In this episode, I have a conversation with Kerri Jackson who is a CPA by profession and is now diving into the world of money coaching.
In this podcast, we talk about what Kerri needed to quit her corporate job, how she creates content despite being an introvert, and how she made the decision to invest in a coach.
Enjoy the episode!
If you are someone who’s been thinking about starting a podcast and has no clue where to start, DM me the word “podcast” on Instagram and I am happy to point you towards some resources.
Highlights from this episode:
[2:15] Starting the journey as a content creator
[7:34] Quitting a corporate job
[9:49] You have something to offer
[11:10] Content creation as an introvert
[22:00] Getting help
[22:45] investing in yourself
[29:26] Do what challenges you as long as its enjoyable
Connect with Kerri:
Website
Instagram
LinkedIn
Facebook
A little bit about Kerri:
From a young age, numbers were just her thing. An aptitude for math led Kerri into a 15+-year career as a Canadian Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA ,CA). Kerri started her finance career at a mid-sized accounting firm in Toronto, Canada.
Kerri knew early on in my life that she wanted financial independence and the freedom to choose how she lived her life. Early in her career, she created a solid strategy for her money, focused on saving, investing and building wealth. She saved bonuses and pay raises until she accumulated over a million dollars in her portfolio. After achieving her version of financial freedom and independence, she quit her job and is now pursuing a life with the freedom to choose how she wants to live it. The freedom of choice is her big WHY.
And her mission is to help more people do the same – be strategic with their money and create financial freedom, ease and choice in their life.
Transcription:
Mahrukh Imtiaz
You are listening to the Spicy Chai podcast. I’m your host, Mahrukh Imtiaz. And my mission with this podcast is to bring you the voices of content creators who are just a bit ahead of you. People you can relate to. You can hear about their struggles and wins and learn from their mistakes so you don’t have to make the same mistakes. My hope is that this podcast inspires you to start putting your voice out there and creating content consistently so that you can make the impact you want to make with the skills you already have and start creating the life you want to live.
So grab your cup of Spicy Chai, and let’s get this show started.
Hey, beautiful what’s up? Welcome to Episode 23 of the Spicy Chai podcast. This podcast is to make content creation fun, easy and less stressful for you.
In this episode, I have a conversation with Kerri Jackson who is a CPA by profession and is now diving into the world of money coaching. In this podcast we talk about what Kerri needed to quit her corporate job how she creates content despite being an introvert and how she made the decision to invest in a coach early on in her coaching career. And before we get into the conversation with Carrie if you’re someone who’s thinking about starting a podcast and has no clue where to start, DM me the word podcast on Instagram at Mark dot m dot MTS. Also in the show notes, I’m happy to point you towards some resources. Awesome. Let’s go enjoy the conversation.
Kerri Jackson
You know you’ve got the skill set, what seems simple to you is difficult for others. It’s just a lot of the inner work and mindset shifting, seeing the fears come up and then figuring out how to work through them.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Our guest today is someone who has lived in Toronto, Bermuda and London, England. She’s someone who can confidently say that numbers are her thing. And she’s currently building her following on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook and has gained over 1000 followers across all those platforms. However, that’s not Kerri’s real genius. You see her genius is her ability to help people with their money from an early age she focused on money saved and invested until she accumulated a million dollars in her portfolio. Wow. Welcome to the show, Kerri.
