How failing fast led to a six-figure business
After 15 years in the maternal care industry, I’m noticing an exciting shift. Services and products that were once quite niche are moving into the mainstream. The needs of lactating breasts and bleeding uteruses are becoming more visible rather than being hidden away like something shameful. Have you noticed this too?
To give you some examples: massive multinational companies are producing period undies, multiple brands of lactation cookies are now available in major chemists, and I just saw postpartum pads with reusable icepacks in the supermarket. Things are changing in the maternal care industry, and it’s about time!
After generations of being ignored by the patriarchal business world, there is a huge opportunity for businesses that meet women's needs. In this blog, I share examples of successful female-founded businesses that serve women, make big money, and promote big cultural changes—all at the same time. I also explore the key skills to developing the mindset needed to build multiple six-figure businesses.
First, let’s explore the need for postpartum care and the ways that people tend to spend money during this time.
Is there a demand for postpartum care?
In Australia, 300,000 babies are born every year, and AU$1.5 billion was spent online on baby products in 2022. In fact, globally, we spend US$67 billion on baby care products every year. So people ARE spending money on postpartum.
Meanwhile, we have incredible postpartum professionals ready to make a difference by providing practical in-home care, group support, online education and other valuable services. However, parents aren’t likely to spend money on services that will actually meet their needs and help them have a calm and fulfilling postpartum experience.
Instead, parents are spending their money on material items. The marketing for these items is often fear-based, preying on the vulnerability of inexperienced and desperate parents.
Why do you think this is?
Are women no good with money?
This gap between where people are spending their money and the postpartum professionals ready to serve has deep cultural roots.
The Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative says, “Gender parity in entrepreneurship could add US$ 5-6 trillion in net value to the global economy – and each women-led firm is six times more likely to hire female employees than male-led ones.”
Research on messaging in gendered magazines shows that women are taught to cut coupons, be thrifty housewives, spend their time instead of money and stop buying so many shoes and lattes. Men are taught to take financial risks, invest and splurge on business lunches, golf and expensive watches.
As women, we are often led to believe that we are no good with money, it is not polite to talk about and it is definitely not okay to want more of it!
Do you feel uncomfortable talking about money? If so, you are not alone, and it is not your fault. A cultural narrative is at play that flows into how women approach business.
Society’s view on women in business versus the reality
According to Forbes Australia, in 2023, 0.7% of venture capital funding in Australia went to solely female-founded businesses (some stats up to 7%). Only 22% of Australian startups were founded by women, and when women apply for business loans, they are more likely to be rejected, loaned less than men and subject to more stringent terms.
And yet, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has found that women business owners:
Generate more revenue per dollar invested
Are less likely to default on loans
Have more superannuation than employed women
Are more likely to own their home
Have higher net worth, even when their disposable income is lower
and 57% are pleased or delighted with the quality of their lives
Who are these women, you ask? Let’s look at some examples.
Examples of successful businesses that serve women
ModiBodi
Sydney mum-of-four Kristy Chong founded ModiBodi (period undies) in 2013 and sold it for $140 million in 2022.
Fernwood Fitness
Fernwood Fitness (gyms for women) was started in 1989 by a Melbourne stay-at-home mum and now generates $75 million a year.
Moxie
Mia Klitsas founded Moxie (pads and tampons) in 2006. Within 10 years, it was valued at over $30 million, and now their postpartum pads with gel packs are available in supermarkets.
Newborn Mothers
Yep! I’m being bold and adding myself to this list. Want an inside peek at how I started and grew my business?
My business beginnings
When I started out, there was zero postpartum doula care available in my town in Western Australia. There wasn’t even any local training!
I met with a business coach who told me that no competition meant there was no demand (and yes, he was male!) But I disagreed. I knew there was a need for postpartum care, I’d seen it with my own eyes, and I believed there simply weren’t businesses that knew how to respond to that need. So I thought, there’s only one way to find out!
And I started advertising my services.
Would you believe that my gut feeling was right? Within a year, I had multiple clients and was selling $2k—$5k packages. This has led to my unshakeable belief that maternal care is a huge untapped market, but we need to use our imagination to see what’s possible. Because (like my coach), no one is going to do it for us.
I started out with a business model where I traded dollars for hours. With this kind of business model, there’s a natural ceiling to the amount of money you can make, as you are limited by the number of hours you can work. But I always knew I wanted to have a bigger impact.
Five years later, I began moving beyond 1-to-1 care and delivered my first postpartum group training to seven people in my mum's kitchen. This was the beginning of what is now the Postpartum Education and Care Professional training!
How my business grew
When I was planning my third baby, I knew I had to move beyond the “dollars for hours” business model. I was motivated by wanting to have a bigger impact, spend more time with my family, and buy a home in the community where I grew up. Through working one-on-one with clients, I realised mindset and education were having a huge impact. So, I began to dream about how I could take that online.
In 2015, I launched my first postpartum professional training online and earned $15,000 and 18 enrolments. But I knew I couldn’t do it alone, so while pregnant and breastfeeding, I joined a mastermind to find accountability and like-minded peers to journey alongside.
Soon, I had my first six-figure year, which then grew into my first six-figure month in 2020. Today, I’m the director of a global company with thousands of students from 60 countries.
Why we need to be okay with failure
I’m happy with how my business has grown, but it hasn’t all been easy. Behind the scenes, I failed over and over again! People didn’t buy my stuff, people unsubscribed from my emails, and people asked for refunds.
