Ep. 303: The Truth Behind Building a Million-Dollar Business with Inés Ruiz

Shannon Mattern: Inés thank you so much for being here on pep talks for side hustlers. Can you share a little bit more with our listeners about you and what you do?

Inés Ruiz: Uh, hi and thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to share this time with you. I mean, as with I, um, I have an online school teaching teachers how to teach a Spanish in line that was a lot of teach the same sentence and we are also developing a school, um, here in the States, um, helping students, um, connect with those teachers that we are training and we are certified by university. So you kind two branches of it. And then, um, I, I, I share my journey at DiaryofanEntrepreneur.com, and I have a free membership for, um, for women entrepreneurs. And I, I, I just want to share everything that is going on with me and help other women, um, as the same way you are like very honest and very transparent about, um, what this is about and all the things we go through. I share all of that through Diary of an Entrepreneur.

Shannon Mattern: So diary of an entrepreneur is, is that like the story of you building these other businesses? Is that, is that really what that was thought about?

Inés Ruiz: I share, um, you know, the things that I discovered what worked for me with D then I like to talk a lot about mindset as you've talked before, like mindset is one of the biggest thing. And I feel that I don't know if as women entrepreneurs that are very high achieving, we have a lot of blogs and a lot of barriers that we put on ourselves. So I talk about everything, you know, business life, uh, money, mindset, everything around that. I feel like somebody to talk to me about when I started,

Shannon Mattern: Oh my gosh, I love all of it. I want to talk about all of those things. So can you start off by sharing? Like some of the things that, that you tried in the, in the beginning, or like at any point that just really didn't work for you and how you kind of found your way?

Inés Ruiz: Wow. I love that question because I feel that sometimes we are just like, go, go, go. And we don't look back. If I look back my first year of business, um, I'm gonna go slightly a few months before that I was working at Cambridge university. I was a professor in England. And, um, that's when I met my husband, he was deployed he's in the air force and we met in England and there was a point that his like fav, um, every station me to the States and I was like, Oh, shoot, I don't know if I can close with you. But yeah, it was a big, Oh, wow. So, um, I was, uh, you know, point, wait, I think if you were, you would incorporate it before she, you understand, I don't see what we, those environments, I wasn't academia, but you can call it corporate, whatever it is.

Inés Ruiz: We do not even understand what mindset is. I was just go, go, go. My master's I have now almost three masters, two degrees. I like all of these things and just go, go, go that I didn't even have stop and fake. Like I might happy he sees what I'm want to do. And I realized that I was not happy. I couldn't get to that. I didn't know that that's what was going on, but I stuffed for a second. I was like, I'm not happy. I love teaching. I don't like it. A striction of the institutions, like everything else I have to do. Um, there's so much to have to prove I was youngest in that department. I was, you know, all of these things that just made it, it was, Oh, it was so heavy. And I didn't, I know, I understand all of this now, but back then, I was just like, you know what, I'm going with?

Inés Ruiz: You I'll figure it out. For me. It's more important to be with my person than a title or a career. And I want to be like, everybody was like, you crazy. Like you may, it you've 26 year old. And your boy, I came here to varsity and I was like, I don't know. I have no idea what I'm doing, but I know that this is not, I'm not going in. Good. I'm not going to end up going to get placed. Like, this is not who I want to be. I'm not enjoying this. I just be like, go, go mode for so long that cool. I haven't even stop for a second and be like, um, so he was like, he, what happened to skinny, his space, you know, for a second to be like, okay, let's see what's going on. And then I just started putting things together.

Inés Ruiz: I was like, okay, I have a master's in you learning. I love teaching the Spanish. I love teaching. I know I can help other teachers, um, you know, find better methods and connect better with our students. And at the end of the day, it's very business, you know, because it's like how to connect with your clients. It's like, it's exact same thing. How do you connect with your students? How to make their life better. Um, and that's when that school started to, you know, it was an idea. And then I remember we were at the, um, at the hotel on base, just waiting to be sent to the States we already had. We didn't have a house. We were leaving off once he pays on my computer and I sold my first course in that hotel waiting just to be, and I remember crying and looking at my husband and be like, babe, if I sell like four courses a month, that would be my salary. You know? And he's like, how can you?

