When Your First Isn't Your Last

Amanda Steinberg of DailyWorth.com

I went to a great presentation last week.  It was a chat with Amanda Steinberg, founder of DailyWorth.com. If you don't know, DailyWorth is a financial website marketed to women.  Why do women need their own financial website?  As Steinberg explained, women are shortly going to be inheriting most of the nation's wealth.  Statistics show that women can be shockingly uninformed when it comes to investment details.  Even wealthy women, who might at least know a 401K from an IRA, lack knowledge about the details of what funds they are invested in.  DailyWorth seeks to inform women about money from a smart and fresh viewpoint.

Steinberg recounted how she started DailyWorth.  You might be surprised to learn that DailyWorth was not her first business venture.  Along the way she had some other hits and misses and in fact her family had become so used to her starting companies that when she felt she'd finally hit the nail on the head with DailyWorth they just patted her on the head.  What was different about this business that made it so successful?
1)  Steinberg's new business filled a burning need in the market;
2)  she got coaching help from someone who had been down the road before;
3)  she was totally authentic in this business.
What does all this mean?  Before DailyWorth, there wasn't a great financial website out there geared toward women.  Many women wanted to become more financially literate, but there was not a good resource that really addressed women's concerns.

Secondly, although Steinberg had extensive experience coding and launching websites, she had not before been involved with a site that generated money through ad revenue and provided solid content.  She found another woman that had sold a lifestyle website for a ton of money and picked her brain about how she did it.  Picking her brain cost around $5,000, but Steinberg felt she could not have had such a successful business without guidance.

Finally, Steinberg felt that she hadn't been able to completely be herself in prior jobs or business ventures.  With DailyWorth she finally felt like she was able to be completely herself, leading to a sense of total authenticity in her work.  If you've ever had a day job you hated because you felt like you had to smother your personality, you'll know what this feels like. 

For me, the authenticity was the most surprising factor, but I realized that when I first left my employee life, I was so happy because I finally felt like I could be myself in my business interactions.  I just didn't have a label for it.  To recap:  fill a burning need, get help and be authentic.  A little luck doesn't hurt either. 

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