Ready to make the leap from day job to being your own boss but are way too confused on what that actually means? By the end of this blog post (and video from BTV) you’ll know EXACTLY which one is THE path for you — online business, creative entrepreneur, or creative!

Here’s the T: i was sooooo confused when i was first starting out in the whole online biz game as to exactly what i was.

i knew i wanted to write and i knew i wanted to help people, but i didn’t know how to frame it or what i do to make $$.

So i just started taking classes on the assumption that what i was trying to build and create was an online business. i tried to monetize my drag and pretty much everything else. Didn’t work. i had no clients and i was totally bummed and unhappy with what i was doing because ….

i wasn’t 100% an online biz.

i was an online biz AND a creative entrepreneur. When i realized that EVERYTHING shifted and fell into place — which is what i’m hoping this new BTV video, Online Business, Creative Entrepreneur, or Creative? Which One Are You?, will do for you.

In this video, i break down all 3 be-your-own-boss options to help you decide which path is THE one for YOU!

Keep in mind that this a very cut and dry explanation of something that is way more fluid. But the goal is to help you see and understand who you are and what you want to do BEFORE you go out and just run wild in the forest (although that is sometimes fun too!)

Online Biz Owner

An online biz owner/online biz creator is someone who monetizes their products, goods, and services and sells all the above in an online format.

Yes, they are still passionate and create from within that passion but their focus is more niching themselves within an established realm.

And more often than not, their biz focus is something that you have to learn to do — aka online businesses focuses more on “skills” like coaching, marketing, building a biz, copywriting, web and graphic design.

For example:

• Melissa Cassera is an online biz owner who teaches people how to create an obsessed fan based. She sells her classes and services in the online marketing niche.
• Marie Forleo is a B2B (biz to biz) and has an online biz called B School where she teaches other biz owners the ropes.
• Using myself as an example, my coaching services and what i provide in that arena is online biz. I’m taking my service (coaching) and i’m sharing it in a 1:1 coaching format, ebooks, and online class, and blog posts.

For me, this is the biz/biz side. The “work” option of being your own boss — even though i love it and it doesn’t feel like work. Online business falls into societies conventions of what is and is not “work.” 

Niches in the online biz space could easily fall into a 9 to 5 job setting. 

However, online business owners want to take their skill set and make money on their own and NOT be dependent on a job for their source of income. 

Creative Entrepreneur

A creative entrepreneur while still skillful is more focused on craft. And the core “offering” or gig of a creative entrepreneur is something that, while it can technically be taught, lives more in the space of “i have to do this thing or i will die.” Lives more in the world of art.

Creative Entrepreneurs want to make money off said craft.

For example, a drag artist wanting to live off their drag. A writer wanting to live off their writing. An actress, photographer, astrologer. All of these things are long established arts.

For example

• My friend Asia O’hara is a creative entrepreneur. She is making her living off her art (drag).
• Kent Youngstrom is a creative entrepreneur who has turned his art into an amazing business.
• i’m a creative entrepreneur because i’m a writer who is making a living off her freelance work, my 1:1 writing coaching, my books, and (hopefully soon-to-be-published) my memoir.

This is my zone of genius and who i help in the online biz side of my business model via coaching writers, artists, performers, metaphysics, astrologers, etc.

i’ll be going a bit deeper in a future video and blog post about the different kinds of creative entrepreneurship because there are many ways to structure it. 

Creative

Creatives (as i refer to them) are people who love creative work for the sake of creating. Their focus is on the doing of the creative project as opposed to monetizing it.

For example

• i love astrology, drawing, and tarot. But i do those things as my creative reprieve from everything else. They are MY creative outlets that i have no desire to monetize (well, for now, lol).
• Some people love web design and do it for themselves and for fun but they have no desire to make a living off it.
• Melissa Cassera loves writing her own copy but has no desire to write for anyone else.

Most of the times being creative is what helps us fill our wells so we can do the other things we have in our life — the work.

Picking the right one for you!

Now can all 3 of these things intersect? ABSOLUTELY!

An online biz can be (and often is) creative and creative entrepreneurship can be (and often is) an online biz.

The point is to understand where you fall along this spectrum so you can take the right steps and find the right support and resources to help you grow in that area — instead of trying to force your creative entrepreneurship into an online biz like i did with drag.

The truth is most people (at least people i work with) are some kind of hybrid.

The goal isn’t to box yourself in, but to understand what categories what you want to do falls into so you can start to learn and hone those tools and skills so you don’t waste time like i did spending money on trying to 100% be an online biz when you should be learning about how to make money off your art, your writing, or your performances.

Now it’s your turn

Watch the BTV video, and let me know in the comments which one — online biz, creative entrepreneur, or creative, you are!

Wherever you fall my goal is to provide a space to help you explore your path. 

You got this!

And if you don’t, let me know how i can help!

Mucho mas love, light, and following your own boss path,

xo-b

P.S. Don’t forget to watch this week’s BTV video where i go deeper into each category and help you refine which business model you are! Watch the video here.