Inés Ruiz: Yeah, I know. And now it's like this month, we already sold a $65,000 worth of courses, you know? And you look at that. And I think we forget a lot about the beginnings. We don't talk enough about the beginnings and, um, how we got here and what he took us because yes, I sold my first course in a hotel room, but that first year, um, I think I pay myself, myself $10,000 and nobody talks about that either. You know, I have a great salary now, but my first year, um, he was really rather, you know, an international move. We moved to a whole other country as a whole other culture. For me. It was a lot of, um, a lot of things. And you know, we're not eating organic. I can tell you that. [inaudible]

Inés Ruiz: um, so yeah. Thank you for that question because I don't think we go enough into those, um, beginnings. And I think it was a, your question of what would be then I think it was a matter of, I need, I have no idea about anything. I was just a teacher, right? Like, I don't know. I know how to create a course because that's what I do. But how noise sound is like now I put it at work, like why nobody's buying it. I didn't understand the power of social media to send email Lees. I have things on my website, dieted download for at least a month. You could just go in there, click, I get the download, you know? So, um, the first year was a process of, um, who we are, who are we connecting with? What do they need? You know? So it was a lot of figuring it out and trying to everything go, like I've tried everything.

Inés Ruiz: People are just upset. They try one thing and it doesn't work. It's like, yeah, 20, 31 works. I keep it, I try another 30 to work. I keep it. And that's how I kind of collected, let's say tools and things, that word for my business. But I tried everything, everything you can think of. And even I must, I'm going to add to this. Even things that I thought didn't work. Like I was doing webinars on my second year. It was a pain. I didn't know how to say was horrible. Didn't work. We move on other things last year. I was like, you know what? I'm going to give it another chance. I mean, another mindset I'm learned other things, so let's give it a go. And we are having amazing results with webinars. Everybody's now webinars on deck. We are having amazing. We have between 601,500 attendees. Um, we know how to convert now that we know how to guide them through, you know, it's, it's a lot of testing, but then also going back to the things that you are like, I will not do that. That doesn't work for me. And just having that learning mindset. Um, yes, sorry. I get too excited.

Shannon Mattern: All of the things that you just said, because I think, I mean, I know just me personally, the mindset in the early days was this didn't work. My idea must be terrible.

Inés Ruiz: I caught a ball. I didn't know what I'm doing.

Shannon Mattern: Yeah. I don't know what I'm doing. This must be wrong. I need to throw this thing away and make something different. And what that did slowed me down so much. I talk about this now. It's like, you know, I tried all these different things, but with different offers every single time. So it was like changing.

Inés Ruiz: You're always starting from scratch. Yes.

Shannon Mattern: Starting from scratch every time. And what that did for me was like, it kept me busy and it kept me creating and it didn't, and I wasn't putting things out there. And that's why, you know, I I'm so glad that you said that it's like, you, you got to try all these different things to make it work. But you know, don't just assume that the first, you know, the, the, the thing that you have to offer is not the right thing. It's the tactic, it's the words. It's the, this, you know,

Inés Ruiz: My mindset towards some things like, I don't know if he happens to you, but I used to hate upsells. I think there was leaky. It was salesy. I was like, I'm not doing that sales like that. Okay. So again, back into that mindset to those Norman and try and things, it's like, I'm a scientist. Right? Okay. Let's just stick my opinion out of this less drugs. So we did just an example, maybe the ass summit for teachers. So is a summit about teaching us Spanish languages, teaching online, all of this. And we are lucky that we work with a lot of collaborators. That was one of my first policies, collaboration and, you know, gathering everybody. So we did a conference and we were like, okay, um, you know, we are an institution. We can actually, um, you know, give certificates on things like that. So let's do an app.

