think entrepreneurs naturally have. And so it's like, maybe this is something that you haven't even considered, but like, what would it look like if you explored it?

[00:30:09] Hala Taha: So I am curious about starting an Airbnb and one of my fantasies. Is i'm not married yet. I was in a long term relationship Begging him to do airbnb with me to host an airbnb because to me I feel like it's such a fun project to do With a partner like it just seems like the perfect business project to work on with somebody that you love because it's Relatively easy.

It's an investment that both of you guys will be a part of. There's like enough things for both people to do. And to me it just seems like such an awesome thing to do with your partner. So can you talk to us about doing this with your husband and what that is like? 

[00:30:46] Jenna Kutcher: Yeah, I got to shout out my husband, Drew, because he does most of our work with the Airbnbs and he loves it.

Like he is our real estate professional in our family. He really enjoys it. And so he does the majority of it. And it is so fun because I love the decor. I love the messages. I love like making sure our guests feel cared for. I love the recommendations, like all things we've talked about in this episode.

And he is very good at like the financial side and the organization and managing our cleaner and just like different things like that, where he has more of the boots on the ground mentality. And I'm more of, here's the experience, but I'm going to paint this picture. And so it is so fun. And we always want to pick places that we love and enjoy ourselves.

We love this and you will love this too, which is a theme. Have you noticed? I love telling people about business. I love telling people about the products I love. I love just sharing experiences with people. And so it was such a natural progression and for us to do it together. It was our first big investment as a couple.

We really had to have conversations of can we do this? While we do this, what does this look like? And it felt like a huge leap of faith. And it's just been one that has been this like beautiful journey for the both of us. 

[00:31:57] Hala Taha: I feel like it connects you guys closer because you guys are in business together.

You're making money together. I just feel like that's such an awesome thing to do with your partner. So I love that you do that. So something else to know about Jenna is that she only does stuff. That brings her joy. You only do things that you want to do. I bring Jenna opportunities all the time. She's in my podcast network where I booked sponsorships for her.

And she'll be like, I don't want to do that. I'm burnt out. I'm burnt out on IgE reels. And I'm like, but it's thousands of dollars. Are you sure? And she's like, yeah, I don't care. I'm burnt out. I'm not doing that. You can book it in two months or whatever. So talk to me about that. How are you able to sort of just put your foot down?

A lot of people couldn't just turn down. money like that. 

First off, it is such a privilege to be in a position. Yeah. It wasn't always like that. It 

wasn't always you've got to sacrifice, 

[00:32:46] Jenna Kutcher: but I've realized, and here's what I've really realized is if you have listened to this whole episode, you recognize the power of trust.

And I want my community to trust me. And if something isn't in alignment, not only do I feel it, but they feel it. And so I have had to get so good at discerning what are the right partners? What are the right opportunities? What are the right sponsorships to take on? Is this in alignment? And I feel that way with every opportunity, whether it is getting asked to speak on stages that I would have once dreamt of being on, but now I'm saying no to, or whether it is hosting a mastermind or all these things, I could do a million things.

I don't want to. And I think that I'm just at this place in my life where. I just recognize peace needs to be protected. And right now in this stage of my life, my priority is my family. And anything that I'm saying yes to is a no to them. And what is the most important thing to me? And so turning down things like recording another social media reel, to me, it's like, but this is more time with my kids, or this is protecting and preserving the integrity of my followers.

[00:33:52] Hala Taha: She'll even turn down things that are a good fit. 

[00:33:54] Jenna Kutcher: Totally. Totally. I will 

[00:33:55] Hala Taha: turn down things that are a great fit for her because she's like, no, my time with my family is more. 

[00:34:01] Jenna Kutcher: Yeah. 

And I think that like boundaries. Protect what's sacred to you, and I've just had to relearn this lesson over and over and over again.

Boundaries aren't bad, and boundaries keep what I say most important to me and they, they exemplify that. What I am saying is most important to me is reflected in my calendar, it is reflected in my bank account, is reflected in the way I show up every single day. And so it's a muscle that you have to learn to flex.

And it takes time because I think that there was a time in my life where I got paid 50 to take pictures of a cat and I couldn't believe it. Like somebody was paying me to do something I love. This is amazing. And what a blessing that is. And the better that you get out listening to your gut and discerning like, well, this is a great opportunity, but is it the right opportunity for me?

It keeps you in alignment so that you are not passing up things that you should be saying yes to, and that you are not saying yes to things that you should be saying no to. And so I feel like I just have a really strong intuition and a gut game. And I don't apologize for saying no any longer because.

