Episode 181: How to Grow Your Design Business through Passive Revenue with Gigi Davarashvili

Passive revenue can be a game-changer in your design business, allowing you to impact more people and scale your business, while also freeing up your time to work one-on-one in the projects you’re really passionate about. Gigi Davarashvili, a former Brand Strategy School student of mine, joins me for this episode to discuss how she added passive revenue streams in her business to achieve the growth she was looking for. Gigi is a corporate-marketing-dropout turned conversion-led brand and web designer, as well as a business educator for designers and the co-founder of lolab, a project and business management platform for creative entrepreneurs. Gigi first embarked on her entrepreneurial journey in 2016, after realizing that she wanted to do, achieve and create more with her life than the corporate world could give her. Without really having a backup plan, she started freelancing and eventually opened her design agency, One6Creative. With foundations in sociology, neuromarketing, and business, Gigi has been able to build a creative agency led by conversion first and design second, and work with clients ranging from industry-leading solopreneurs to globally-recognized brands. In addition to that, through the One6Creative Academy, Gigi has taught hundreds of fellow designers how to effectively run and scale their design businesses, from creating a streamlined and reputable client experience to effortlessly raising their prices and confidently increasing their exposure. What Is Passive Revenue? Passive revenue is income generated in your business without having to work one-on-one with a client. From digital products to courses, there are a variety of options that designers can offer to create passive revenue or passive income. What You Need to Know About Passive Revenue A common misconception is that passive revenue is easy or that it doesn’t take a lot of hard work. This is very far from the truth—if you aren’t marketing your products or showing up for your potential customers, you’re not going to make passive revenue. There are so many phases in the development and success of your passive revenue, one of which is the “planting the seed” phase. This could be marketing or collaborating with other professionals to share about your product so people know it exists. These seeds that you plant are meant to sprout and do the work for you long-term. Managing Multiple Streams of Revenue It’s really important as you’re making this transition to focus on growing one stream of revenue at a time. This will allow you to create and dedicate the time needed to the revenue streams and build the products out to fully serve your audience and customers. Additionally, you’ll need to create systems to manage the ongoing work of updating, accommodating, and checking in on each stream of revenue in your business so you aren’t missing out on anything from them. Setting Expectations for Your Passive Income Revenue It’s really important to make sure you’re not trying to fill missing revenue in your business. You need to approach passive income revenue in the beginning as a bonus revenue that has the potential to supplement your income later on. Your passive revenue will be a lower price point than your one-on-one work, which will take longer to replace missing revenue than offering ...