Who I follow to learn about growing & improving my online business
One of my email subscribers recently asked me who it is that I follow online to continue learning and growing my business, so I decided to put together a list for y’all!
Who I follow online now is pretty different from when I started, honestly not because the people I first started following didn’t have good information and content, but generally because people tend to stop posting content consistently after a few years. So that’s led me to having to search out new online business owners to follow and learn from.
This is the list of the places I currently go to learn about online business and marketing, in order to keep growing and improving my own business!
1. Female Entrepreneur Association vlogs
Topic: authentic Behind-the-scenes entrepreneur life
These vlogs of Carrie, the founder of the Female Entrepreneur Association, I think are one of the most authentic behind-the-scenes look at what running an online business really looks like. While I don’t think Carrie intended these to have specific educational lessons in them, I actually found myself having a lot of ah-ha business moments while watching them! Highly, highly recommend these!
2. Paige Hulse weekly newsletter
Topic: all the legal stuff for entrepreneurs
Paige is my go-to person for all things legal in my business and I swear her emails pop up with the most relevant info in my inbox just when I need it. She covers what to do when someone copies your creative content, how to make sure your website is ticking all the legal boxes, how and why to use contracts in your business, and more. While she does have a blog, I find her most valuable info come in through her email subscription.
3. Being Boss podcast
Topic: Serviced-based business content
I’ve had this on my favorited list of podcasts for years now, it’s truly one of my go-to business podcasts from two super real entrepreneurs. Emily and Kathleen also run their own web design and branding businesses, so they do talk a lot about the topics and challenges that I think a lot of serviced-based business owners will find really valuable.
4. Ashlyn Writes YouTube
Topic: Copywriting & Behind-the-scenes business
If you need help with your copywriting, Ashlyn is the girl you need to follow! While she has a lot of great blog posts, I’d also suggest checking out her YouTube channel where she consistently posts videos weekly both about copywriting and how she runs her business. As someone who thoroughly enjoys poking her nose into other businesses to see how they’re run, I love seeing how Ashlyn does things.
5. Harvard Business Review articles
Topic: Work-life balance research & managing a team
This is honestly the most academic of the bunch, with a lot of their articles written by researchers and academics. HBR has some really quality articles on work-life balance and running a team, both of which you don’t get so much when following individual entrepreneurs.
6. Jenna Kutcher’s podcast
Topic: stories of successful business owners
This one probably won’t be much of a surprise to you as I think Jenna is truly at the top of our industry and is making a big impact and waves online. Her podcast is my go-to for hearing the stories of other successful business owners, learning all things online marketing, and honestly just hearing about her real life, both the highlights and the struggles. She’s the definition of being real online.
7. Denise Duffield-Thomas blog
Topic: Money & not glorifying working to death
I’m pretty sure Denise sends her most recent blogs to her newsletter, so this is one of one the ones I get straight to my inbox, but I think the same content is on her blog. I admire Denise for how guilt-free she is about desire for money, hating housework, and not liking working herself to death and being super busy. I legitimately admire her DGAF attitude and absolutely intend to work towards being as chill and lack-of-caring-of-other-peoples-judgements as she is.
8. Dani Watson’s YouTube
Topic: manifesting, success & attracting clients
Dani used to have a fabulous blog back in the day, I really specifically remember happening upon it, opening up like 20 different tabs of posts that sounded interesting and reading the night away. She doesn’t have the blog anymore but does have a lot of videos on YouTube you can still watch where she talks all about manifesting, getting in flow with the universe, success and attracting clients.
9. Mariah Coz’s podcast/vodcast
Topic: building & marketing online courses
Mariah is the mentor who helped me launch 2 hellah-successful courses. Before I enrolled in her program though, I binged on her podcast/vodcast all about building and marketing online courses. She’s truly the online course expert and I had her vodcast videos on in the background while I worked for weeks. Highly recommend if you’re looking to get into the online course world.
10. Smart Passive Income
topic: passive income & online business
Pat Flynn is a bit of an online business legend these days. He was the very first person I started following online when I went to get into the whole online stuff 5+ years ago. I had no business or blog back then, but had a slight interest in all the online stuff, so I started listening to his podcast just amazed by these stories of people making money online. And what do you know, now I’m one of those people. He’s been posting new podcasts for years and is truly serves up some of the best free content on the internet.
11. The Everygirl
Topic: finance & career
The Everygirl is honestly my favorite website, though I read it more for personal than business purposes. The career & finance categories do have a fair bit of information that would serve you if you’re running an online business, so I’m using that as justification to sneak it into this list. (And then of course feel free to get distracted in their home tours and travel categories too while you’re there!)
There you have it, that’s my list of go-to blogs, newsletters, podcasts, channels and sites! I’m honestly always down to find new fabulous content creators, so if you have a recommendation of something you think I might love, please do leave me a link in the comments!
