I Made a $Million At Credit Repair With Irene Day

Daniel Rosen 00:00

 

Hey Credit Heroes. Today we're going to talk with Credit Repair Millionaire Irene Day. This is her award from the wall here in our office. See, Irene built her credit repair business all the way up to a million dollars in just a couple of years. So, if you want to launch or grow your own credit repair business, you are going to love this interview because Irene shares her secrets for social media, building a team, mindset,  automations, and the exact steps she took to grow her business so fast. So, you better stick around!

 

So, the big question is this, how can we take our passion for helping people with their credit and turn it into a successful business without taking loans, without spending a fortune by bootstrapping it from nothing, so we can help the most people and still become highly profitable? That is the question, and this podcast will give you the answer. My name is Daniel Rosen, and welcome to Credit Repair Business Secrets.

 

Hey, Credit Heroes. Our guest today is Irene Day, also known as Credit Queen Irene. She only launched her business just a few years ago when she left her longtime job in retail to pursue running her very own credit repair business full time. And now she has made it in the Millionaires Club. So, now, in addition to running her million-dollar business, she also helps other folks to start and scale their credit repair businesses using Credit Repair Cloud. And today, she is going to reveal her secrets of how she became so successful so fast. So, please welcome to the podcast Credit Repair Cloud Millionaires Club member Irene Day! Welcome, Irene.

 

Irene Day 02:02

 

Hey Dan, thanks for having me.

 

Daniel Rosen 02:04

 

Thanks for being here. Congratulations. I see your award there behind you.

 

Irene Day 02:09

 

Thank you. Awesome. I actually got three. Like, my mom stole the first one that I had. And I'm like, Mom, that's my plaque. I need that for myself. And then, we recently moved into a 3000 square foot office. So, I'm like, I think I need a plaque for the office too. So…

 

Daniel Rosen 02:27

 

Wow. That's so cool. And there's another one with your name on it because we have a little version of it.

 

Irene Day 02:33

 

Oh, yeah. The one in the headquarters. Yes.

 

Daniel Rosen 02:35

 

Exactly. For those of you watching, when you get into the Millionaires Club, you get this big award as Irene has behind her. And then we make a second one that goes on our wall. So, our goal is to fill our entire office building with these things covering all the walls. So, that's our big goal. And we've come a long way. There's, I think we're at 41.

 

Irene Day 02:58

 

I’m number 35. I was like, check me out, check me out!

 

Daniel Rosen 03:03

 

How does it feel?

 

Irene Day 03:04

 

It's been an amazing journey. Like I starting out. I didn't really have, like, a goal to be on the Millionaires Club, but then I'm like, why not me? You know not? Yeah, why not? So, I was definitely a huge accomplishment in my business. And I think it meant a lot to me because I had spent so long working for somebody else. When I left my job, I was at my job for exactly 13 years, as my last day at work was my 13th anniversary. I've never been somebody who wants to be an entrepreneur, like when I graduated college in 2016. I just wanted a better job. I wanted to work in human resources. That's my degree in organizational leadership with a minor in HR. I wanted to work in HR. I worked Monday through Friday, nine to five. I had my weekends off drove my little Ford Fusion, which was our company car. Like, that was all I wanted. So, taking like this headfirst approach into entrepreneurship. It was not something that I felt like I had in the cards for myself, but you know, there are higher powers that go make it do what I do. So, here we are. There are so what were you doing in that previous job? So, I worked at Stabili. So, it's a grocery store chain. When I was there, there were about 3000 stores across the United States and stores that I was at. So, I'm in Ohio. Ohio was the most profitable division. And I was in the top stores in our division. Literally the 13 years I worked there.

 

Daniel Rosen 04:35

 

What were you doing there?

 

Irene Day 04:37

 

When I left? I was an assistant manager. I got hired as a cashier. I got hired when I was 17. And I just worked my way up the chain.

 

Daniel Rosen 04:43

 

So, that's how you learned how to manage your team.

 

Irene Day 04:46

 

Yes, I tell people, like, people ask me all the time, like what's the most like what skill set do they feel like I have that kind of put me ahead of the curve. And really already having management experience like being able to deal with people hence the reason I went to school with HR, and HR, but being able to deal with people being able to manage people, being able to manage systems with people, I tell people all the time, you can be the smartest person in the world, like you can be super great with people. But if you don't have systems in place to run your business, you're not going to be successful. And I think that's why Credit Repair Cloud and like really being able to master Credit Repair Cloud is so important, especially in your credit repair business, because I've used a ton of credit repair CRM, like I've been in the industry since 2007, saying, and I tell people time and time again, Credit Repair Cloud has not failed me like anything I've wanted to be able to do in my business systems wise, Credit Repair Cloud has always been at the foundation of that. So, yeah, you can absolutely run a business without systems, but it's going to be very hard to scale, it's gonna be very hard to keep track of your metrics, keep track of your team, keep track of everything you got going on, without having the proper systems in place to be able to do that.  

 

Daniel Rosen 06:02

 

Exactly. Now, I want to back up a bit. OK, I want to know, how did you even think of getting into credit repair? What led you into this?