Inés Ruiz: So you come into the summit for free. If you want to keep all the videos at the top, you know, a lot of people does that. Uh, we're gonna, you know, you have the upsell and we get your certification. Like you have attended this conference whistled, like we thousand dollars or off that upset. And I was like, okay, that's a good thing. I'm proving myself wrong. And I'm proving that, you know, I can just be objective and try different things and do them my way. I didn't do it in a, uh, bro marketing way. You know, I was like, what can you offer to my people? They most certifications. They are teachers. You always want to have that in your CV or something like that. So it's like, what do they need? They need that certification. Okay. Let's give them what other perks we can give them.

Inés Ruiz: You get all the videos, you also get extra materials. So I mainly work for myself instead of trying to force, which that's what happened at the beginning, trying to force a lot of marketing techniques or things, force them and not making them me. Now, when I say me, I mean, my company, you know, our corporate emails, like what we represent and just make it copy base. You know, they told me to say these are, they told me to add a deadline or they told me these. And instead of that, just making my way. And it's like, okay, I can always learn. And I can always, you know, kind of prove myself wrong. Like I hate that sales and now it's like, I'm sales everywhere, you know? So yeah, I think it's really important for us to, um, try and never say no, and it's not a failure. It's just like, it didn't work at that time. But now maybe a year after I know I have a whole other skillset, other mindset, maybe we can make it in a different way and it's okay. You know, it's, it's not black or white. Everything. There's always has to be that flexibility as entrepreneurs. And you know, that curiosity and wanting to try different things. I feel that if we not innovating, trying and testing, we are stuck. And that's the worst thing that kind of happening in our business.

Shannon Mattern: Oh my gosh. I so resonate with just also the things that like didn't work for me at the beginning now that I've learned so much more and I have different mindset and all the things like now I've made them work for me and I'm doing it in a way that like, I feel good about, but at the same time, just exactly what you said and basically repeating what you said, because I like, I can still resonate with all of it. It's just, you know, I'm just putting my, like, taking my own opinion out of it. Like maybe I'm not motivated by a deadline and I'm not motivated by an upsell. And I make decisions, make decisions differently than other people. But that doesn't mean I have to put my biases into everything that I am doing. Um, you know, for, because I know that my clients are a little bit different in the way that they make decisions. And I'm, I'm just kind of recently finding that out with testing out some different things about, I have some fast decision makers. I have some slow decision makers. I have people that like, don't need a whole lot of hand holding. I have people that need more. And if I'm like, if I am choosing to limit based on my own, my own decision making, like I am excluding so many people from buying from me because I am like unintentionally forcing them into my life.

Inés Ruiz: Tell him how you want them to buy from you. Yeah. Yeah. And, and I feel as well that we need to have a mindset that is not by saying this item mean that we need to go around running and testing everything because I feel as the other problem we have, I had that at the beginning. I was like running like a chicken without a man. Can I say that in English?

Shannon Mattern: Yes. I'll tell you with our head cut off. Yes.

Inés Ruiz: Yeah. So I worked like that, just trying everything. So now what I do now is like, okay. And all the thing that I would like to say, I mean, for me is I, I kept my phone directional courses. So I've been for these four years and a half, I've been selling the same course. I've been just adding extra things that go with it. So that's one thing that I always kept kept on, um, a very basic offering and very concentrate on what I'm doing instead of trying to go all the way. So that's my thing. And then what we do now is for example, for this year, um, which I think we are a lot when you have a big email list. I think we have like 90,000 people right now in our email list and you have big numbers and you have all of these.

Inés Ruiz: We cannot take decisions on a split second before we do a decision that I can take right now can cost me $20,000. So everything has to be, which it has helped me to slow down because I'm very fast, you know? Um, I know all of that. So what we did was sit down and be like, okay, let's organize our year themes. So on January, I want guys asked to work on the shop. I want to make it to convert more. Let's work on the shop. And then on February, we're going to work on the checkout. I don't like to check out that we have let's work on that and how can we make the process way easier. So, you know, we kind of put things that we wanted to work on, like a monthly themes. And then we have kind of a list of things that we call the list.

