We recently connected with Michelle Schroeder-Gardner and have shared our conversation below.

Michelle, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Do you take vacations? Why or why not?

Yes, I take vacations all the time! In fact, I traveled full-time for around 10 years. About half that time was in an RV and the other half I was sailing and traveling on a sailboat. I also have run my business from an around the world cruise to 30 countries.

One of the biggest reasons that I run my online business was to have the flexibility to travel and enjoy life while still making an income.

For entrepreneurs who feel like they can’t take a break, I recommend focusing on automation, outsourcing, and setting clear boundaries. Scheduling content in advance (I will write articles months in advance, for example), automating emails, and funnels and having a team (even if it’s just one virtual assistant) can make a huge difference. My virtual assistant is a huge lifesaver, she handles most of the day-to-day tasks for me so that I can have a flexible schedule all the time.

Another tip is to build a business that doesn’t require your constant presence. For example, my blog earns passive income through affiliate marketing and display ads, allowing me to take time off without worrying about income stopping.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m Michelle Schroeder-Gardner, the founder of MakingSenseofCents.com, a personal finance and lifestyle blog that helps people take control of their money, start side hustles, and build online businesses. Making Sense of Cents is one of the longest running personal finance websites too!

My journey into blogging started as a personal passion project in 2011 when I was working full-time in finance and paying off my student loans. What began as a way to track my own financial progress (I was working on paying off my student loan debt as fast as I could) quickly grew into a profitable business, allowing me to leave my traditional job and travel full-time while earning a six-figure (and sometimes seven-figure) income.

On Making Sense of Cents, I teach others how to reach financial freedom by sharing personal finance tips, side hustle ideas, and business ideas.

What sets me apart is my ability to make boring or hard financial topics easier to understand (I like to write as though I am talking to a friend), as well as sharing business ideas and ways to make extra money that people may not know about. I’m proud of the impact my blog has had – helping others pay off debt, quit jobs they dislike, and build businesses they love.

At the heart of my brand, I want my audience to know that financial freedom is possible, and you don’t have to follow a traditional path to create a life you love.

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

Yes, my side hustle turned into my full-time career, and it completely changed my life. I started Making Sense of Cents in 2011 while working full-time at a financial services company and paying off my student loans.

At first, my blog was simply a way to track my financial journey and talk to others who were also working towards not living paycheck to paycheck. I never imagined it would become my main source of income or that I would leave my job to blog.

In the beginning, I was trying to find ways to make extra money so that I could pay off my student loans quickly. I still remember writing blog posts and asking people if they knew of any other ways to make money that were flexible. Eventually, I learned that I could make money online, such as by freelance writing and blogging.

I grew Making Sense of Cents by focusing on ways to make money from my blog while keeping things as simple as possible. One of the biggest things that helped was affiliate marketing – I started recommending products I actually used and made sure my blog posts could bring in traffic for years. I also added display ads to my blog posts, started doing sponsored partnerships, and built my course, Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing to create multiple income streams.

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

I built my social media accounts by focusing on sharing quality posts, being consistent (this is SO important!), and engaging with my readers.

I didn’t try to be on every platform at once – I focused on what worked best for me. For example, Pinterest was a game-changer for my blog traffic, and I used it to drive millions of page views. When I first started on Pinterest, so many people told me that I was wasting my time and that my readers weren’t even on there – wow, were they wrong! I think Pinterest is a great place for most industries.

Facebook is also an important platform, where I have built an engaged community through my blog’s page and Facebook groups.

For anyone just starting, my biggest advice is to focus on one or two platforms where your audience is most active. Don’t try to do everything at once. Try to be consistent with posting (for example, I create around brand new pins every single day on Pinterest), share useful content, and interact with your followers (reply to their comments!). Also, make sure your social media presence is leading people back to something you own, like your website or email list, so you aren’t fully dependent on social platforms. Social media is great, but you don’t own it, so that’s why I recommend doing that.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.makingsenseofcents.com/
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/michelleschro
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/makingsenseofcents1
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/senseofcents
• Other: https://pinterest.com/senseofcents