Here are the most important and helpful resources that will help you on your path to launching a 7 figure brand (and beyond).
Books
- Nail It then Scale It is an AMAZING book for product development and product market fit. It is a MUST read if you are at the starting stage
- Ready Fire Aim is really helpful for all stages of your brand. Overall this is an amazing book.
- This is an amazing book to teach you how to sell and persuade. Selling is extremely important in the first part of your business.
- Traction is extremely helpful beyond six figures, when you need a system and process. If you need something that’s more detailed than Traction, I recommend Scaling Up.
Making Money is Killing Your Business
- Making Money is Killing Your Business is also very helpful after 6 figures, when you need a system and process to go beyond.
- When you move beyond 7 figures and you need a culture to transmit to your team, Warfighting is amazing.
- This is a book that will help you a LOT if you are stuck in your identity. This book teaches you to shed your identity in order to transform. My friend who recommended this book to me told me that his favorite “move” is to first read an amazing book, then directly DM the author and ask him to become his mentor. I need to try this!
Global Business Communities
Let me explain why these communities are very important. There are many MANY secrets that are never published anywhere that will become your crucial advantage in business. The ONLY way to learn these secrets is to be part of a community and to speak in person.
- I recommend Ecommerce Fuel with ALL of my heart. I owe almost all of my business knowledge to ECF. I cannot recommend this group highly enough. You can apply once you are making 7 figures per year. My goal with Chicago Brandstarters is to get as many people as possible to “graduate” to ECF. Among every group I mention below, I would say I have learned the most by far from ECF people.
- This is an amazing and free program for small business owners to learn all the basics of business. I can’t believe it’s free. You can apply once you are making $75k per year and have at least 1 employee. In the past, Goldman Sachs focused very heavily on helping women and people of color. Goldman Sachs is now focusing very heavily on helping rural entrepreneurs. What is very valuable is they teach you lots of standard business skills. However, not that many “secrets” are revealed in this program.
- I highly recommend MDS to any business owners building on Amazon. They have amazing events and tons of super practical advice for Amazon. You can apply once you are making 7 figures on Amazon per year. If you are above 6 figures you can attend their events. MDS people are very highly technical and smart.
- I have not attended any EO events, but I heard they are really amazing. I will probably be applying very soon
- I have not attended any Vistage events, but I heard they are great!
Chicago Business Communities
I have noticed that each entrepreneur / business community has a very different vibe. I’ll try my best to be fully honest with the vibes I picked up from each group.
- Jess Cervellon and Dillon Duchesne curate some really fun, open, inviting, free events that are extremely fancy with top sponsors in Chicago.
- Founder House has a great and active WhatsApp group chat for founders and well-run events in Chicago. The attendees tend to be on the aggressive / ambitious / young side of entrepreneurship. Lots of motivation and inspiration!
Entrepreneur and Family Business Council
- If you are in a generational family business (or are building for legacy) I HIGHLY recommend EFBC. All the members are VERY solid people who are very helpful, and kind. From a scale of 1-10 where 10 is super aggressive and ambitious, and 1 is very stable and solid and conservative, I’d say EFBC is around 2.5/10.
- I got to speak here! They are really lovely and friendly. I am not exactly sure how helpful they are since I didn’t learn from them but I imagine they’re pretty badass! I think they try very hard and are very smart. I’d say they are probably a combination very academic and very aggressive/ambitious.
- A brand new community for longevity and health startups. I attended one event so far, they are really kind and thoughtful.
Chicago Brandstarters
- Out of all the Chicago-based communities, the Chicago Brandstarters is the only one with biweekly private dinners and a confidential groupchat where resources are shared. Plus it’s completely free! Disclosure, we are slightly biased because this is us!
Coworking Spaces / Incubators in Chicago
- I 100% wholeheartedly recommend mHub to everyone doing manufacturing in Chicago. They have a woodshop, metalworking shop, laser cutters and much much more. Amazing classes and events all the time. I miss coworking at mHub. It was soooo inspirational.
- The Hatchery is THE place to be in Chicago if you have a food brand starting. Chicago is a food city, and the Hatchery is the epicenter of food in Chicago
- I heard this is amazing. If I was a small food brand I would check them out.
- Matter is the absolute epicenter of health entrepreneurship in Chicago. I worked here for about 3 years as part of a different health startup. I will say that in my experience the members at Matter tend to be less practical and scrappy, and more academic to the point of paralysis from overthinking. Their live events are extremely valuable
- The Plant is aesthetically my favorite place in Chicago. If you have an environmentalism related business, I highly recommend you seek office space in The Plant
- Also a very important community to be dialed into if your business is related to environmentalism in any way! They are more on the activism side of environmentalism FYI
Discounts
Finaloop – my favorite automated bookkeeper and accountant for Ecommerce! Get 50% off your first 2 months: Finaloop Discount Code
Outersignal – amazing software for finding out which of your customers are VIPs or important people for B2B! Get 50% off your first 2 months: OuterSignal Discount Code
Gusto – the best way to get health insurance for yourself and your team. It’s also great for payroll and tax. Earn $100 when you sign up for Gusto: Gusto Discount Code
OutRank – SEO on autopilot. Set it and forget it to write high-quality blogs every day. Save 10% with this discount code: CHIBRANDSTARTERS
American Express Business Gold – Earn 4x points on Meta Ads, Google Ads, Tiktok Ads and more. Earn 200,000 welcome points: Amex Business Gold Referral Code
American Express Platinum Card for Schwab – Transform Points to Dollars that go into your Schwab investment account.
Charles Schwab – You can receive AMEX points directly in your Schwab account as dollars. Using Business Gold and the Platinum Schwab card, you get 4.4 cents per dollar on ad spend. Earn up to $1000 when you open an account with this referral link: https://www.schwab.com/client-referral?refrid=REFERAAQ792NK
Chase Bank –
I use the Ink Business Unlimited. With this link you can earn 150k bonus points when you sign up. Chase Ink Business Unlimited Referral Code: https://www.referyourchasecard.com/21e/EN4U7KSJ4B
Tolstoy –
I use Tolstoy to display shoppable UGC videos on my website. I highly recommend it. Use this link to sign up and also support the Chicago Brandstarters (we earn commission): https://www.gotolstoy.com?fpr=chibrandstarters
I use JoinBrands to do cold-start on TikTok Shop.
If you’re a brand with no videos and no sales yet on TikTok, for $25 per video, you can get TikTok creators to buy your product and then make a video for your products.
Use this link to sign up for JoinBrands and also support the Chicago Brandstarters (we earn commission): https://joinbrands.com/?ref=B9h7Qu
I use Time Doctor to track the productivity of my remote team. Get a 17% lifetime discount and 14 day free trial here: https://timedoctor.cello.so/oAWM0I3XTuE
ShipBob –
The 3PL I have used with NeuEve. I highly recommend them. Use this link to sign up with them (and also to support the Chicago Brandstarters!): https://partnerwith.shipbob.com/tyrza15wjnr3
Please let me know if there’s any other helpful resources that people need to know about!
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