 

Irene Day 06:11

 

So, in 2014, my great grandfather died, he was like, my favorite person in our world. When he passed, my credit was terrible. So, all of my credits were in the low four hundreds, I had heard about credit repair. And I've always been a person, like if I have a problem, I'm going to find a solution. So, I heard about credit repair. And when my grandfather died, he left me some money. What do we do? Well, we get the money, and we got bad credit, we pay off our debt, because we don't know like, how the credit system actually works. So, I paid off $30,000 worth of debt, October 2014, my highest score increase I had was 12 points. And I had been looking for help. And everybody that I was finding was either doing it through like network marketing, or I would ask them like, what do you have customer service? Like, if I have questions, whoever, who do I talk to? And they're, oh, you're not gonna have questions. I just spent $30,000 in cash. And my credit score went up 12 points. I have all the questions in the world. So, that's when I really started doing a deep dive. And that's when I realized, like, this credit repair thing, like this is a real thing. Like we've got state legislation, and we've got federal laws, like you got licensing, it's a whole, it's a whole ballgame. So, I repaired my credit. And then my coworkers, they've always had more faith in me than I had in myself, honestly. So, when I told them like, this is what I want to do, they were my first clients like Irene, fix the credit, we got to get our credit thing. So, that's where I started. And then I graduated in 2016, from Baldwin Wallace University. And I had actually applied for internal job that I should have gotten, like, I had a letter of recommendation from my store manager, his boss, which was our district manager, and his boss, which is our regional manager. And the internal recruiter never reached out to me. They ended up doing an internal investigation and found out that he hired one of his friends needed a job, even though they specifically told him to hire from within, because that's why our previous Human Resource Manager got fired. Because she didn't know our policy. She didn't know, like, how the company was being ran. So, a lot of times, people would call the our human resource manager and she was just completely useless. So, when I had applied for the job, my district manager was like, they would be crazy for hire anybody else but you. So, I just knew like, yeah, that's my job. Like, I've been here all this time. Like I put in all this work. I'm great at what I do. I'm great with people, I know our policies inside and out. And I didn't get the job. Wow, I didn't even get a call for an interview. And after they did, like the internal investigation, like me not getting the job made it up to the CEO of the company. I and this is a multi million dollar company made it up to the CEO. Oh, so they ended up firing the human resource manager that was responsible for filling that position, which all fired him through it and give me a job. Like I'm still in here with private student loan debt from Whirlpool private university, slinging freight. Wow. So, I thought I was putting in my two weeks, but I saw my district manager like once I gave him my notice, I told him that it was important than I had the opportunity to work until my 13 year anniversary. So, it's really a three week notification. But he didn't have a problem with it. And my co workers like they wrote great send off like they had a party and everything. And I cried the whole way home. But that was like the longest day of life. Longest day ever. 

 

Daniel Rosen 09:41

 

And then, did you have plans at that time to open up the credit repair business? 

 

Irene Day 09:45

 

Yes, I started, I officially started my business in March of that year. When I quit my job though. I only have three active clients. 

 

Daniel Rosen 09:53 

 

So, it was a little side hustle.

 

Irene Day 09:54

 

Yeah, but when I quit, it was like oh, reality hit me real fast. Aren't you guys growing people bills, like you need to hop on it and start generating some money? So, 2017 I definitely struggle. Like I tell people all the time, I think we see a lot of people that talk down on the nine to five, like, Oh, you should leave your job and do this. No, you absolutely should not like you should do what is best for you financially, for your financial situation. me leaving my job, the way that I did was not good for me financially and my financial situation. I just happened to be blessed enough, like my house was paid off, because it was the house that my granddad left me, and I cashed out my 401k. So,, and I was contributing pretty high, because I don't have any children. And I was like, relatively young. So, I had like, almost $50,000 in my 401k. And I had cashed that out. And it was like sink or swim. And I learned how to swim in 2017. So, here we are.

 

Daniel Rosen 10:54

 

You sure did. Nothing like that to light a fire under you? Yeah. How did you start to turn it into a real business?

 

Irene Day 11:02

 

Social media has helped tremendously. So, I've always been good with people. And I've always been a solutionist. Like, a lot of times, I think people come into wanting to be a new business owner and they want to free their way to the top. And I don't mean monetarily, I mean, time wise, dedication wise, discipline wise. I did a lot of research. Like I'm always reading articles from fannie and freddie mac like about what's going on with the mortgage industry. I'm going through all of the credit repair conventions, like staying on top of what's going on. And a lot of times, we fail as business owners, because we try to be super salesy. And I tell people all the time people buy from people they like, know and trust. Right, right. So, do they like you? Do they know you? Do they trust you? How do you build trust you build trust by being able to educate your audience. So, it's like, I do a lot of educating my audiences. Like, I'm actually a certified financial education instructor. And one of the things that I do outside of my business is that I actually write financial literacy curriculum. So, Wow. Yeah, like, constantly, I'm constantly giving people like credit advice, tax advice, we also offer tax preparation as a service for Hannah Financial, and that has helped tremendously with building my like, non trust, because people feel like I can go ahead and financial get my credit fixed, and they know what they're doing. So, definitely build on like, know and trust. We started running paid ads in October of last year. OK. And yeah, but a lot of that has just been organic. I do a lot of networking outside of social media. So, I go to a lot of like realtor events, mortgage hunter events. And yeah, show my stuff.

 

Daniel Rosen 12:51

 

You're doing it all. Well. So, back there, the beginning, you lost your job of 13 years, you had three clients, three, you had a little bit of money, and a little less pressure than a lot of people, slightly less, but probably pretty scary, right? Was it scary?

