We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Gwen Jimmere. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Gwen below.

Alright, Gwen thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Before we talk about all of your success, let’s start with a story of failure. Can you open up about a time when you’ve failed?

I started my first company, Naturalicious in 2013 with just $32 in the bank as a single mom; and grew it to over $20 million in revenue. I then started another company, Good Hair Bar, a state-of-the-art salon and spa. Unlike when I started Naturalicious, I had plenty of capital to start that business.

I’ve always been good with money. I’m not a spendthrift. I pay myself first. I invest, I save. I don’t do debt. But against my better judgment, I took out a ton of loans for this new business, thinking I had the Midas touch, and that every business I started would automatically be highly successful, just like my first one.

Needless to say, Good Hair Bar became a statistic and was one of the 50% of businesses that failed in the first three years. This left me with hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay back. I was depressed and was left feeling like not only was the business a failure, but so was I.

Just as this was happening, I went through the worst breakup of my life, and my mom had just passed away a few months prior. With a broken heart and empty pockets, I spent months wondering, “How did I get here? Things like this don’t happen to people like me.”

I recall my son asking me to buy him a pair of $45 Crocs because his old ones had holes in them. Normally, whatever he wanted, I was able to just buy it. No big deal. But this time, I had to sheepishly tell him that we didn’t have the money. He looked at me, worried, and asked “Mommy, are we running out of money? Do you need me to help with the bills?”

That crushed me. I always want my son to feel secure at home: physically, emotionally, and financially. He should enjoy being a kid. Not worrying about if we can afford to keep the lights on.

I called myself being a good steward of the blessings I’d be given. I hadn’t gone off spending money foolishly on designer shoes, luxury bags or exotic trips. Personally, I still lived frugally, despite the success of my first business, and yet there I was in this situation, wondering not only how this happened to me, but how I was possibly ever going to recover.

One day I broke down on Instagram Live and shared that I was grieving way too many losses in my life at one time and I was having a hard time with it. I really just needed to get it off my chest in a transparent way. I didn’t want to hide or pretend like everything was ok when it wasn’t.

The next day, a friend called and asked me what my plan was. I told her I didn’t know, but all I did know was that I’m a winner and that I never stay down for long.

The following week I put together a debt pay-off plan and I got super aggressive about paying off this massive debt I had incurred. I avoided as many non-essential purchases as I could and cut my costs significantly. I had to say no to a lot of things I really wanted to buy or do because I was focused on getting out of debt as quickly as possible.

I stopped feeling sorry for myself, and took responsibility for the decisions I had made. I also started to realize that just because the business failed did not mean that I was personally a failure. I started tapping into the great money habits I always had, and I found myself paying the debt off, one loan or card at a time.

Within 8 months, I had paid off $147,000 and was out of personal, consumer debt. I couldn’t believe it!

Soon after, I started making videos on how to get out of debt and grow wealth, and I found that people were really gravitating to the way I make money topics simple, easy to understand, and actionable.

That’s how the Get Money Show started. It’s my weekly show on YouTube and it’s growing very quickly. The fulfillment I get from seeing the proverbial lightbulb go off in people’s minds when they “get” the topic and implement it into their lives is like none other.

From that, I started The Get Money Crew on Facebook, which is a free, private group that serves as a safe space for people to ask money questions and get answers right away.

I will continue to grow this community, and although I went through an incredibly tumultuous time in my life, I am grateful for it now. Because without it, I would never have thought to teach personal finance management that helps thousands of people get financially free and live the lives they truly want.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

It can be awkward writing about myself, so I’ll share my official bio:

Gwen Jimmere is a gifted visionary on an unrelenting mission to challenge the standard of beauty. As CEO of both Naturalicious Beauty, she leads a beauty empire that creates high-performing, time-saving beauty solutions that have collectively saved over 140,000 women more than 1.2 million minutes on their beauty routines.

She’s cemented her place in history as the first African-American woman to hold a patent for natural haircare products, and her products can be found in over 40 countries around the world and in over 2500 retail stores, including Ulta, Whole Foods, and Sally Beauty.

Named, “the world’s leading authority on textured hair care”, she is an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Winner, and has been named one of the 100 Most Influential African Americans in the U.S. along with the likes of Beyonce, Serena Williams, and LeBron James; as well as a Top 10 Business Woman in the U.S., and a Crain’s 40 Under 40.

As host of The Get Money Show on Youtube and everywhere podcasts are available, Gwen shares her experience and wisdom on both business and personal finance, teaching those who tune in how to build a 7 figure net worth, even if they’re starting from nothing like she did.

So, whether you’re hustling on starting a new business, or plotting the next move for your personal money empire, Gwen invites you to join the her Get Money Crew, where success isn’t just a goal; it’s the only option.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

A lot of people focus on building big numbers on social media. I focus on building strong communities. I call this going deep, as opposed to going wide.

There are thousands of stories about people with 100k followers, who are broke and can’t get anyone to buy from them. I’m less interested in being popular and more interested in being profitable.

Most people are in a race to make money as soon as possible on social media. The problem is that, even if they have short-term success with it, it doesn’t usually last… or it becomes a hard, daunting, energy-draining sell every time.

No, thank you.

What I do, instead, is take the time to create tons and tons of value. I give away a lot of incredible, free information for months before I ever ask anyone to buy anything. If you can give away some of your best content for free — content that actually improves the lives of your audience — they’re going to be clamoring to buy whatever you have when the time comes.

In this way, I will already have created a loyal audience, who trusts what I’m saying, and who knows I have their best interest in mind.

By the time I offer them something to purchase, they already see me as a friend — someone they can relate to, who is just like them.

They see me as an authority or expert in my niche, which for years was hair care with my award-winning brand, Naturalicious. I’ve more recently pivoted to focusing on money and personal finance. In both instances, I’ve provided my community with tons of knowledge that they’ve been able to implement and see results right away. So they know that I know what I’m talking about.

And finally they see me as someone they admire. I share my own stories transparently. I’m not afraid to use myself as an example. I tell them about how I messed up with my own money and how I fixed my finances. In this way, they feel like if I did it, that they can do it too.

All of this ultimately builds loyalty.

Combining all these elements together — becoming the friend, the expert, and someone they admire — allows me to go deep with my audience. And when I make them an offer to purchase something I’ve created, they’re purchasing it because they trust me and they believe I have the solution to their challenge.

To me, that’s the best and easiest way to build an audience. If you do that, the numbers will come naturally. But if you solely focus on getting a bunch of followers and you haven’t done the work to provide them with incredible value, you’re only stoking your ego.

And ego strokes have never paid any bills.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

My niche is focused on money and helping regular people build a 7 figure net worth. I’ve read a lot of books on money. 217 books on money, in fact!

But out of all of those, there are three specific books helped me get out of the rat race and taught me how to build a 7 figure net worth.

I actually created a whole episode of my show, The Get Money Show, detailing them, which you can watch here: https://youtu.be/-RYFpfm7LPA?si=VhPoroR1RkBUnDM3

I break them down into the book that will help you survive, the book that will help you sustain and maintain, and the book that will help you thrive.

They are as follows:
Survive – Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey
Sustain and Maintain – Get Good with Money by Tiffany Aliche
Thrive – Fearless Finances by Cassandra Cummings

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.gwenjimmere.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thegwenshow
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thegwenshow
• Youtube: www.youtbe.com/gwenjimmere
• Yelp: `