Inés Ruiz: Like, whew, I just sold this new software. Uh, let's put it on the playlist. And whenever we have a bit of breathing time, we will go there. So I think we are a bit more cautious because we know the fact of what we do. It has a bigger impact on before, before, you know, I could just go to my team and be like, Hey, let's test this, that like final and tomorrow we are testing it. But right now, everything that we do, the consequences, the ripple effect is way bigger, which I think it has helped me to, you know, for us to be more organized and still test things, but in a different way. So it's more like a game or, Hey, I saw this post on Gary VSP and I love it. Can we just something similar for our teachers? So it's like this, um, keeping not disturbing the flow of the business because we tend to be like, you know, jumping on these and excited about things. So I tend not to, um, interrupt my team and you know, the flow of it, but then I will just bring ideas and we will test them out. So he's a very balanced, um, on that I'm happy the right team, that they know how to manage you as an entrepreneur and getting excited about all these things. And, but I've never stopped doing that. It's just in a more conscious way I will say now. So yeah. Tests everything, but always not interrupting your business. I think that's the summary of what I'm trying to say.

Shannon Mattern: Yeah. And I think that's so important because it does pull you back away from, from your marketing and which I want to ask you about that too. I mean, you go from, you know, creating this course and selling one in your hotel room to an email list of 90,000. Like, can you kind of share that, that progression and the timeline of that growth and some, maybe some of the tactics that worked really well.

Inés Ruiz: Yeah. I don't have the numbers with me about the email list. I have them somewhere how we grow the email list, but, um, the first year, like we didn't have an email list. I was just giving everything for free at the end of the send email marketing. And so he was, I think we might end up a year maybe with 3000 people, but it was just, um, you know, my market, these teachers. So we created a lot of materials, so they would just opt in to download something. And then we started doing, we did webinars for a while, and then we've been doing a lot of, um, op teams like, um, diaries or books or things like that. And webinars have been like a big thing for us and collaborations. We, since day one, I been collaborating with, um, my influencers, you know, there's the influencers in every single market.

Inés Ruiz: So there are Spanish teachers influencers too. So the first thing I did was contact them. And at the beginning they were working with me for free. I just went open, you know, open and honest, like, listen, I worked at Cambridge university, I'm creating this school. I have zero money. Um, I have lasting work with you. I love your word a lot, you know, so very openly. And I'm telling you, nobody said, no, they all say yes. Um, so we started doing this collaborations, who we do, contests. We do a lot of contests with them, with us. Um, so it's been a lot of collaboration, uh, and that has been a lot of people to us and they are athletes too. So we reward them for doing all of that. So I think, um, that's what we started in the past year. We actually have cut down a bit of lead gen, especially bots, because I don't feel the leads that we're getting with that quality.

Inés Ruiz: That's the, that's a thing you can grow a list really fast. Um, the thing is like if that list converts, uh, we are lucky that our list convert really well and most of our sales come from our email list, but it took us a lot of cleaning it up. Or these, I think this happened to me, but I think this happens to a lot of entrepreneurs too. I wasn't clear about my market, so I was kind of niche, but didn't want to be nice. So I was trying to be more general and that didn't work. So, you know, it took me out, it took us a while to figure out, um, you know, who we wanted to serve. I'm not feeling like I feel that we were, we wanted to be like, okay, we're training teachers, but maybe we can just train teachers because that opens up our market.

Inés Ruiz: But then we don't have things for them. We don't resonate with them will resonate with language teachers. Um, so I think we grow a lot, the least as well, but with now with the right leads that we have to clean up the list, um, bots were great for me personally, the work anymore. Um, it has lost a lot of engagement with Facebook, for whichever reason, Facebook. I don't think they are liking them much anymore. Um, but these past year it's been webinars, um, contests with athletes and we discovered a few. That's the thing. When you, when you, when you pay attention to your numbers, I think the numbers are key in income, but also like we track how many downloads we have, what are we selling more like we track all those things. So if we know, for example, that a diary for teachers works well every year we're gonna do it.