 

Irene Day 13:06

 

I was terrified. That was I've never been a risk taker. Like everything that I've always done has always been very calculated. I've never been the person like, hey, Irene, let's go bungee jumping, or let's go get on roller coasters. Like, hmm, I'm not a risk taker. I don't like that. I'm also terrible with money. So, like, yeah, I had this 50k for my 401k. But that 50k spend like $5,000 when you are terrible with money, and even now, like I've gotten a lot better. But money management has always been like, not my strong suit. So, how do you go from three clients, to being able to make a living have this showing up consistently? Awesome, we want consistent clients. But we don't want to show up consistently. And that was something I really struggled with in 2017. And once I, it's really just a mindset shift. Like, you have to approach this as this is all I have. So, it's like, I knew this is all I had. But I'm like, Oh, you know, I could probably get it. I could probably get a job. Like, I got a lot of experience. I got the education, I could probably get a job. But once the mindset changed, like, this is all I have, and I can absolutely get this done. It was like night and day. It was like, it was like a complete 180. So, and I tell people all the time like it's not hard. The hardest part about running a credit repair business or any business, in general, is really just showing up consistently like people do not understand. Like we see, we see people when we like, Oh, they were an overnight success. A lot of people failed for 10 years before they got that overnight success. And that overnight success came with them realizing that I have to be consistent and what I'm doing, and it's not a couple of days like I've seen people take credit repair training. Alright, you've been in class for three weeks. You haven't been keeping up with the coursework. If you haven't been actively doing the challenges and everything that we have in it, but it's like you want consistent clients, you can expect your clients to show up for your business consistently if you won't show up for your business consistently.

 

Daniel Rosen 15:12

 

Sure, that makes a lot of sense. And back to what you're saying people see someone successful, and they, it looks easy. They don't realize that's just the tip of the iceberg. You don't see all down below what went into that. Yep. So, to go from three clients to make a living, how did you start to get the first consistent clients?

 

Irene Day 15:34

 

A lot of the clients that I got initially, were not local. Oh, yeah. And it's crazy because I was doing a lot of local marketing, like a lot of local networking, a lot of local marketing, but my initial set of clients were not local at all. And that's like one of the great things about social media, it gives you the opportunity to touch so many people that you would never have the opportunity to touch if you just walk outside of your front door.

 

Daniel Rosen 16:00

 

So, now we're doing social media back then. Oh, I didn't realize that.

 

Irene Day 16:05

 

And when I say like, show up consistently, people think, Oh, I got to get on live. And I got to talk about credit all the time. I want to say now, a lot of social media stuff that I do is like 50% credit 50% real life and like just random stuff like today, I realized that I parked my Tesla too close to the wall in the garage. And I use the summons feature, so pull her out of the garage, so I could go to the office. I posted that real it's almost 2000 views in less than 24 hours, like, had nothing to do with credit. But it was funny. And I had almost 20 DMS, hey, how do I sign up for a consultation. So, it doesn't necessarily have to be credit, credit, credit, credit, credit, credit credit, again, it goes back to people buy from who they like know and trust. So, yes, people know me as credit going Iranian like they know, I'm gonna give you all the game unique. And they also know they can come into my profile and get a good laugh, or they can see me actually in the field at a mortgage lender networking event like you, you're gonna get, you're gonna get a little bit of everything when you come across my social media profiles. And I think that has what has helped me to be able to build my audience, even the days that I don't want to show up for just credit.

 

Daniel Rosen 17:23

 

Awesome. OK, now I'm understanding how you're getting these clients from everywhere. That's amazing. How often do you post?

 

Irene Day 17:30

 

I don't post as often as I should. I have committed to being active on social media at least once a day. So, whether it's posting on my story posting on my timeline, something else about social media, that social media marketing that I see is people will have all these great posts like and they're aesthetically pleasing. They have like the graphic designers doing. But one of the most important parts of social media is being social. So, yes, going live is great. Yes, post news post is great. But are you actually interacting with the people that are interacting with you? And then also helps with your social media algorithm? Because that's how Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, that's how they decide who sees what is Who are you actually interacting with. So, it's definitely a job. But it's probably one of the easiest and freest ways of marketing that you are ever going to come across. Very, very cool. Now,

 

Daniel Rosen 18:24

 

I know you said you have an office now did you? Were you initially doing this all from home?

 

Irene Day 18:29

 

Oh, yeah. I was doing it all from home. And when I started, so in 2017, there was actually a merchant account freeze for new credit repair businesses. Right number? Yeah. So, when I got my first merchant account with payment, cloud, they had to do a site visit. And I'm like, What is that? And it was like, Oh, well, we just need to come and see them. Make sure that you're actually running a business. So, I had, I had my little printer set up on my disputes on my computer. And they like, um, I'm like, Well, what else do you guys need to see? And I was like, Well, if you have any marketing material, I got flyers. I got flyers. I got cards, like, I got shirts, like what you need what you need to see. But they came it was a quick five minute visit. And yeah, I was initially I was at home. And I've just gotten bigger and bigger. Like my, I think my first office space was like 500 square feet. Wow. And the place I'm in now is 3000 square feet. There's four offices in our office, we got a conference room, I need a bigger space, especially because like locally, I want to serve as more local clients. So, I actually have two local employees. The rest of my team works like remote across the United States. And I needed somewhere to be able to shoot social media content. Sure. So, what better place to do that then at the Hannah Financial headquarters. Awesome. Awesome.

 

Daniel Rosen 19:49

 

So, are you in your office right now?

 

Irene Day 19:51

 

No, I'm actually in my home office. This throne is very uncomfortable to work in. So, I just Yes, it's not Good for my back at all. I love I love. I see you've got a crown. Yes. I've got a crown. So,meone gave me this day are we? How about that?