Kerri Jackson
Thank you. Nice to be here.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Yeah, really, really excited. So what is your story of what made you want to be a financial coach? And second, why did you get started on creating content around that? Um,
Kerri Jackson
My transition into being a financial coach was it was a bit of a journey. So I was moving around a lot. And in my career, and I’m a Canadian CPA. Ca Yeah, yeah, by trade. So I was in the financial world for over 15 years, started in Toronto, took a job in Bermuda with KPMG was there for about five years, took a job with a hedge fund manager went across to England, I was with them for seven years, the last two years, or two or three years, I went back to Bermuda. And then it was about five or six years ago, I had just gotten out of a short marriage, my marriage was ending and I was kind of the I was in Bermuda and trying to get things back together for myself. And I just kind of found myself a little bit, you know, not as not as motivated for work not as inspired for what I was doing. I was the only person in the office in Bermuda. So I was feeling a little bit isolated, not sure if this is what I what I wanted to keep doing. And my friend introduced me to a log about financial freedom, and the fire movement, the financial independence, retire early. So I was kind of like mid to late 30s at this point. And I’ve always been good with my money. And I started thinking was like, could I do something like this? Could I quit my job? And how much do I need to do that? And so I really just kind of absorbed everything on this guy’s blog and just started looking at my own situation and realized, like, you know, I could do this, and I was ready to move on to the next step. So it took me a good like, that didn’t just happen overnight, like I had already, you know, accumulated a nice savings. But then for about a year and a half, almost two years, I really dedicated myself to this plan. Finally, four years ago, I quit my corporate job and I moved back here, I kind of got to the point where I said, Okay, I’m ready. And I was like, Okay, well, I’m just going to figure out what I want to do and see how that goes. Like, I had the freedom now to not be pressured to find a new job and start working right away. And it was just a gradual thing. Over the last few years I’ve been I tried a bunch of different things. I went to nutrition school, I’ve had a difficult time settling back to Toronto, and I took off to Mexico a couple of times for the winters. And it was just while I was down there and thinking about starting a business and doing something and I was thinking I should go into the nutrition side and just it didn’t feel right. Like I just like it just doesn’t excite me and then kind of said, well, like what does excite me and I just started thinking about my own journey, how I’ve always been like really passionate about money and not in the sense of like I have to have it, but just like, always wanting to learn, and I’ve learned so much in my career and really interested in it. And I said, you know, maybe that’s my specialty, maybe that’s what I can start helping other people do is find the financial freedom that I had. That’s where it started. And I got some help, I found a course to help me kind of build an online business, got my website up and started, that took two times I hired somebody to do it didn’t like the while the outcome was okay, but it wasn’t me. And then I found somebody else to help me and I actually rebuilt the website on Squarespace. So that was like a crazy period of learning how to build a website, at the same time that I had hired the website person, they were doing social media for me. And that, again, didn’t feel very aligned with my voice and what I was wanting to share. So that was when I let that go, as well. And I really started having to learn how to market myself and put myself out there on social media. And then yeah, so I started working with clients about a year ago, and it’s just been kind of building up over the last year. And as you know, like, it’s just always an adventure. There’s always something new to learn and definitely had like the highs and lows over the past year. But I want to keep going.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Yeah, for sure. And thank you for like going into so much detail because that’s what it is. When people are listening to people’s stories of getting clients, they don’t realize that there was so much that happened behind the scenes, there’s so much that happened on the journey. They only say, Oh, look at Carrie producing content, having clients around money, but it’s like no, I tried out nutrition school, I moved different countries. I’m a CPA. So talk a bit about that. I was really curious. You went into nutrition school, because probably there was some interest there, right? But it just wasn’t interesting enough when you realize that okay, nutrition school isn’t for me, maybe I need to focus something else. What was that decision? Like?
Kerri Jackson
It was, yeah, nutrition and health and wellness is definitely a passion of mine. I’ve got my yoga teacher certification as well, like, I definitely have this holistic nature about me and very much interested in it. But I think what I came back to is just like, What are my innate talents and skills? And then what do I really enjoy? What do I know how to teach? And
Mahrukh Imtiaz
And how to get that out? Like to work and really break that down? For someone listening to this? How did you figure that out?