Inés Ruiz: So again, it's like picking the things at work. I keep it, you know, I know conscious work. Okay, we'll keep that. And then it's just finding, you know, different ways to, to work with them. But if we do a contest, we can easily get something between five and 10,000, uh, leads. Um, so it's not that hard for us to generate leads now because we've tested and we know what kind of things work. Uh, now we are refining. Do we want to do the diary? Not really because it's attracting a broader spectrum that might not be our prospect buyers. Um, so it says, I think with every year it kind of during tensions kind of change. Um, so at the beginning we just wanted to grow the list. Then now we are working more on having a more specific list that people who are really interested and in some point are going to buy, we don't, we are not, our courses are relatively expensive for, you know, the European market, especially new locations since education is almost free over there. Um, so our selling process is way longer. Um, you know, a lot of experts says they have to buy within the first 15 days or something like that. Our prospects can take anything from one week to six months. So we are in the long run here. We nurture, nurture, nurture, and then whenever they ready, it's a very conscious decision to work with us. Um, so yeah, we are working now on maybe not getting so many leads, but getting leads that are more, um, our kind of people.

Shannon Mattern: I love that. And so you you've like tested and experimented all these things in your own business, and then you create diary of an entrepreneur. At what point did you decide, like I need to help other people with what I'm learning over here, building this business?

Inés Ruiz: I think it was when, I mean at the beginning, I didn't know anything so I could write, but I think once I crossed six figures and I started joining masterminds and, um, you know, seeing what seven figures ease and all of these, I was like, I was feeling, and I'm going to tell you these, I wasn't in one of the biggest masterminds. Um, and you can be ended up in the entrepreneur world. And I saw the struggle of a lot of people that had seven figure. And you have on your newsfeed with ads and you're like, dude, I know you're struggling. Like why not? You know, people are not really sharing the reality of all of this. And when I started to seeing that and I'm not, so I made it to seven fears and I was struggling. And all of these dudes in here are mostly struggling.

Inés Ruiz: Like there's something not right. There is something that we are not doing, right. And we are. And if you don't talk about it, you are setting the wrong expectations to those women who are five or get it to 60 years because you are not sharing the reality of this. And that's when I was like, I don't want to be part of these. There's all the way of doing business and all the things that I felt wrong or felt that I was not enough or that I had no idea about business or all those things are coming back. You know, it's like, I'm taking my power back off. We know what we're doing. We do know if not, we will not be here. Doesn't matter if you've done $1,000, $1 million, you know how to make money, you know what you're doing and you're going to figure it out.

Inés Ruiz: We all gonna to figure it out. So I'm not bad now or worse for being in this mastermind or not. And what I did is I got out of that mastermind 2000, I'll tell you about 2000. At the end of 2018, we did a seven figure a year and he was a disaster. He was a major disaster because Shannon, I was stressed and I didn't trust myself. I was leaving my decisions based off my coaches, my mentors, which they have no idea about my market. And, but I just felt like, I don't know, I never had a seven figure teacher. You know, I was putting my value in other people who have no idea about my team, about my people on, about what we do. And yes, we scale, we scale to almost immediate dollar this year, but I ended up with a line of credit and nobody talks about that.

Inés Ruiz: Nobody talks about having, I have six figure lunches. I had them, but then they don't tell you how much Facebook ads cost you. You know, I have a six figure launch, but I spent $40,000 on Facebook. My team, uh, you know, all the admin costs had gone up because everybody's working like crazy. And then we have whatever, all the expenses design or whatever it is. And I have a six figure business and their net profit was $7,000. And nobody's talking about that. So, no, I don't want you to pick, to put a six figure launch on a pedestal because that's not the reality of it. You tell me, what's your profit on that. And then we got to talk. Um, so I just wanted to share all of that. I feel they see when I made it, I feel deceived and I felt that I was just thought of that, the CV.

