We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Deacon Hayes a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Deacon, thanks for joining us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?
When my wife and I got married, we combined our finances and realized we had $52,000 of debt out side of mortgage debt. We were just starting off in life and felt like we were starting out behind and weighed down by debt. We decided we wanted to figure out how to pay it off in a short period of time so that we could have less stress and more peace of mind. After a lot of hard work and sacrifice we were able to pay off all $52,000 of debt in only 18 months. This was a liberating feeling and inspired to start a website called Wellkeptwallet.com where I would share tips on how we made money and save money so that we could pay off our debt. I realized having a real life experience in paying off our debt gave me credibility to people reading our content therefore we were able to gain an audience that felt like they could relate.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
Before I started my site, I was a licensed financial planner. I realized that most people who successful in that industry worked with high net-worth clients. I had a desire to help the everyday person, so I knew there had to be a better way. So I started my site as a way to educate the everyday person on how to make more money and save more money so that they could achieve their financial goals in life. It is so rewarding to hear stories of people paying off their debt or saving for a vacation and it is a privilege to be a small part of that.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
At first I really struggled to make money with my website. In order to help offset the lack of income, I realized that I had learned a skill that I could make money with on the side. I had built the website myself and I knew other business owners who needed a website to better represent their brands. So i started a side business where I built websites for other business owners. In the process, I also learned Search Engine Optimization and the added that as a service as well. Before I knew it, I established a very profitable side business that help fund my original business. Eventually Well Kept Wallet became much more profitable than the digital marketing business, so I sold that business in order to spend more time on Well Kept Wallet.
Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.
One of things that really helped me turn my side business into a full time income was leaning into my own personal story which was unique and no one else had. I was able to take our story of paying off $52,000 of debt in only 18 months and pitch it to credible news outlets like Yahoo Finance, MSN Money and more. That exposure gave us a huge boost in readers and credibility in our space. I remember one time when I did a local TV spot, the camera guy asked if he could take a video of my budget form on our site. Not thinking much of it, I said, ‘sure.’ Well, apparently people were so interested that we got tens of thousands of people to visit that page and made a few thousand dollars in ad revenue in a just a few days. Keep in mind this was a free form, so this was a huge eye opener for me. If we could get traffic to the site, we could figure out how to make money even if we did not charge the read a penny.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://wellkeptwallet.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wellkeptwallet/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WellKeptWallet
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/well-kept-wallet-llc
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/WellKeptWallet
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/wellkeptwallet
Image Credits
Deacon Hayes