Kerri Jackson
Um, I think when I was starting to picture coaching someone or helping someone with nutrition, it just didn’t feel right. So I was really dragging my feet, wanting to start that business. I didn’t feel motivated to do it. I was like, I did have a coach at that time. And I was like, I just don’t like I’m not like, I was just like, really, there was no energy behind it. And then once I opened up to think, oh, what else could I do? And then this came to me. I was like, Yeah, let’s do this. And I started right away. So it’s hard to explain. It wasn’t just like a moment, but it was more of the feeling I had when I was trying to do nutrition. And then the feeling I had when I decided to do financial coaching. And I just had that drive or that instinct, I guess to be like, yep, this feels so much better. And this is what I want to be doing. And
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I think that’s the important piece, right? Like, you weren’t just thinking you weren’t just in this, like, Let me think about this. You were doing even for nutrition. You were like, Alright, I’m going to go to nutrition school, I’m going to try to coach people or I’m going to try to see how this feels. And that’s how you understood, okay, this isn’t for me. And all right. Let’s go into something else. And I think that’s the important piece that you just kept taking action. 100% believes the same thing. I think when you keep taking action, we all start doing things that we’re somewhat interested in. And there’s some things that pull us more. And there’s some things that don’t pull us as much, but we don’t know what that is until we really dig into that. So absolutely, yeah. 100% And then one thing else that you said was when you were trying to quit your corporate job, you wanted to know what I need to be able to quit, what was that process? Like for someone who’s really considering Okay, I want to quit my job. Can you break that down?
Kerri Jackson
Yeah, well, and a large part of that is like what’s your financial ability? Right? I mean, we all need to survive and have our our comforts or our desired lifestyle. So for me that look like really looking at my lifestyle and the lifestyle I wanted. And then I had to do the work of pricing it out essentially is kind of saying, Okay, well, where do I want to live? What kind of home Do I want to have? How much do I want to travel? Am I okay, giving up certain things material things that don’t mean as much to me, like, what would the cost of my ideal lifestyle be? And then it was almost like you have to kind of reverse engineer into that and kind of say, Okay, if this is how much I need a year, how much savings do I need, if I can invest it and be making you know, maybe 678 percent, you know, erring on conservative if I were to live off of 4% of that, could I survive and how long could I survive without working at all or could I worked part time my goal was was more or less just to be able to have the flexibility and the freedom to work part time if I wanted to, or to start my own business like I’m doing without this pressure that I think a lot of entrepreneurs feel of like having to make money right away. So it was more it was a I call it a reverse engineering of my lifestyle really and deciding like, Okay, what’s, what does my lifestyle look like? What does it cost? How do I get enough saved up in order to then feel okay, I can take this leap like that
Mahrukh Imtiaz
You also talked about how it all started from you following the money blog and thinking, Okay, well, maybe I can do this. So talk us through what were some of the fears when you were getting into money coaching, even though you have a CPA, you have the background, you have the results? What were some of the fears that Kerry was feeling,
Kerri Jackson
It was more just putting myself out there like I’m an introvert or introverted person, I don’t really like being center of attention. And starting my own business, it’s just me, I would have to be the star of the show, you know? And so that was that’s still a challenge for me, I would say in how I produce content as well. Yeah, that was my biggest fear, I think. And then you always, you know, imposter syndrome, obviously, it’s like, Well, who am I to be doing this? Can I really help somebody? You know, do I know enough to help somebody? I went through the whole like, well, maybe I should get certified in this. And maybe I should get certified in that. And, you know, I really had to kind of do the inner work of looking at my life and my experience in my career, and keep shifting the mindset to be like, No, you can do this, like, you know, you’ve got the skill set, what seems simple to you is difficult for others. It’s just a lot of the inner inner work and mindset shifting, seeing the fears come up, and then figuring out how to work through them. Right.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
So you went from an introvert who doesn’t want to be in the center of it, and now you are producing content? So talk us through that? How did you do it? How are you overcoming your fears? And I’m pretty sure some of them still exist, but how are you overcoming them?