Inés Ruiz: And if I just talk about the good things, but I don't talk about the reality of feet or what I'm learning. I learned from that, you know, from the profit from seven figures, our profit was ridiculous. I think we're nearly $14,000 that year. And we ended up in debt because the expenses were not going down anymore. So last year I said, that was my mantra. Some people would not like it, but my mantra was, I don't want a seven figure business. I want a six figure profit. Yes. And I keep on saying that old year I was not looking at the numbers. I was just better decisions, better decisions. We want a seven, six figure profit. And we did it last year. We almost got $2,000 profit do in doing $3,000 less. So, no, I don't want a seven figure. I want to see six feet, double six, figure profit. And nobody talks about that. And I feel that I shut down for a bit, which I guess it happens to a lot of us. Like, I felt like a fraud. How am I talking about how are you there to call me seven fever owner when I'm in that, how I end up with a line of credit, how I can help other women if I'm in the middle of this. So for a while I felt like I lost my voice because I could speak up.

Inés Ruiz: I was like, it's my fault. You know? And what happened is that I just started getting my power back from my team. When we went in the middle of that, I know they're fantastic and expensive coaches last because that's another good thing when there's no money, you see who's there and who's not. So that was a very big cleanse, right? And my team came to me and they were like, we know you like to learn and all of that, but we don't want any coach. We want you to tell us what to do in marketing. We're done. And that was like, cool. Okay. My team trusts me over all of these. Maybe it's my time to show up. And I had to show up big time on every aspect of the company. There was nobody. I have nobody to go and talk with because they all feel disappeared when the line of credit happened, because that's the thing.

Inés Ruiz: They praise you when you are on the top. But when things go route, they are out. You're not my client anymore. You know? Um, he took a lot out of me. Um, but he helped me and I'm grateful about it because I realized that I have the power. I have the decisions I can work with my team and we can figure things out. And now I, I hired experts. Like for example, we went to develop our YouTube. I'll just go to an expert in YouTube. Um, but I have not been in a mastermind. I have not been in any heavy coaching or anything like that. Um, just because I feel like this is the time to have the power bike and seeing the numbers that kind of gave me some validation of what I'm doing is right for me, for my team and for my business. And I always love to have mentors and to have, and learning, but from a different perspective of, you can add to my life, but it doesn't mean that without you, I'm not enough. I mean, off on my own, you can help me add some things or, you know, um, grow in some areas. But if you're not there, I'm still okay. And that's a really hard thing to swallow for other women

Shannon Mattern: Was getting really emotional over here, hearing you talk about this, because I feel like what is marketed out there makes us feel like we're not enough. I mean, it's always a choice. We can think whatever we choose to think. Yeah. But your honesty in this whole process is just so refreshing because you know, we're all striving. Not all. I have been at a point in my business that I let go like last year of like, I don't want that. I don't think that that is the place where I want to go. I don't want to try to get there. I want to be profitable. I want to make a living. I do want to grow this company as big as I can grow it. What you're saying is just so refreshing to when you said, like, I trust myself, I know I have the answers. I know I can do this. I don't need to put that on anybody else. And you know, people aren't sharing the whole story. And I just, I cannot thank you enough for saying that because I don't think everybody's disingenuous. I really, really don't, but I'm just like, what's the other side of this picture

Inés Ruiz: Is fear. It's fair to say the true them be both durable. And, and the thing is like, I feel that when I was in all of that, I have so much pressure because I have to body date, everybody, this call it. And I had, you know, I was like doing what they were telling me, but inside I knew I not gonna work. That's not gonna work. And if it doesn't your fault or whatever, everybody, it was like, okay, this is the w that was the worst case scenario that you could put me when I was alone with any, um, you know how your health let's say, you know, somebody who knew more than me, I was in a better position. And you know what, nothing happens. If you mess it up, you mess it up. Like, that's just nothing happens. You're not going to die. Your business, nothing is going to happen. And so it's like, shoot, like I thought this was like the worst thing that could happen to me. And we actually started a year with minus 20,000 and we still make, you know, more than $600,000. I have all this profit, like if this is word like a happened, okay.

