This is part 2 of the article (and podcast episode) on the challenges of running a one-person business.

Solo Entrepreneurship Challenges

1. Separating personal and business finances.

That one makes me laugh now because I’m only getting better at this now. It’s so hard for me because numbers are not my thing. No one ever taught me how to manage money well.

But also I wasn’t very passionate about getting better at this. I worked a lot on my money mindset, but not on my financial discipline and financial literacy.

A period I had last year, another one with fluctuating income and some insecurity so to say, led to my best progress ever in terms of money management.

I would never let things get to where they were last year. Technically, nothing was too bad. Just emotionally, it was very, very heavy imagining the uncertainty that may come.

Without that period, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Feeling so stable, wanting to make my money work for me. Finally listening to all those budgeting tips, how to separate personal and business finances, how to allocate money at the end of the month, how to pay myself a salary, how to finally make sure I never worry about taxes and business expenses. 

And guess what? It wasn’t hard. I spent a few hours here and there, organizing things, taking decisions, opening some new bank accounts and just setting things up. Now it’s easy and it’s happening every next month regardless of what the income is.

It feels very good. But I only did it in my 30s and after being in business for eight years.

Actually, I’ve heard many others say that.

Usually, when the person studied finance, of course, it’s a different story. They know numbers better than anything. For most people who get into business, that’s not the case. 

We’re more creative. We listen to our emotions even when it comes to money. We don’t really know the right resources for financial advice.

So we aren’t sure who to listen to and we just keep doing the things the way we’ve always done them, even when we earn more.

Anyways, I hope you can separate your personal and business finances as soon as possible so you never worry about this. I hope you budget well, you have savings and you definitely save money for taxes every month. So when the tax bill comes, it’s nothing more for you than one transaction you have to do with money that has already been allocated for this.

Also, work on your money mindset, take courses on finance, start investing as soon as possible.

Create a business budget. I created it this year. It felt very good, an annual business budget.

Now I never need to worry about business expenses again because they’ll never technically come from my income on a specific month. Because every next month I actually save some for that in a separate account.

These are the little financial habits I’m talking about. They’re very easy. You just have to do them. From then on, it’s about consistency.

2. Shiny object syndrome

Another solo entrepreneurship challenge I can think of right now is the shiny object syndrome. It can lead to losing focus, working on the wrong things and following trends. I did this once.

Well, in the past I’ve done it many times but for short periods of time and it never actually took me away from the business in a big way. But in the last years I sort of decided to become a full-time course creator and I left the blogging business behind, which was the thing that was working so well for me. And yes, most of it was passive income. 

Things were set up well. But when you stop paying attention to something and stop maintaining it, it usually goes down. I neglected it.

I was so focused on the course business. I was so into the idea of having those big launches a few times a year and earning a lot and changing people’s lives with my programs. Now I see there was also ego involved in those goals and maybe that just wasn’t my path in business, or at least not yet.

I’m not going to give up on digital products. They’re still the best way you can learn from me. The courses are still there.

People are still having amazing results from them. But this is not my main income stream. It’s not even close to that. 

I went back to the blogging business with full power and laser focus last year. Now I’m reaping the benefits because the income is higher again. It feels stable. 

It can only grow. I diversify it again. I do what I love the most, which is to teach other bloggers how to do the same.

I even created my membership last year. It’s called Fearless Bloggers. You can join anytime. 

It’s the place where you can just find the accountability you need as a blogger, my best strategies to grow your income and traffic, the latest SEO and Google updates. You can ask any question you have. I can give you my feedback on your content, on your blog, on your strategy, anything else.

We talk about the most sensitive topics such as AI for bloggers or how many big sites are losing traffic now due to big Google algorithm updates and what that means for us. And sponsored blogging, which has always been my biggest income stream. I have so much to say about it. 

And yet it’s not talked about much in the industry because it’s a more sensitive topic. But yes, you can definitely make a very good income working with brands.

So, the shiny object syndrome. Back in the days, it has also happened for me to want to be on a certain social media channel and to imagine being like someone else, to be sold on their promise that I can build a following there very quickly and make a lot of money. It can happen, but it’s not for me. In general, social media is not for me. But specifically these goals, it’s just not how I want to show up online.

As a user also, I don’t want to be on socials. So the same goes for being a creator. Shiny object syndrome.

You will be tempted sometimes. You will fall for it sometimes because your mind is very good at creating stories. Often you will say: “Okay, let me leave that behind and work on this instead.” Or “This person is making so much money. I want to have what they have. Let me listen to their advice.”

But it ends up being not the right advice for you, not the right person to learn from. That time doesn’t need to be wasted, though. You still learn valuable lessons.