Kerri Jackson
Well, I I’ve started with preparing content or creating content that feels good for me. So I like writing. So I’ve got my blog, and I tried to or not as consistent as I would like to be, but I try to, you know, issue blogs as much as I can. So I write I started on my Instagram is where I focus a lot of my social media and I would research and I would use like templates that I could find, I joined a couple of like stock photo memberships, so then you can get different kinds of Canva templates. And I did a couple of Instagram courses, you know, it was like, I just had to get some a bit of background knowledge. And I’m a bit of the type of person where I probably over learn before I get going. So I just then set a schedule for myself. It’s like, okay, you’ve got to post, you know, three times this week, and then create the ones and it took me a while to feel comfortable even putting pictures of myself like as selfies up there. And then I got more comfortable doing that. And then I kind of started finding my voice a bit stronger and getting what I wanted to talk about across. And then I had my rebranding done. So then that gave me another visual style to be working with, it was just a bit of a slow development. I’m still super resistant to video, though, I have to say that is my biggest challenge right now wanting to speak directly into a camera. So I still struggle with that,
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I can see that. And it’s something that a lot of people fear or scared of. But what I really, really liked what you said there is you’re focusing on your strength, you don’t want to be on video, you don’t want to be in camera, but that doesn’t stop you from creating content, you’re like, alright, well, I’m gonna write blogs, or I’m gonna go to the Instagram route, where I do see your content where you’re posting pictures and your writing. So I think that’s important pieces. You don’t have to start off trying to ace everything. It’s like, what are my strengths? And where do I start? Yeah, it’s kind of and then you said that you took a few courses, one was online business. One was Instagram, were there any that were really, really good that people would benefit from your content?
Kerri Jackson
I wouldn’t say there was any that I was like, Oh, yes, this is it. This is what’s working. I kind of picked up a few tips and tricks, but then a lot of the stuff I just didn’t resonate with as well.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Talk about that a bit. What was the stuff you weren’t resonating with?
Kerri Jackson
Um, sometimes the message about leaving comments, just on like, you know, leave 10 comments on posts, and slip into people’s DMS and it just it felt a little bit inauthentic to me. And then I have been part of an introvert printer group, which has been really helpful because the feedback that I got from that coach is more or less like, yes, that’s a strategy to help build your audience, but it doesn’t have to be forced, you know, take the time to follow a few hashtags that are relevant to you, and then comment on things that you really do feel there. resonate with you like don’t force yourself to engage in content that doesn’t feel authentic or that you, you know, you’re just doing it to hit your 10 engagement comments for the night. So I’m learning and this has really only been in the last couple of months to really handle Instagram the way I want to handle it and engage with people’s feeds or posts that do feel like I’m like, Oh, that was a really good, like, you know, I learned something from that, or that made me laugh, or, Oh, I love this person. And I’m just going to give a little heart or something like that. And one of the other things that a lot like a lot of the Instagram courses promote is focusing on creating a grid or to make it look a certain way. And I was trying to do that I’m like, This is so overwhelming, like, it’s just, it then takes it up a lot level of you know, it’s already hard enough to want to be posting four or five times a week. And then you’ve got to make sure your grid looks good. And I was like, Okay, I’m stopping that. So it’s been a lot of trial and error and listening to the information in these courses, which there is a lot of good stuff in them. But then you’ve got to make it your own and do what feels good for yourself.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I agree. I think that’s so key, you’re gonna learn a lot of things and people will tell you but at the end of the day, what matters most is that you’re posting and posting, there is no grid. If you’re not posting the comments don’t matter. So yeah, like, I really liked that. And so far, like being a money coach on Instagram, I believe you’re on Facebook and LinkedIn as well. What have you learned, like starting off? Like, what are some things that you feel have worked? Well? What are some things you feel have not?
Kerri Jackson
Consistency does help for sure. And I think I’ve got like, what would what I think it just helps people see your your feet a little bit more often right, that you will pop in, I still don’t understand how Instagram works, like some posts all get a decent reach. And then another one that I thought was like, Oh, this is good. It gets like no reach. So
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I’m like this one. Yeah, it’s gonna go viral. Views. That’s great.