Inés Ruiz: So much fresher ourselves. And be like, I don't know how to do this. I need somebody, I need a mastermind. I need a coach, all these things. But all of that is a good plan, but you are okay on your own. And if it takes, people have taken me, maybe, um, it's gonna take me because I'm not getting to the seven figures and the six, you know, 600, 700 kind of a range. And it's gonna take me another year if I want to, to maybe get to seven figures, but I'm going to be growing in a way that is sustainable and works for my business. And I'm growing with profit instead of one year, I'm exploding because that's what happened the prior year with the 420. So we went from that from 900 something, almost a million. Can you imagine that that stress and their happiness of doubling your business in one year to those numbers, we felt the right foundation because you did not have the right foundation.

Inés Ruiz: We were doing things that we were supposed to be doing or putting money on certain types of fats or omnipresence or these or that. And then the profit. It was not there. That was the problem that they can help you grow with certain things. But if you don't have the full nation, it just crumbled. And that's exactly what happened to us, everything crumbled. And I have to build everything from scratch. Um, I think it was the best thing, you know, it was not a humbling experience or anything like that. It was, it was built in my confidence. That's what it was. It helped me build my confidence. And it's like, okay, you know what to do, listen for God's sake, listen to your intuition for once, you know, stop deviating or stop, you know, be like, Oh, you don't know anything. You know, that's not good enough, but that's not, that's not a good idea.

Inés Ruiz: That's a stupid stop doing that, going with it. And what happened is my team was on board for almost everything. Like, you know, they are supportive, not in a crazy way. That idea. Yeah. That's a good idea. Now they are, they have the same mindset because we work on that. Yeah. Let's try with the bare minimum. You know, we don't try to do these massive things, but Hey, we can try this, this box. Let's figure it out. You know, miss take us a few days of work and let's test it. Um, I was, it was a building process and I think a lot of women getting that limbo and never had the wake up, wake up, call that I had ended up like that. But they give up before they get it. Yeah. It's always, even at those levels, even a seven figures, you think that, Oh, the next you know, I just need this in my, I just need these scores at seven, six figures, seven figures. It's the same thing. You're just going to have coaches who are selling bigger courses of your mastermind never ends the not enoughness doesn't end at five figures, six figures, seven figures, eight figures. There's always something bigger, shinier, more expensive to sales. So I was like, I don't know if this is what a seven figure business. Maybe I'd be like, yeah, but I've used using my way. I don't want to be my worst Venus and my income be attached to a person that is not me or my team.

Inés Ruiz: You can help me up, but my weakness is not attached to your mastermind price. Wow. This topic is just, Oh my gosh. Like I want to, what's your, I want to talk about the mindset a little bit more, cause I know it's so important. We only have a few minutes left. So if I could ask you, you know, and I asked this question to everybody who comes on the show, I would say, I would talk to you for another two hours. If we like this conversation is so good, I don't want to end it, but I'm like, dang it. Um, what is one belief that you had to change about yourself to get where you are today? I know you shared a lot, if you could just kind of boil it down to that one key, but I, it was money. I told you that the physio was really rough. The first month I had no idea what I was doing. I'm like, it's okay to say it.

Inés Ruiz: And I think, um, in that summer, I, um, because I wasn't certain of what was going on. I actually apply for the university here to work as a teacher. And they, um, they were like, yeah, they look at my CV. And then when I get, we have a place for you with an interview, like, yes, come here. And he was again, that, which I guess is the other way around, right? Like corporate, um, calling with a, you know, like save every month. You're gonna have it a man, my business that I have no idea what I'm doing. I feel so incompetent. You know, I can be back to be a teacher, the university where I sleep pretty safe being, or being in this uncertainty. And I don't know who I am or what I'm doing. I feel so unworthy. I know. So it was like that collaboration.

