TN60: What you need to start and grow your own portable business – Best of Series
What do you need to start and grow a portable business as an expat partner?
This week is entrepreneurship week! At this occasion you will find in this episode great inspiration, insights and tips to start and grow your own portable business as an expat partner.
For those of you who know me well, you know that entrepreneurship is for me not just a sense of business and a way to make money, but a real passion and mindset that I believe every expat partner could benefit from.
In fact, even if there are some jobs that can be portable for expat partners, these jobs are usually very limited. I really believe that one of the main solutions for expat partners is to start their own small portable business. That is why I try to bring you as many examples, inspiration and practical tips to help you take that leap and build your own successful portable business.
You will be able to hear some extracts from four expat partners who are also great entrepreneurs! Their extracts summarize some of the great insights and advice that were shared on many of Tandem Nomads past podcast episodes.
Andrea Martins is a serial entrepreneur who founded three companies. She started when she joined her husband abroad, quit her successful job and launched the famous website Expatwomen.com that got so much success that she managed to sell it for a substantial six digits number. After that she founded two other startups, Story Résumés to help job seekers create attractive resumes through story telling. Then, she founded Green Socks, which is the Uber for lawn mowing. If you want to know more about how Andrea created each of her companies, check out the full version of this episode on www.tandemnomads.com/37.
Erin Long is a speech pathologist who managed to transform her therapeutic skills into a great portable business, with her company Worldwide Speech, she helps her clients all over the world via online therapy sessions. While moving with her husband and kids from a country to another she managed to grow her company and expand her services. Erin shares so many more tips on how to grow a company starting from zero on www.tandemnomads.com/46.
Jo Parfitt is a serial expat entrepreneur. She developed multiple ventures around one of her main skills, writing and publishing books for herself and for other authors. She teaches how to write and is the co-author of Career in your Suitcase, a great book for expat partners who want to build a portable career. She shares here some of her tips that helped her create and grow her companies. In the full version of the episode, Jo shares with us her fascinating journey and how she started her portable business before even laptops were so common, check this out on www.tandemnomads.com/36.
Bérengère Ferrier is the person thanks to whom I started my advertising career in France. She since became a great friend and few years ago she quit her successful career to join her partner in the US. She launched her own consulting agency, Creavilia. I reached out to her to ask her how she managed to grow her business so quickly not knowing anything about the country and not even being totally fluent in English when she arrived. She shared some powerful tips in this little extract. And you can find even more insights from her experience on www.tandemnomads.com/49
Here are some of the great take aways and important points that these inspiring expat entrepreneurs share with you in this episode:
- What are the right questions to ask and research to do when starting a business.
- How technology and internet are a great opportunity that expat partners should embrace.
- What are the imperatives to know when growing your company and your team.
- How to connect and build a network that supports your business locally and internationnaly .
- How important it is to build resilience and patience in the process.
Also, two great books were recommended in this episode that I highly recommend you to check out:
- The Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki.
- The E-Myth by Michael E. Gerber.
Was this episode enlightening to you?? Please comment and share below!
In the next episode (the first episode of Tandem Nomads second season!), your will find some great resources to become a freelance. Freelancing is indeed a great way for a lot of expat partners to start their small portable business!
Stay tuned to turn your challenges into great opportunities!