How I Bootstrapped a $4 Million Company, with Laura Roeder

Afford Anything | Make Smart Money Choices

Paula Pant | Cumulus Podcast Network

Entrepreneurship, Investing, Business

4.7 • 3.6K Ratings

🗓️ 29 May 2017

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

#79: When Laura Roeder was 22, she quit her job to become a full-time freelancer. She earned $30,000 in her first year as a freelancer; $60,000 in her second year. Ten years later -- (Laura is now 32) -- her company earns $4 million in annual revenue. (Can I repeat that? Did I bury the lede? *Laura went from making $30,000 per year to owning 100% of a company that earns $4 million per year.* And she did this within a decade. Oh, and she also had a baby.) (Like, whoa.) Laura is the founder and CEO of a software company called Edgar, which provides social media automation for entrepreneurs and small businesses. In this interview, I ask Laura (sophisticated) questions such as "How the f**k did you make the leap from freelancer to multi-million-dollar company owner?" Here are some of the insights that she shares: #1: You have nothing to lose. When Laura quit her job, she conquered her fears by reminding herself: "Hey, worst-case-scenario, I work an hourly retail job for awhile if I can't find any clients." Sure, that might suck. But is the worst-case-scenario *so bad* that it's a deal-breaker? When Laura realized that the worst-case-scenario was something that she could live with, she proceeded full-speed ahead. #2: Cut the cord. When Laura transitioned from freelancing to consulting (her intermediate step before starting Edgar), she knew that if she maintained her client base, she wouldn't be motivated to grow her consulting business. So she cut the cord. She dropped all of her clients, including one extremely lucrative contract, in order to motivate herself. #3: Look for what's next. Laura's transition follows a sensible narrative arc: employee, freelancer, consultant, software company founder. Each step led to the next opportunity. Freelancing turned into consulting, which turned into a kernel of an idea for a software company. She couldn't have predicted, at age 22, where she'd be in 10 years. She simply proceeded one step at a time. ____ Listen to Laura describe her story -- and share advice for people who want to start companies and/or work remotely -- in today's episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You can afford anything but not everything.
0:10.7	Every decision that you make, every dollar you spend, every hour you spend, every ounce
0:14.1	of energy you spend comes at the expense of something else.
0:18.0	So every dollar that you pay for avocado toast, you are trading that for not having to spend
0:25.8	the time and energy to think about the small stuff.
0:28.4	So you can decide for yourself whether or not that's a good trade-off.
0:31.4	I say it's a great trade-off because your time and energy are worth something.
0:35.6	Welcome to the Personal Finance Podcast that does not tell you to ignore ten dollar bills
0:40.5	while you pick up pennies.
0:42.5	Did I just say ten dollar bills?
0:44.1	Screw ten dollar bills.
0:45.1	You're going to be picking up hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands?
0:49.5	Thousands of hundreds.
0:50.5	I don't even know where I'm going with this.
0:52.2	I've clearly gone loopy so let's just get to today's guest.
0:55.2	Her name is Laura Roder and she, oh speaking of people who go after the big bucks, she's
1:00.0	a CEO and founder of a company that earns four million dollars in annual revenue.
1:04.8	And before you start thinking, well that's great but how does she relate to my life?
1:10.2	Here's her backstory.
1:11.8	When Laura was 22 years old, she quit her one and only full-time W2 employee job.
1:18.1	I guess technically she's employed by her own company now but you know what I mean.
1:21.7	She quit her job at the age of 22.
	...

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