Yeah. My no is literally just a reflection of what is mattering the most to me right now. 

[00:35:08] Hala Taha: Okay. Well, this has been such an awesome conversation about all the different ways that you 

generate revenue. We talked about courses, affiliate marketing, we talked about you hosting a property on Airbnb, and also about your mindset. I loved learning about that because I need to have some more boundaries. So thank you for sharing that and thank you for joining us on Young and Profiting Podcast.

Thanks for having me. 

 I loved having Jenna on the show, and this was actually one of the first times that I met Jenna in person. The first time I met her in person was actually the day before this interview. I had flown out Jenna for a podcast network event, the IAB Upfronts. Jenna's somebody that I looked up to for so long.

She's just so bubbly, so nice, so genuine, like she's the real deal. It's so obvious why she's so successful. And Jenna is the OG female podcaster. I've been looking up to Jenna since I first started podcasting. And it's so crazy that now, four or five years later, we're peers. She's actually in my network.

We're business partners. And it's just so crazy to think so much can happen in four or five years if you just start. Put your nose to the ground and work hard. It's just a surreal moment for me to be basically talking to one of my podcast idols in person. Being her friend, talking to her all the time online, and now being able to meet in person.

And by the way, we recorded this live in an Airbnb, and you can watch it on YouTube. So if you want to look it up and see what it was like with us interacting on video, go to my YouTube channel, just go on YouTube, look up Young and Profiting, you'll find it right there. It's really easy to find. And we are going to be having an in person interview summer.

I'm going to be doing so much in person interviews because it's so much more engaging, it's so much more fun for me, I feel like it's better for video. And just better for the conversation. I did the Gary Vee video in person, so I'm going to be doing a lot more in person videos and I'm just so psyched for that.

And I'm just so psyched about the conversation that we had with Jenna. She really broke down all the different ways that she makes money and she didn't hide anything. We talked about affiliate marketing, podcast sponsorships, and one of the things that we talked about was email lists. And this is something that I want to stress.

If you haven't started your email list yet, get on it. Email lists are so powerful. I'm kicking myself for not starting my email list sooner. We've had an email list now for like two years and it's amazing. It is helping us with all of our initiatives and it's sort of like a security blanket. You spend all this time creating content on Instagram and YouTube and all these platforms.

But you don't own any of it. You've got to pull those people out into your email list. So if there's nothing else that you take from this interview, it's go pull your contacts out from social media and get them on an email list. The other thing I wanted to call out that was pretty unique was Pinterest.

We don't talk about Pinterest a lot, but it's still huge. It's basically a search engine and it's so big, especially amongst women. So if you want to be highly searched and you feel like you can follow an SEO approach for your business, then you should try to leverage Pinterest so you can be found there too.

And finally, I'm so excited that we got to talk about real estate because that's something that I really want to get into. And Jenna gave a lot of pointers on that front. And I know most of you are listening and didn't watch it, but if you could just see the joy on her face when she started talking about her experiences hosting through Airbnb, she really finds joy in doing that.

She loves hosting other people and getting the feedback from them and making it nice and warm and welcoming. And I could see how that could be a really fun thing to do. That's why I want to start an Airbnb. I feel like it'd be so much fun. I feel like I'm so busy already, I don't know why I would want to add yet something else on my plate, but when it's fun and it brings you joy, you get the motivation to do it.

So for me, I really want to start an Airbnb, so I'm just hoping that my significant other is down. I'm thankful for Jenna schooling us on all the different ways she makes money, and I'm also thankful for all of you guys who listened. To this episode of young and profiting podcast. Now, if you have somebody out there, who's interested in learning about things like affiliate marketing, podcast, sponsorships, starting a real estate business with Airbnb, then share this episode, share this link, pass it around, spread us by word of mouth, that's such a nice thing to do for.

Your yap queen who just wants to help more people. I want more people to hear the show and I need you guys to spread it. Spread it around. Spread the love. And if you did enjoy this show and you learned something, then please drop us a five star review on Apple Podcasts. Nothing helps us reach more people.

Then a good review from you all, take a couple minutes and do that. Man, you guys are awesome, like, I get new reviews every day and they make my day. I really read them every single day. If you guys prefer to watch your podcast as videos, you can find us on YouTube. Just look up Young and Profiting and you'll find all of our episodes on there.

And if you're looking for me, you can find me on Instagram at YapWithHala or LinkedIn by searching my name. It's Hala Taha. Thank you so much to my incredible production team. You guys are awesome. This is your host, Hala Taha, aka the podcast princess, signing off.