One of my most disappointing failures was a crowdfunding campaign in which I tried to raise funds to produce and publish my book, Newborn Mothers. I knew this kind of book was desperately needed. I had written most of the manuscript, and all I needed was the money to get it off the ground. But the fundraising campaign failed. I also sent my manuscript to publishers but didn’t even get any replies.
So it took me another year to slowly self-fund the book, and in 2018, I finally published it: Newborn Mothers: When a baby is born, so is a mother.
I was so exhausted by the end of this process that I quietly published my book without much fanfare during the Christmas holidays of 2018. A few weeks later I was away camping and offline with my family, I woke up to texts from everyone I knew! My book was #3 on the Amazon Best Sellers list, next to the Barefoot Investor and MICHELLE OBAMA.
The desire and the market for maternal care had been confirmed once again.
Another failure was a course I created called ‘Retreat’. After sitting with mums for years, I felt like I knew what they needed, and I was going to give it to them! I created an online course to support mothers in finding peace and joy in the comfort of their own homes. I wanted it to be high-quality, so I worked on this course for a year and invested $30,000 of my hard-earned business profits into software, video production, and editing.
The course looked incredible!
And I sold it to…zero people. No one bought it!
Over time, I have learned that failure is a normal part of learning new skills, and I’ve learned to be okay with it. And you can too.
In fact, accepting the inevitability of failure is so important to building a successful business that it’s one of the key skills I teach my students. Let’s explore those key skills now — keep reading!
Key skills to develop the mindset needed to build a multiple six-figure business
Key skill: Failing fast
Failing fast is a lean startup approach to developing products and services with less time and money. It is also called fail early, fail better, test early or fail cheaply. It involves the iterative process — create, test, tweak, create, test, tweak. So rather than spending one year and $30,000 creating a product that no one buys — you create it in a low-cost, low-energy way. Then you test it, tweak it and go again!
The failing fast mindset reduces the shame and stigma associated with failure. It requires less planning and more action, which means you move forward in your business more quickly!
Once I learned to fail fast in my business, my failures didn’t affect my self-belief or my knowledge that there is a need for maternal care. I would simply dust myself off after a failure, learn what I could from it, and implement it in the next offering.
The Postpartum Education and Care Professional training we have today is living proof of a fail-fast mindset.
Key skill: Sunk cost fallacy
The sunk cost fallacy centres around the idea that sunk costs have already been spent and can not be recovered. The sunk cost fallacy is when people keep trying the same unsuccessful pathway because they’ve already committed resources to it. It’s that program that you just can’t let go of because you’ve spent so much time and money creating it.
However, sunk costs should not be considered when making future business decisions. In my case, if I had focused on the time and money I spent creating ‘Retreat’ and kept investing more time and money in making it work, I never would’ve found my way to training postpartum professionals!
Part of failing fast means knowing when to quit, change or let something go.
Key skill: Fake it till you make it
Sometimes, we wait too long for feelings to spur us into action.
But if you wait to feel confident, you may never take action to get clients. If you take action to get clients, your confidence will begin to grow.
Acting as though it is already true will begin a positive spiral where your actions influence your feelings influence your actions.
How to develop an idea for a scaleable product or service
If you are ready to fail fast, let go of sunk costs and decide to fake it till you make it. It’s time to develop an idea for a scaleable product or service! Here’s where to start:
1. Brainstorm
Ask yourself: What problem do I currently solve for my clients?
Now, ask the question: How can I solve this problem for 1000 people?
Explore different formats to deliver your solution, such as programs, training, courses, agencies, products, resources, templates, plans, books and memberships…
2. Deliver
Find out if people want to buy by selling it by making a quick and easy offer
Deliver it live to get feedback and test your ideas
Fail fast
Let it go
3. Try again!
The future of my business
Remember how my first business coach told me there was no demand for maternal care? I was so glad I didn’t listen!
Since then, I have trained nearly 2000 postpartum professionals in 60 countries, generated over $2 million in revenue and I’m a bestselling author.
People often think that we can only find financial freedom through hustle culture but this has been completely untrue for me. In fact, in 2021, I took six months off to travel with my family and still earned over $300,000 that year. Then in 2022, I bought my first home!
And I still want MORE! In the next ten years, I am working towards our Postpartum Education and Care Professional training becoming a Government-recognised qualification with public funding. I want to contribute to a culture where postpartum care is seen as a recognised career, where kids hear about postpartum professional work on their high school careers day. Oh, and I want to earn $1 million in revenue every year!
Will I fail again? Obviously! Will I keep trying? Absolutely!
Want to create a postpartum care business?
Despite what some unethical coaches may say, there is no cookie-cutter ten-step plan for building a six-figure business overnight. It’s about developing key skills and the mindset of an entrepreneur, which takes time and effort.
Success comes from doing the work and taking consistent action. Community, support, and accountability make a huge difference!
Here are some of the types of businesses my students have started:
One-on-one in-home support
Educational classes
Mothers circles
Online support
Meal delivery services
Traveling doulas
Agencies
If you are ready to start a postpartum business, you’ll learn everything you need to know about postpartum, how to start your business, and how to get your first client in the Postpartum Education and Care Professional Training.
Curious about starting a postpartum business? Download the guide and learn how to start a postpartum business providing valuable support to new families, PLUS create flexible and meaningful work for yourself.
Newborn Mothers Postpartum Education and Care Training includes 12 modules on caring for new families, including mental health, breastfeeding and sleep support, plus a bonus module on business and marketing so you can actually get clients and get paid. If you want to transform the lives of Newborn Mothers and make a living while doing so, then this training is for you.