 

Daniel Rosen 20:13

 

I love it. I love your branding. It's amazing. So, let's talk about your team. How long were you a one woman show? When did you? How long did you go until you got your first hire?

 

Irene Day 20:25

 

I was a woman, Michelle probably until I hit about 200 clients. Wow. Yeah. And you know what? St Luke's secrets to success? Once I decided that I could not do this anymore. I actually outsourced

 

Daniel Rosen 20:39

 

Oh, fascinating.

 

Irene Day 20:42

 

So, I'm a control freak, right. So, outsourcing for me initially was like, knew what you want me to have somebody? And it's like, doing research, because I'm always researching. I'm always reading up. There are several businesses that outsource some type of function in their business. Absolutely. Yeah. And I feel like one of the things that I have learned in the scaling process is a lot of us are in our we getting our own way when it comes time to scale. Because we are trying to do every single thing in our business. We're trying to be the graphic designer. That is something that I'm outsource. We're trying to be a social media manager, that that should be something that I outsource to get done more consistently, but I'm, I'm still doing it on my own. We want to edit our own videos like this. And trying to master all of those things takes you away from the things that are going to actually bring you business. Like if you're selling a house on Thursday, trying to edit some videos for social media, when you could be out networking, you could be out passing out business cards, you could be out passing out flyers, you could be looking at your KPIs, trying to see what works over here. What works over here, what's not working, we get caught up in a lot of busy work.

 

Daniel Rosen 22:00

 

Sure. You can't be the captain steering the ship. Exactly. On below rowing.

 

Irene Day 22:04

 

Exactly. So, yeah, outsourcing, I'm definitely pro outsource. And I think it's important to make sure that you are using reputable companies, especially in the credit repair industry, because a lot of times, you're gonna have people who come into the industry that are passionate about what they do, like they genuinely want to help people. And then you're going to have people that come into the industry that just see it as a quick book or something easy to do. And usually those people with that mindset, like it's just a, it's just a quick buck. Usually those people with that mindset have low business integrity. And I think with everything that's going on with credit repair in the credit card industry, this is not a space for somebody that has low personal or business integrity.

 

Daniel Rosen 22:48

 

Sure, absolutely. Hey, so let's talk about your team. You said you have two team members, they're in your office. Yep. And then you have a number of them around the world, six of us, six of you, and what do they each do?

 

Irene Day 23:01

 

So, one person does our credit coaching calls. So, we actually do monthly coaching calls. So, when we reprocess your file, yeah, you get the updates and CRC, like we sent you a message with your score increases any deletions that you have, but then we have you schedule a call us actually go over your results with you. We go over your results with you. And then I tell people credit repair is a team sport. So, it's like, yeah, as a credit repair specialist, I can get you 14 deletions, right. But if you're not getting the score increases that you want, it's because you're not being a team player, you're not adding positive credit, you're not paying down your credit card balances. And a lot of times, we feel like, Oh, this is common sense. Nothing about the way credit works, it's common sense. And that's why it grinds my gears when I see people asking for help with credit repair. And then you'll see somebody comments like, Oh, you can do it yourself. Listen, you can go to Target and buy some shampoo and conditioner and wash your hair. But I can guarantee you it's not going to be the same cleanliness and it's not gonna look as good as it did. If you went to a professional hairstylist, that's the same thing with credit. Like it's, it's not, it's not rocket science, but it's not something you just wake up and just be like, Hey, I'm a credit specialist. And I can repair your credit like that's, that's not what credit repair is. So, it's important. It was important to me, especially once I could actually hire people to be able to make sure that I was doing something that was putting Hannah Financial, apart from the other credit repair organizations, like people always asking like, Oh, I really why do you charge so much because I offer a higher quality of service?

 

Daniel Rosen 24:39

 

Sure. How do you provide a higher quality of service?

 

Irene Day 24:42

 

Those monthly coaching calls are gold. All of our disputes are sent certified last year during the pandemic, especially with the passing of the cares act. They affected the credit industry. Basically, Congress told the big three the big three credit bureaus that they didn't have to abide by the FCRA, which basically says they have to investigate disputes within 30 days, it gave them the option to investigate disputes as long as you guys are operating in good faith to try to get them done in 30 days. But that translated into people are not getting results because their disputes are not being processed. So, I had to make an executive decision to start sending our dispute letter certified. And that first month, I think that was like an additional $15,000 to our bottom line, wow, monthly, and I was like, Oh, no, these prices got to go up. So, my entire life that helped with the quality of service, because we are not sending and certified disputes and not getting results.

 

Daniel Rosen 25:44

 

Yeah, absolutely. And I saw on your site, you have a big focus on customer service, you have a whole thing about it. And I think customer service is everything.

 

Irene Day 25:54

 

It’s important. And I tell people like there are going to be customers that you can help and there are going to be customers that you cannot help. So, we have a money back guarantee. And like legally with crolla I can't guarantee you results, right? So, I can't be like, hey, Daniel, I can guarantee you that I can get that repossession off your credit. I can't do that, right. However, I can't guarantee our services. So, if you are an active client with us for six consecutive months, we cannot get any items removed or repairs from your credit report. I refund you all your money. Like if you actually were five star five star rated on Google BBB accredited, because credit repair is legal in the state of Ohio, BBB accredited, like if you go and read our reviews there. We actually have reviews from people that we couldn't help. But we gave them their money back. And we were like, Oh my god, like you refund us our money. Yes.

 

Daniel Rosen 26:45

 

A lot of people are afraid to give refunds. Yeah, I think the more you refund, the more you make, because more people will trust you.

