How a High School Dropout Built Her Dream Business
Launching a business can be extremely scary. There are many excuses to not do something: whether it’s not having the traditional educational background or access to thousands of dollars or even overall fear of not being successful.
For Yael Bendahan, being a highschool dropout did not stop her from starting her own social media marketing company and making $300 per month to a 6-figure run rate!
After moving from New York to Israel with her family as a teenager, Yael struggled to adjust to her new life: culturally, learning a new language, and her self esteem was affected. She ended up dropping out of high school after 11th grade to attend a boarding school in England. While in England, she got her confidence back and was able to adjust better. She also met her future husband!
As a mother of four boys, she and her husband realized that one form of income wasn’t going to work. “ I don’t have any skills, I don’t have a high school diploma, I didn’t go to college, what could I possibly do?” She started researching online on what she could do and came across mommy-blogging. Shortly after, she realized that blogging was a long-term income strategy. While working as a Virtual Assistant, she wanted to figure out how to manage her client’s social media better and came across Rachel’s Social Media University (SMU). Yael quickly went through SMU Elite and the Social Clique within a year.
During a Facebook Live Rachel and Yael discussed Yael’s experience as a business owner and her journey through Rachel’s SMU. Through self-learning, getting results and never giving up, Yael provides tips that will help anyone become successful.
TEACH YOURSELF
Yael took charge as a member of SMU. She wasn’t afraid to ask the questions that others were thinking. Rachel noticed Yael’s work ethic and saw something in Yael that reminded her of herself. “Yael has a hunger and a true desire in education.”
Her tenacity for learning and education started when she was 4 years old when she began to learn how to read.
And she took that passion and hunger, and implemented it in SMU and her business, getting unbelievable results for herself and clients.
“I love learning… And if I didn’t have to worry about income or money, I would learn things all day.”
GET RESULTS
Yael continuously set goals for herself in various aspects of her life, which says a lot about her personality. Whatever she does, she’s going to do it all the way.
As a stay at home mom, she strived to be the best — creating a cleaning schedule, meal plans, and baking fancy cakes. This attitude transferred to her work.
Yael wants her clients to know and feel that she cares about their businesses and work, whether it’s trying new strategies, copy, ad, etc. She added that “Whatever I can do to perfect what I’m already doing, it’s what I’ll do because that’s who I am.”
NEVER GIVE UP
As mentioned before, there are many, many, MANY excuses not to do something. But you just have to do it!
One of the first options is to pick something that you are good at or interested in. For Yael, it was freelance writing.
If you are unsure of your good at or interested in, something that Yael suggests is to “take an educated look at what’s out there. Join relevant groups for the fields you’re interested in and see what people are doing. The only way to know what to do is to try things!”
With success comes some challenges. As a blogger, Yael was getting $300/month and sold social media packages to smaller clients. A few months after joining Social Clique, she lost about 3 clients in a month.
Yael asked herself what she should do. “The only thing I can do is put my head down and learn everything I can and ask all the questions. That’s my only choice… I can only move forward.”
She decided that she had to push through and she eventually reached her first $5K and $10K months. And this January, she will reach her six-figure run rate!
From learning about her experiences, challenges, and successes of being the owner of a social media marketing business, Yael’s story was inspiring to hear. It showed that no matter your background or the fear of getting started, through hard work and dedication, success is attainable for anyone.