As James Wedmore says, my business mentor, with any action you take in business, you either get the results you want or the lessons you needed. Those lessons are going to take you closer to what works. So don’t be afraid of that, just be mentally prepared for following some trends on social media every now and then or changing direction for a bit only to come back to what you were initially doing.

Be aware of listening to the wrong people in the industry. There is a lot of noise out there and sometimes it’s hard to ignore it. We get distracted and we stop doing the work that we’re actually meant to be doing.

But it’s okay. It’s not the end of the world.

3. Lack of structure.

No workflows, no operations. All those fancy words that we don’t even want to mention if we’re creatives. I only got to it this and last year.

I would recommend you read the book Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business. It can give you all the structure your business needs. Processes that you can apply directly. 

So you set the right goals, you set targets and you have weekly, monthly, quarterly and yearly meetings, which is what I’m doing now. So there is no chaos, so you always know whether you’re on track or not.

When you’re not, you do something about it. When you are, you celebrate. But the numbers are powerful. They speak for themselves and if you ignore them for too long, you won’t grow the metrics you want to grow, and you’re going to end up not exactly where you want to be in business. 

4. Wearing too many hats

Another challenge is wearing too many hats, which is inevitable in solo entrepreneurship.

I don’t mind doing it, but many other smart business owners will tell me that I’m a fool for doing this. That if I delegate right now, I can grow my business quickly. Maybe I’m not ready for that. Maybe I’m not ready to handle the responsibility of paying other people, of just bringing other people on board.

And maybe that’s a mistake, but it’s what works for me now and it’s what feels good. So I like to follow that.

By wearing too many hats, I mean playing all the roles in your business. 

You’re doing the marketing, you’re doing the bookkeeping maybe. Even though I send my files, because I still do a lot of my bookkeeping, I prepare the invoices, I do things, then I send them to my accountant and he deals with the rest of the things.

You also do the sales, you do the content creation, you build the website, deal with technical issues, you do the research constantly, you start using new tools. You also have to be the CEO of your business, which means whenever possible, you let go of the day-to-day activities and the small tasks and the repetitive work and you focus on the big picture. You decide where the business is going and whether what you’re doing now is taking you there.

Every business has different departments.

Such as sales and marketing, operations, and finance. Even if you’re a very small one-man business, those still exist. It’s just very chaotic and very mixed, but you are the person operating each department, managing it and working in it. So that’s a lot of work and you need to organize your time well.

You need to make sure you don’t neglect a whole department in your business, so to say, and this is again where structure and operations can help you and save you time.

5. Having reasons to give up

Another challenge you might experience down the road is having reasons to give up. I mentioned some of them already with the many examples I give you and I don’t know what yours will be.

There can be plenty and each again will be a test for whether or not you are made to be in business.

6. Loneliness.

I’m an introvert, so this is not really a problem for me, but the loneliness can come because you will work from home.

I go to cafes sometimes. You can also rent a co-work space or find other ways to be around people, but it’s lonely.

Also, in my case, I moved to another country, which was part of my vision to design my life the way I wanted.

When you move to a new country, you work from home and for yourself, you’re literally limiting your chances of having a good social life. That’s the case for me. My social life has never been as good as I want it to be, but that’s not a deal breaker for me. 

For an extrovert, it could be. Also, it takes effort to go out there every day and find social opportunities, to make friends, to have hobbies, to be around people. It always takes effort for me. 

Yes, some might be lonely because no one understands them in their life because no one else is in business. Then you might find those people online, in a community or in a coaching program.

For me, it’s enough to follow business owners I admire and learn from, to take their programs, to check out their social media updates, to listen to their podcasts and to read their books.

I tap into their energy and they motivate me to keep going. They also dealt with loneliness at some point or still do. But you might want to accept that. 

It will show up in different ways. If you manage your emotions well, and if you actually make the effort to change this, there are ways to also be social. But you’ll still be less social than if you worked with people.

7. Imposter syndrome

Another challenge for those in solo entrepreneurship. I work really well with this, but back in the days I didn’t. 

That’s why it took me years before I actually started earning from the business. It’s very hard to feel confident about what you do, because you do it for the first time, because probably it’s never been done before. You always feel like you don’t have the expertise to actually do it.

I have so much to teach on that topic. It’s a mindset topic, actually. There is a beautiful bonus training I’ve added to my course Fearless Content, which is all about content creation, content marketing, branding, but also spirituality and personal growth, so you can use your unique energy to create the best content and build an impactful brand.

I recommend you take the program if you’re interested in that. There is a video training as a bonus all about imposter syndrome and how to handle that.