 

Irene Day 26:54

 

Listen, I tell people, it only takes one that like you not showing up the way that you should or you not taking care of somebody when she showed on your end as a business owner to make or break your business. I think there are situations where there are people where you cannot satisfy everybody. But I stand firm behind our policies. So, no results six months, I will give you money back when no problem. Like I've even had people DM me on social media and I tell people I do not do customer service on my DMS. Like I have no idea who you DM me, baby girl 123 I have no idea who were your client, right. And I actually have people on payroll to make sure that you are service in a timely manner and the way that I want you to be service. Those people are not in my DMS. But I've had people messaged me on social media like, Hey, I read, I was thinking about signing up for service like I was a client last year, but I didn't get any results. And if I see it, I'll ask them like, well, how long? Were you a client? Oh, I was a client for six months. OK, can you send me your address, so I can send you a cashier's check? Because you can only do credit card refunds for six months. And they like what like, why are you sending me my money back because this is my money back guarantee. And it's very important to me, and my business integrity that I'm taking care of everybody that needs to take care of

 

Daniel Rosen 28:24

Very, very smart. So, you've got your team handling all this? How do you train your team to know what to do?

 

Irene Day 28:32

 

So, it took me like, four months. So, just really write out everything that I do in my business from start to finish, and even like the smallest thing that you feel like you do, like, write that out creating flps. Right. And I had already been doing that that was something I already had experience doing because I've been in retail for 13 years and was in retail management for eight. So, right now everything that I did, I'm also very patient, which is so weird, because I'm really hot headed, but I'm like, I'm really patient it takes it takes me a while to like, push me to the hotheadedness. But I'm going to be extremely patient with you. And so you get me there. And I think that has helped also because we all learn differently. Like I'm a very hands on learner. Everybody is not a hands on learner. So,me people prefer to sit and absorb information and then go from there. So, right now everything created my fops, a lot of the day to day that I do now is just checking on my team, hey, what we got going on, pulling calls, like I'm always listening to our calls, all of our calls, incoming and outgoing are recorded. So, listen to the calls like and if there's something that I didn't like, we'll have conversations about it, hey, I was listening to this call for another day with his client. I'll explain them what was going on. You could have handled this situation differently or you could have worded this differently. I think even when it's not really something that you want to hear is very important to still be able to effectively communicate with people. And I think you you do that just by talking to people like they're human beings like, just because I'm, I'm giving you corrective action or I'm trying to change something that you did like doesn't mean that I have to talk to you like you're not a human being.

 

Daniel Rosen 30:20

 

Right? So, very, very smart. I see how the management skills you learn in the previous job really are. Yeah, you're here. This is amazing. You're, you sound like an amazing leader. Thanks, Daniel. That's congratulations. How does it feel to have employees and be responsible for them?

 

Irene Day 30:41

 

Um, it feels awesome, especially because I am not always my best self, right? I'm 34 I'll be 35. This year, I got diagnosed with bipolar depression when I was 22. And there are some days where I just physically and emotionally cannot write. Sure. So, having people in place that support me genuinely, like in my business, and professionally, I think it has been so important with the success of Hannah Financial, like, even down to my tax repairs, like the girls are actually in office with me like they make well above industry standard to do that work and after, like when you take care of people, more times than not, they will absolutely take care of you.

 

Daniel Rosen 31:32

 

Amen to that. So, now that you've got all this work delegated, what are you mostly focusing on yourself?

 

Irene Day 31:40

 

Right now, in business, probably getting more disciplined with my day to day. So, I've been like making myself get up and go to the office, like, once at office today, and literally just sat there waiting for Amazon to bring me packages today. So, really just being more disciplined. We have like our set meetings. So, we have set meeting times every week. I'm Hannah Financial University. Uh huh.

 

Daniel Rosen 32:05

 

What's that?

 

Irene Day 32:06

 

So, I actually teach people how to start and scale credit repair businesses.

 

Daniel Rosen 32:11

 

Awesome.

 

Irene Day 32:12

 

Yeah, I think when I started, there wasn't anybody that I would consider an industry leader, or somebody that was like, on the Millionaires Club. That was really teaching people how to get started. And I think there are tools that are going to be extremely important in your business and Credit Repair Cloud. But it's completely different. Having somebody with the experience is going to be able to guide you step by step to get your business off the ground. And I really like teaching people, like as crazy as people make me sometimes. I really like I really like teaching people. And I really wish that I would have had the foundation that I'm able to give people now when I first started my business, because I felt like I probably would have been on the Millionaires Club list in 2018. And not 2021. But the late but not denied. Here we are.

 

Daniel Rosen 33:07

 

So, what do you teach them? And what results do they get?

 

Irene Day 33:10

 

So, this is actually our first cohort graduation this Friday. Wow, graduation is Friday, as he said on how to use the credit repair software, there's a lot of things that you can do and CRC outside of like the basic like adding a client and a lead. So, being able to show them how to use those scripts. Uh huh. How to talk to people, like how to do a proper consultation, because we don't understand that a lot of the things that we feel like might be common sense are not common sense. Like there's no such thing as common sense in business. Common sense is in common, it is not common at all. So, I'm really just giving them the foundation of everything that I wish that I had burned out, like I had no structure to my compensation, licensed and bonded, I had no idea how to even do that. And then I'm in Ohio. So, what's going on? Now, a lot of states are actually transitioning their credit service organization licenses to the nmls. And that applicant process is grueling, giving them examples of the documents that they need to be able to, like properly apply for their license using the nmls. We do lab zooms. Every week, we'll have guest trainers, for like affiliate marketing. We had somebody for that merchant accounts, like we had Rick from five star.

