Monetizing and Selling a Seven-Figure Financial Website - And What's Next

Welcome to another episode of the Plutus Awards Podcast. Our community is filled with hundreds of stories from creators and entrepreneurs just like you. And through this show we share these stories of challenges and successes from bloggers to podcasters from writers, speakers and more. In today’s episode I share how and why I decided to monetize my personal finance brand. It wasn’t an easy decision and for those of you making the decision my monetization story will highlight the fears and concerns I had about the process leading with the following question that I needed to answer “Will monetizing my brand impact the authenticity, brand mission and purpose of my project and negatively impact the community that I serve with my content?”

In the first episode of this season I spoke with Harlan Landes, founder of the Plutus Awards, Plutus Foundation and Plutus Voices events. It’s a great conversation about the evolution of the Plutus ecosystem and what motivates Harlan to do the work that he does. The main question that the Plutus Foundation will be exploring this season is the tension that content creators in the personal finance space feel when deciding whether or not to monetize their brand. I absolutely felt this tension and nervousness at the time that I decided to monetize my brand partly because I had to ask myself if I was being inauthentic, greedy or disingenuous as a person in the personal finance space. I thought it would be interesting to share what I thought about, what I was afraid of and how and why I ultimately decided to say “yes” to making money as a personal content creator.

The Beginning

I started blogging about money in 2012 and honestly, what I put out for the first couple of years was messy. I started with Blogger, a free blogging platform until eventually I decided that I liked blogging enough to tackle using Wordpress. I’ll never forget sitting in Eric Rosenberg’s apartment in Denver wanting to use his turntables on Christmas Eve and hanging out with his girlfriend who would become his wife as he transferred my website to Wordpress. Something that I couldn’t afford to pay for at the time. I wasn’t a prolific blogger, but I was passionate about the space, the community and the content that I was putting out there and my hope was that if I could help at least one person by sharing my story-I’d made a difference.

2012 soon became 2013, 2014, and then 2017 arrived. It was around that time that I was really having some deep private conversations with myself about the value of my time vs. what I was putting out. I still had debt that I was paying off, I had made the leap into self-employment and was navigating what I enjoyed doing as an entrepreneur and I was increasingly asking myself the following question “Does it make sense for someone in the personal finance space to say “no” to money…especially when they needed it?

They… meaning me. And the other question that I literally spent years working through is how can I make money, still be authentic and still advocate for the financial changes and empowerment that I talked about on my platform. I didn’t want to make money with credit card sign ups, I loved affiliates but hadn’t yet found many affiliate programs that were a good fit and “lit me up” At the heart of the conflict that had over monetization was how to do it in such a way that I could still share what I believed without having the products or services that I partnered with negatively impact my brand? Finally I figured out how to monetize authentically while staying true to my brand.

I became incredibly clear about the overall mission of my brand which is to empower Black and Brown communities while educating and partnering with allied communities to increase access to financial tools, products and opportunities that were previously inaccessible to these communities. This looked like sharing free content in the form of podcast episodes, leads for projects and sharing opportunities such as grants, jobs and scholarships. Basically, kicking the door open and getting rid of financial gatekeeping.

Being candid about wanting to unapologetically want to earn more money. I decided to rebrand and “Michelle is Money Hungry” was born. I made it clear that I was modeling, earning more for other Black and Brown women to see and feel good about. I also shared the statistics that backed up why this initiative was so important.
Black women earn significantly less than white men
We are typically financially responsible for other relatives or friends who need financial support.
We’re battling what we don’t know such as the right wage to negotiate for
We have to bridge the financial gap that Americans find themselves dealing with in the form of: health insurance, childcare costs, expensive housing and more.
Also, the math wasn’t mathing. I was known for being in the process of paying off my debt. I had no business not making as m