Imposter syndrome is when you feel like you aren’t good enough to teach what you teach. It’s also about feeling like a fraud and asking yourself “Who am I to be saying this? To be even starting a business? To be teaching this topic when I’m not certified in this? Or when others have been doing it for so much longer and I don’t have nearly as much experience as them? Who am I to do it?”

Here I can also spot feelings of low self-worth and you have to work on that. You have to love yourself more.

You have to find the confidence to teach what you want to teach.

Here’s how I can simplify this challenge.

There is a reason why in the beginning I was only talking about personal growth. 

I wasn’t even teaching it. I was talking about it. I was working on things in my personal life, then sharing my results when there was progress and this inspired people.

Even when I was just sharing what I’m going through in a different perspective, that would ultimately shift my energy and inspire me to take action. People loved it. It’s the one thing they needed that day to find hope and work on whatever it is they were working.

So whatever you’re teaching, whatever you know, you’re better than beginners and you can teach beginners. Always keep learning more about the thing you teach, your subject, master it and teach it on a deeper level.

But in the beginning teach what you know.

There are people who don’t know that and they need exactly that kind of information on that basic level. So you are still helping people, believe me. I hope that helps.

8. When life happens and business is left behind

Now this solo entrepreneurship challenge may be related to some of the things I already mentioned, but let me just combine it with them so you can see how it relates. Life will happen and you have be able to still stay in business when it happens.

People will die. People will break your heart. You may have children. You may have problems I can’t even imagine. You might buy a house. You might lose another income stream. You might be betrayed.

You might need to deal with health issues or those of a loved one. It could be anything. And these are not even the emotional issues. These are the actual things that happen that can bring us down for a long time. But that’s when having structure in your business helps.

That’s why I’m all about passive income and having different income streams.

I’m all about having a business that exists even if you’re not on the laptop daily. That’s when good money management comes in handy. Because if you are saving and investing and always allocating your money well and budgeting well, then every bill is paid, the savings are growing, and everything is under control.

Even if you can’t focus on that for a few months in the worst case. So the business can keep going for sure. You might just stop creating new content, which is not the end of the world.

If life really is tough in that moment, don’t push yourself.

You can also create content for many months in advance. So if that happens, you can actually publish that. 

There are many ways. You can also repurpose content, which is one of my most favorite things.

Something that you’ve already talked about, turn it into a podcast episode, turn it into a video, turn it into many social media posts, turn it into many newsletters.

There are ways and you can prepare in advance. So when life hits, your business isn’t hit.

9. Industry changes and economic uncertainty

Finally, another big challenge in sole entrepreneurship is facing changes in the industry or economic uncertainty.

That might mean one of your income streams, maybe the main one, goes down and even disappears. That can cause a lot of stress and that’s why diversifying your income, again, is key.

Other big things can happen too. The pandemic changed the world and online business too. Course businesses then doubled or tripled in revenue and people were spending way more time behind the screen.

New businesses emerged and some existing ideas weren’t relevant anymore. Now with AI, that happens too. Freelance writers might not be in demand that much anymore as a tool can do a similar job.

But you can also use AI to enhance your business in multiple ways. It all comes down to adaptability, staying up to date with what is new in the industry and taking risks when necessary.

After hearing all this, you might be asking yourself:

Is all this worth it?

For me, the answer has always been an undeniable yes.

I know it deep in my soul and even when the reality isn’t how I want it to be, I keep going. One way or another, I have been in business for eight years now. And solo entrepreneurship fits me very well.

What about you? The challenges of sole entrepreneurship I shared aren’t meant to scare you or anything like that. It’s a realistic view of what is actually happening once you’re in business.

You need the mental toughness to be able to overcome those challenges and to be okay with the fact that maybe they will keep showing up and maybe forever.

If you can live with that, you can be in business.

At the end of the day, you get to decide if that is better than a day job. For me, it is and even if you bring all those challenges I mentioned at once in my life right now, I’m going to deal with them and I’m going to keep going and be grateful for what my business is giving me just as much as I am when things are going well.

I love my business and I don’t just love it when it’s giving me the amount of money I want. I loved it then. I love it now. I’ll love it at every next stage. This is unconditional love. This is devotion.

This is the kind of mindset and energy that will keep you going forever. That’s what you need to grow your business.

The beautiful thing though is that all those challenges I mentioned don’t really happen at once. It’s good to prepare mentally for them. Some probably you’ll never experience, but I just shared some of the hardest parts.

I’ve experienced all of these, some in a very small way, for a very short time. Now that I have some understanding of them, it’s fine if they show up again in the future, but also things now are structured in a way that prepares me for that because I don’t want to stress too much in those moments.

How has solo entrepreneurship been for you?

Let me know if you can think of some other challenges. Maybe I missed something. Maybe you’ve experienced something else that I haven’t. I want to hear it. You can always contact me about it.