 

Daniel Rosen 34:28

 

Oh, he's awesome.

 

Irene Day 34:29

 

Yeah, he was a guest trainer. So, really just like given them literally the blueprint of what they need to be able to say this is next level. And I know where some people like I've got a lot of students who are in the credit card industry, but like they need their system piling up. So, showing them how to set up  automations. And then there's like, like little quirky things like you can't send like text messages using texting platforms with shortened URLs. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, I just found this out two months ago like what Bitly links so showing them how to get custom Bitly links Little stuff like that. And it sounds like so my knew, but you'd be surprised. Like, the smallest thing can stop you from being able to use a system. Like when I got the email that you can't use Bitly links, they were like, yeah, if you don't correct it, we're gonna close your account in 30 days. Oh, okay. But I fixed it. But thanks for letting me know what other stuff like that. So,, yeah. Oh and disputing, disputing, hey, like, very, very, very important part of being able to run a credit repair business and being able to get results. So, absolutely. Very, very cool.

 

Daniel Rosen 35:33

 

What are some of the biggest mistakes you've made on your journey the Millionaires Club?

 

Irene Day 35:39

 

Biggest mistake I made was probably not vetting the people that I was doing business with, like not doing my due diligence as a business owner, when deciding who I was doing business with or who I was getting education from?

 

Daniel Rosen 35:54

 

Gotcha. And then nowadays, what do you think is your biggest superpower in business?

 

Irene Day 36:00

 

I think my biggest strength as a business owner is that I know how to work with people. Like I feel like that alone will always put me ahead of the curve. And I'm also very, very, very good on like, on the back end, I feel like I'm kind of like the Kanan of Credit Repair Cloud. But yeah, like  automations and systems, I'm very, very good at those. Also, I'm very self aware. So, I know what works for me, what doesn't work for me, I know. Yeah, this is not going to be a good fit for our business. Like I have no problem telling people No, a lot of times, especially early starting out, I was taking everybody like you needed your credit fix you as a Hannah Financial client. So, realizing that everybody that needs their credit fix is not essentially a client that would be a great fit for Hannah Financial. And people ask them like, what does that look like? So, when we do our consultations, we ask you one of the questions, probably the most important question outside of what's the 16 digit number in front of your credit card is? What are your goals during this process? So, if you are a client, or you are trying to be a client, and we asked you that, and they like, Oh, I just want to have a better credit. You're not an ideal client for us. Because the people that have realistic goals, like I want to buy a house, I want to buy a car, those are going to be the people that are going to get on the field with you and do the work.

 

Daniel Rosen 37:24

Sure, they're more motivated.

 

Irene Day 37:25

Mm hmm.

 

Daniel Rosen 37:27

Very, very smart. Hey, you mentioned  automations. Yes. What are your favorite  automations?

 

Irene Day 37:33

 

Probably our initial consultation, automation, like you get an email from me, I'm actually we're working on recording video campaigns, because we're going to be moving away from email marketing.

 

Daniel Rosen 37:46

 

Oh, wow. Tell me about this.

 

Irene Day 37:49

 

Yeah, we're going to be moving away from email marketing, because the open rate with text marketing is just so much bigger. So, we're going to be moving away from email marketing, but we're gonna have a text campaign. So, initially, when you sign up for a consultation, and you get a email, explaining like what we do how we do it communication as far as being a client, you get a text message reminder. Hey, is Irene from Hannah Financial, you got to call Tuesday at 2pm with one of my team members, you also get another text and email one hour prior to your consultation, and then you get another text and email 15 minutes prior to your consultation. You have to follow up with people the money isn't a follow up the money is not when they first see you. And I've read like a lot of books on marketing. People have to see you at least seven times or interacted to at least seven times before they even decide to buy.

 

Daniel Rosen 38:41

 

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. A lot of people get frustrated because they think every visitor is going to buy When they visit your site. But that's not the case. Maybe 2%.

 

Irene Day 38:52

 

I get messages all the time. Like hey, Ray, like I've been watching you since 2018. And I just want to let you know, I finally decided to become a client. Well, welcome. Thank you. I'm sad that it took me three years to convince you but like that, that's how a lot of people are like they have to see you consistently doing what you do. And then that's that's another reason why so many businesses fail like you got people that are hustle hopping, that's what I call it, you over here doing this for a couple of months, you over here doing this for a couple of months, and then you're like, Hey, I wouldn't do credit repair. Why would these people trust you with repairing their credit when you don't even trust yourself? And your capabilities of being a business owner? Because I'm You did? You wouldn't be hustle happen? So, absolutely.

 

Daniel Rosen 39:36

 

Now I saw something really clever on your site. OK, I saw that right away. When you get to your site. There's a thing on the side, getting a free ebook about collection agencies and consumer rights. Yeah, and it looks really tantalizing. Now what happens when someone gives their name and email and clicks Submit?

 

Daniel Rosen 39:53

 

We send them nurturing emails. So, they get, we've got like 30 emails in our nurturing sequence. So, you decide to book a call or become a client? And then once you do we have an automation setup that will take you out of that nurture sequence. But until then you're going to hear from me.

 

Daniel Rosen 40:09

 

And now what's in that nurturing sequence? Is it, it's not selling?