Inés Ruiz: Then we launched a course. Um, so our first course was teaches Spanish. And the second one we launched was teaching Spanish to children. And I remember we, and, um, we did a little bit of a challenge. You know, I was starting to see what challenges an email. And, um, we sold in one week, $18,000. I didn't touch the money for a month. I had this wave of what do I do with this money? It's gonna go away. I had a lot of problems with money, anything money-wise it felt so icky felt so bad. You know, I come from being a teacher, we're just okay. Pay, you know, I'm used to work ridiculous amounts of hours for another month. And then suddenly you're telling me that in a week I did $18,000. So it was like fear. It was huge fear of I'm gonna run out.

Inés Ruiz: Um, so anything Mani mindset. I think that that's being key. Um, for me, especially when I started to having people in my team that just that heaviness, because it's like, I know I can figure it out. There's no problem. But when you have people and families, you know, dependent on you, that's when you just started to be cool. So I had to work a lot in terms of my relationship with money and there's, you know, and I know this is stereotypical, but there's abundance and it's more about, again, I to sell some trust in ourselves, you know how to make money, if you have ever done any money, even if it's just 50 bucks in line, you know how to make money. So he's just, again, trusting that it's going to be okay, you know, you know how to generate money and it's going to come back.

Inés Ruiz: It's, it's like an endless cycle. You know, it's not something that you can decide when it happens or not. And I feel that changing the way I look at money in terms of I'm going to run out of it, but more in terms of, um, how much often can we create, you know, like, yes, I have $40,000 now in the bank. And before I would think like, Oh my God, our monthly Spanx expenses are $30,000. Instead of thinking about that, it's like how much we can create, um, you know, thinking for a more, like, let's say abundance, um, place than the lab. And I think if you come from corporate or any normal job, you're always in a lack mentality of I'm going to run out. I'm just pleased to be the first of a mom. So I get my salary, you know, so you are always in that lag and that anxiety towards money and depending on your family history, that still that's hap.

Inés Ruiz: So suddenly it's hard for us to not that first a month for sure. Money coming in. So changing that mentality and be more, um, as a flow, I don't think about money as numbers now is more like a flow or I don't look, I should look. And sometimes we sit down and we look at the numbers, but, um, I'm more worried about the flow. So I worry more about daily sales, weekly sales, more than the big numbers. I know how a good flow of monies, if there's something that is not right. I talk with my team and be like, what can we do? What can we do to open more doors? You know? So it's more like a flow feeling done, um, number that is lacking, I will say if that makes sense.

Shannon Mattern: Oh my gosh. Do you ever feel like, you know, when you have these conversations, that they're the ones you needed to have on that particular day, because that's exactly how I feel talking to you today. It's just like, Oh my gosh, I personally needed to hear everything that you said today. And I know my audience is going to feel the exact same way. I mean, I, yeah, like you guys couldn't see my eyes getting all glassy, but you just, the things that you share are so powerful, especially the, just the message about trusting yourself. And if you've ever made a dollar, you can, you can make more. And I just, you know, the, the way that you're supporting female entrepreneurs to create, you know, the, the life that they want to create through business and through providing value and, you know, just, this are how our self worth grows through that is just, it's just, you know, absolutely amazing. So I can't thank you enough for being here. Like I said, I could talk to you for another hour, but can you share with our listeners where we can connect with you, learn more about you learn from you?

Inés Ruiz: Yeah. You guys can go to diary of an entrepreneur.com and I'm allowed on Instagram too. So it's Diary of an entrepreneur official. Um, so you guys can find me on Instagram. I love Chuggy with everybody. And then in the website you can access and we have a little free membership, so you can access an, a star, you know, um, started learning for free, which I that's what I did at the beginning. I just Google everything. So I just want it to be that, um, concentrating formation for women who want to start their business.

Shannon Mattern: Oh my gosh. Thank you so, so much for being here. I really appreciate it. I'll link up everything in the show notes and you guys absolutely have to go check out all of those resources and follow her on Instagram. Thank you so much.

Inés Ruiz: Thank you so much.