Kerri Jackson
Totally. So I’m like, I still haven’t I don’t know, I don’t understand how it all works. But I just feel like, okay, if one a week gets really good reach, then that’s good. You know, and then I’ve just noticed over the last couple of months, you know, a few more people are starting to follow. And one thing that did help me was I bought a caption vault, I think she calls it and so it was just prompts, it was a little bit of like, by these and Instagram will be a breeze like it’s still not a breeze. But but now I probably not true. That’s not, it didn’t take me one minute to make this post. It’s given me a little like a bit of a formula of like how to maybe capture attention, and then get people to read a little bit further down how to provide a bit more value into the content, maybe a bit more engagement. So I’ve found that it’s been helpful. The, I think I got that about a month and a half ago. And again, you got to be careful with those things, because they’re not your voice. So I’ve been you know, I’ll take the idea. And then I’ll just completely rewrite it to kind of the kind of thing, which I think that’s an okay way to, to approach things to when you feel a bit stuck as to something to post you can always convert it to something that’s relevant for you or your business.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I agree. I agree. So the few things you mentioned, there were some things that have helped is having a caption on Instagram, and then potentially like what they call as a call to action like something Yes, where you have a caption, which is the first line that people actually read on your post, just for people who don’t know what a caption is, make sure that’s something that people want to read, put some effort into that and then put some effort into writing your posts. And then at the end, have a call to action, which is ask a question or ask people to follow you or maybe ask people to comment. So I think you’re right. That’s a simple formula that people usually like, yeah, kind of helps with Instagram. So that that is super helpful. Yeah. What are some things that you feel like definitely did not work? I know one thing that I kept hearing was trying to be your own self when you’re trying to get these all these advice from other people. Was there anything else that didn’t work?
Kerri Jackson
Um, the grid thing trying to make a grid?
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Oh, my God. Yes. I did that too. I’m like, Oh, my God, this is a perfect, but this is red. My colors are purple, and white. Oh, trust me. I go through that all the time. Yeah.
Kerri Jackson
Yeah, I think it was probably overthinking it a little bit too much as well, trying to make it perfect. Recently, about two months ago, I started using scheduling app later.com. And that’s helped as well, because it feels like I can batch a few posts and spend not five minutes but a couple of hours and create a couple of posts, get them scheduled. And then it’s kind of done for the week. Because I was finding it exhausting to be like okay, what am I going to post today? And then what picture am I going to use with that? You know, it was just getting not enjoyable for a while. And then my introvert coach that I was telling you about. She went through all of my website and my blogs and she actually created about 30 Potential templates, you know, so she kind of helped me figure out how to use my content and repurpose it and how to repurpose the content and then create graphics and turn them into Instagram posts. And that was a big thing that I’ve been starting to do over the last couple of months is like, when I write a blog, I can also make three or four Instagram posts out of it, and an Email Broadcast, you know, it’s starting to get smarter with the content I’m producing as well. So it doesn’t feel so overwhelming all the time. I
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I love that there were two main things you mentioned there. One was batching. You don’t have to create a piece of content every day, you can choose a day, Saturday or Sunday, but you write three or four posts, just be in that zone. Right? It won’t take you five minutes, it will take you four to five hours. But then you’re done. Yeah, me, even if you don’t use a scheduling app, like lynda.com, and Instagram, you can just create them, put them into drafts, because Instagram now has that feature, too. Right. So for listing, that’s key. And then second, I think you mentioned where everyone, all of us already have a lot of content, we always think that we have to keep creating more and more totally so much content, we just need to go back into our content, and be like, Alright, how can I repurpose this? How can I make this better? How can I say this in a different way? You always have to be new and extremely like original content. Yeah.
Kerri Jackson
And even like something that you posted two months ago, chances are is not anywhere near the top of your feed anymore. So you could kind of like, regurgitate a few things and just tweak it and update it for where you are now or something more current and relevant. But I think what I got into was this, like, I’ve got to always have fresh new content, especially for Instagram. And now I’m like, No, I’ve got a lot of stuff I’ve already written. And I can just create new ways of sharing it really. Exactly.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I love that. So we have talked a bit about fears, right? And you’ve kind of talked about what things have worked and what things haven’t, could you just talk us through some of the failures you’ve had so far? And like being a money coach, or and what did you do to overcome it?