 

Irene Day 40:13

 

No, it's education. Um, it's different things that I've experienced with my personal credit, like a lot of the people that come to Hannah Financial, for service, they know my personal journey, or they know they can tell you something about my personal life or, or something outside of Hannah Financial, that is like, Oh, yeah, no irony. And one of the things with that is you have to be able to find balance. So, I've been on social media, since social media was even a thing like I was on Facebook, when you have to have an email, college email address to even get on Facebook, before they let all the crazies on. I've had my Twitter account, since for forever, like, so. I have always, I think initially starting out, I was like an overshare. And then the older I got, I understood the importance of boundaries. So, yeah, like, you might see a video of me, my mom and my brother at lunch. But there are a lot of things like in my personal life that I still choose not to share, right? So, I'm very selective with like, what I want people to see and what I don't want people to see. So, it's like, I still have some privacy, and that helps with my mental health. But I can still connect with my audience and show them like, I'm a regular person. And like, I might not be making $39,000 a year I was making in 2017. But I'm still ironing from around away.

 

Daniel Rosen 41:41

 

Very, very cool. Now I know you're also doing credit workshops, right? So, these are for consumers, right? So, what are the situations where you do a credit workshop? How does that happen? And what do you talk about?

 

Irene Day 41:55

 

So, depends on what the theme of the workshop is. I also do a lot of like online classes, like I've got an online class coming up to show people how to finance cars using their business credit. Nice. And I have something that I've been able to do like in 2018. I got to 2019 Mercedes GLE 400 and my business name. My Tesla Model X that I got this year and my business name. I bought my brother a car, which is really just a driving advertisement, because we're about to get a rep and handle financial market in 2020 Chevy Blazer, financing my business names.

 

Daniel Rosen 42:30

 

Are companies asking you to do these workshops?

 

Irene Day 42:35

 

So, there are I do I have done paid workshops. But like even with the financial literacy curriculum that I build out a lot of those I have to sign NDA for. And I'm very sad because I actually just got a contract for one that was a little over $50,000. And I can't even like, talk about it the way that I want to because contractually, I can't. Well, that's okay. Yeah. A lot of nonprofits, like will pay me to come and do financial literacy workshops. And the Hannah Financial office is huge. So, I plan on having workshops, actually, at the Hannah Financial headquarters.

 

Daniel Rosen 43:16

 

Awesome. What other marketing things do you do? Do you have affiliates?

 

Irene Day 43:20

 

I do. Mostly mortgage lenders and realtors. I'm very selective with who I let market my business. Very smart. You very, very selective, like, if you want to refer clients, to me, that's absolutely fine. But there are American people that you will see marketing material with the Hannah Financial logo that are like directly affiliated with Hannah Financial.

 

Daniel Rosen 43:43

 

How do you attract affiliates?

 

Irene Day 43:45

 

I do a lot of networking. I do a lot of networking. Like for instance, I did a mortgage. It was like a mortgage loan, open house. Uh huh. And we did a breakout session. So, it was like sessions every 15 minutes. And people like signed up for your session, they came. And I talked to them about something that you might not have known. Like, you'd be surprised how many mortgage lenders cannot tell you why the credit scores that they use are not the same credit scores that people see on Credit Karma? Sure. And it's like you would think, you know, common sense, you would think, Hey, we can tell you that we're using psychos Five, four and two. And they they're like, Oh, we had no idea or why the algorithm between FICO scores and Vantage scores, which is what Credit Karma uses for credit scoring, why the algorithm is even as big of a difference as it is. They have no idea. And when I tell them that kind of makes me like, Oh, she really know what she's talking about. And now they're sending me clients.

 

Daniel Rosen 44:48

 

Amazing.

 

Irene Day 44:49

 

And the thing about education like I'm big on the game is so not told, right? Like I was watching this interview masterpiece was like he has to pay $25,000 to sit and talk to Michael Jackson's lawyer for like 15 minutes, like some crazy. However, I think when you are like building your expertise, like making you the go to person in your area, you need to be able to flaunt what you know, right? So, when you can educate people on something that they have no idea about, they automatically are like, yo, you, you know what you got going on, right? And initially, like people are always very skeptical about dealing with people in the credit repair industry, because there are so many of us not operating the way that we should. So, it's like, when you are operating the way that you should, you have to go the extra mile to really solidify, like who you are with the people that you want to network with. And then in turn, like the mortgage lenders, the open house that I did, they're able to explain to their clients, why you're seeing a 720 on Credit Karma, but I'm seeing a 680 over here. So, I was like, yeah, we might be able to get to approve right now. But just by you being able to explain that to somebody who's a potential client, you think they're not coming back to have you closed their loan? They absolutely are.

 

Daniel Rosen 46:09

 

Absolutely.

 

Irene Day 46:11

 

They'd be a fool not to, because where can you go, he's gonna put you up on game the way he just put you a whole game.

 

Daniel Rosen 46:16

 

Makes a lot of sense. So, yeah, so what opportunities opened up once he got the Millionaires Club award.

 

Irene Day 46:24

 

Um, so I didn't want to start doing credit repair business trainings of my own. And so, I could say, I made a million dollars in just credit repair. So, like, we surpassed seven figures and revenue as a company, beginning of last year. But I want us to be able to say I've made a million dollars and just credit repair, before I decided to train other people, because I feel like, especially with call bases, everybody was stuck in a house, one of the things that we see now, you got all these credit repair, business training is popping up from people who have not really seen real success in their business, which is so awkward to me. So, I was like, Yeah, you're gonna pay $200 for their course. But it's like, what are they really able to teach you are? What experience do they really have? Because essentially, I feel like when you buy courses from people who have had success that you want to have, you're essentially buying their experience. So, it's like, now you know, not to make these mistakes that this person made. And it's like, so you've actually done the revenue and made those mistakes. How can you really teach somebody else? I'm having experiences yourself.