Kerri Jackson
The yeah, there’s the whole like, you know, I started off, I got a few clients, and then it was like crickets, and then like, I got a few more and then it was crickets. It’s like this constant ebb and flow. Do you think that once you start, or any at least is like, hey, once I start, it’s just gonna go up, right? Yeah. And so dealing? Yes, yeah. So kind of dealing with those pauses or those setbacks is, you know, initially, it’s like, oh, shoot, like, maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. Maybe this isn’t for me. And then then you just keep going. You just like, okay, like, like, what else can I do? Let me put another blog post out, let me see who I can get in touch with. And I’ve also had coaches pretty much the entire way that I’ve been doing this, not always one on one, I’ve been involved in a couple of membership groups and stuff. But I’ve always known that if I want to be a coach, I also have to know the value of coaching for my own success. And I’ve worked with coaches pretty much this whole past year. And I’ve recently just started with a new sales and marketing business strategy coach. So that’s helped me kind of keep going is pretty much what I’m saying. Like anytime, I do have a bit of a setback or more of like a mindset, like, Hey, I don’t want to do this, or is this the right path? Having that additional accountability and support to keep you going is been helpful as well.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Yeah, that’s extremely key. And one thing that you mentioned was you’ve invested in coaches throughout because you’ve understood the importance of them, and importance of that support that kind of guidance, but how did you make a decision to invest in yourself so many people struggle with that, right? Like so many entrepreneurs or content creators I speak to they struggle with hiring a coach or hiring help, how did you get over that and decide to hire people,
Kerri Jackson
Um, just because I knew this was so new for me, I came from almost 18 years of corporate life where I was an employee. So this was like a whole new world and I knew because there had been one or two points in my life prior where I had been in between jobs and thought, Okay, I’m just going to try something on my own and I just didn’t right I just went back to the corporate world. So I kind of knew myself enough that if I really wanted to start the business and make it successful, then I would need some support and help and how to do that and one of my first courses I took was with this woman Kelly track and she does the you’re conscious Empire course and it’s like it’s it’s how to start a digital online business, but it was all of the like, it was the actual step by step how do you set up a website? How do you connect an email marketing software, you know, all of the kinds of technical stuff that was just like way over my head and that was actually so foundational for me because I just needed that guidance of like, okay, first you get your mindset organized. Second, you know, you figure out out, what do you want to coach on? What does your business look like? Okay, now like, then you get your website, these are the options to get a website. Now you need email marketing, you know. So it was all, I knew that in order for me to move forward, I needed that extra help.
Mahrukh Imtiaz
I love that. I love that. I think it’s so important for everyone to hear that it’s important to get that support you need. Yeah,
Kerri Jackson
And I think from a financial side, I think financially, a lot of people are nervous, or they don’t feel like they can afford it. And I think our friend Aaron always says, It’s not I can’t afford it. It’s like, How can I afford this is like if this is really important to you. And if you want to see the success from it, sometimes you do have to take that investment upfront. And that could mean maybe putting something on a credit card or borrowing money short term with the intention that you’re going to make tenfold hundredfold from that investment. Right? That’s
Mahrukh Imtiaz
It’s very important. Yes. And Taryn was one of our guests. And she did also mentioned that when we think about how can I afford this, you almost put a value on your own worth, like, just as you’re investing in your own self. So it’s important to do that reframe like, How can I afford this? Versus can I afford this? So that you mentioned that as well. That’s a very, very key. I’ve noticed that I’ve said key a lot. So I’m gonna try changing. So you know, I’m sick. Wait, this is amazing. This is amazing. But laughing just doing that. So we’ve been talking a lot about fears and failures. And I love how can you know that that you’ve been so really appreciate that if you were in my shoes, asking yourself questions about content creation? Is there something you would have asked yourself that I haven’t, that would have helped people.
Kerri Jackson
The one area I think maybe we can come back to is someone like me who is not comfortable yet, doing the whole in video thing, or in front of camera thing, and live video and all of that, you know, that’s my, my big block right now. I feel like I could step my game up, I guess on that side of thing. And it’s just like, how do I do that? How much do I push myself beyond what’s enjoyable? Versus like, Okay, I just need to get past this fear or this block that I’m having. But finding that balance between, okay, what’s pushing yourself out of your comfort zone versus this just really is not enjoyable anymore?
Mahrukh Imtiaz
Right? I think that’s why I do like the fact that you are focused on your strengths right now. Because right now, you’re already going so out of your comfort zone, posting content, writing blog posts, making sure you’re consistent, I do truly believe it’s very important to be on video 100%. But when you’re starting out, it’s more important to post content consistently. If being on video for once a week will take that away from you,