 

Daniel Rosen 47:31

 

There are a lot of fake mentors out there. But clearly, you're the real deal.

 

Irene Day 47:36

 

Listen, listen. So, it's, um, really the training. And it drives me crazy sometimes. But it's something that I thoroughly enjoy doing. And this year, I have prioritized like, mental health, for sure. Because when I'm not, when I'm not my best self, like, I'm thankful, and I'm blessed to be in a position to have people around me that can make sure Hannah Financial is still running, right? My Hannah Financial is not running on all cylinders, if I ran a is not her best self. So, really just taking time for myself to like, do things that I want to do. Like, I stopped working on the weekends outside the first quarter. Like I tell all my friends, I'm not working, I'm not doing it. No. So, this is like the first weekend that I've taken off of work. Like I didn't open my MacBook. So,mebody compensated the keyboard and the mouse to my iMac, like, no work got done this weekend. And I had a blast. I had to remind my friends that I'm also old, so I can't be kicking it like I'm a spring chicken on the weekends. But just just to not work, not checking email, not be pulling progress reports. It was great.

 

Daniel Rosen 48:52

 

That's amazing. And that's the great thing about having a team is that the business can keep chugging along without you. Yep. And maybe even run better when you take a week off. Yes, yeah. So, congratulations. That's a place very few entrepreneurs get to,

 

Irene Day 49:09

 

Yeah. And it’s taken four years. Four years - yeah. So, like, Yeah, I'm number 35 on the Millionaires Club list. But, like, it's been a journey.

 

Daniel Rosen 49:19

 

Yeah, it's, you learned it a lot faster than me. Like until a couple years ago, Keaton would catch me doing support tickets, and he'd yell at me say, I was like, I was so used to wearing all the hats, you know? Yeah.

 

Irene Day 49:35

 

I'm pretty sure once you were able to remove yourself from a busy work, you were able to focus on scaling, Credit Repair Cloud, taking credit for your cloud to the next level.

 

Daniel Rosen 49:43

 

Absolutely. So, I want to know, what would you do differently if you started your business from scratch today?

 

Irene Day 49:52

 

I would have found a mentor. And I don't even like to tell people that I'm a mentor because I'm not. I'm just going to train you to do the foundational things that I needed to learn at my business essentially. And you can pick my brain for six weeks because that's how long class usually is. I tell people there's a big difference between mentorship and training. So, mentorships typically are very long-term. So, like, when you find a mentor, it's usually something, it's like, it's a very ongoing commitment. And I don't mean like a couple of weeks. I mean, like, a couple of years. I'd never wanted to do mentoring. I know me, like we talked about. I'm very self-aware. I know what works for me, what does not work for me, the days that I'm not my best self, and I don't want to deal with people. I don't want the burden your business excess, being dependent on me showing up or not. So, what works for me with training is like, I can set aside a certain period to make sure that I get these tasks done, make sure that I show up for live calls. And then, when those six weeks are up, I can take time off that I need for myself and then move on to the next project. So… But I definitely wish that I would have taken, or if there was somebody that I could find that would give me, like, the foundational training that I'm able to give people now.

 

Daniel Rosen 51:14

 

Amen to that. Yeah, having mentors has helped me a ton. Yeah, without that, I was going backward and in circles. So, how can someone who's listening find out more about your coaching and how to contact you about it?

 

Irene Day 51:29

 

So, you guys can find me on Instagram and Facebook at Credit Queen Irene. I'm actually smiling really, really, really big in my profile picture like this. HannahFinancial.com for credit repair services, HannahFinancialUniversity.com to register for any upcoming trainings that we have. And I'm always posting about, like, what we got going on. So, if you guys just find my profiles, like, all my links and everything is in my bio. Yeah.

 

Daniel Rosen 51:56

 

Awesome. Well, I want to thank you so much for your time today, Irene. You're so awesome. And so inspiring. And congratulations again on the Millionaires Club and all of your success.

 

Irene Day 52:06

 

Thank you, Daniel. It's funny when people messaged me. I was like, you want me to do what? OK, here it is.

 

Daniel Rosen 52:15

 

And this was great. Appreciate it.

 

Irene Day 52:18

 

OK, I'm like, I'm leaving. I'm a little, I'm a little bit crazy, but I'm gonna try to do my best behavior. So, yeah…

 

Daniel Rosen 52:23

 

You were awesome. Thank you and everyone out there if you are enjoying this podcast. If you're getting value from this podcast, click below to subscribe so you don't miss out on any other future episodes and secrets you learn here on the Credit Repair Business Secrets podcast. If you're feeling kind, rate me, give me a review, give me a thumbs up, give me some comments, because these things really help, OK? And have a great day, you guys. Be a Credit Hero and keep changing lives!

 

Hey, everybody, it's Daniel again. And really quick, I'd like to invite you to join what I believe is the best thing we have ever created inside the Credit Repair Cloud community. And it is a challenge that we call the Credit Hero Challenge. If you're just planning out your business, or you're just getting started, and you dream of having a successful business of your own, so you can quit your nine to five and fire your boss and have financial freedom or so you can add another revenue stream to your existing business. If that's your dream, you need to get into this challenge. We created this challenge to help you to create and launch your very own credit repair business to build a proper foundation for a really successful business. This challenge is going to help you to understand the strategy, the tactics, and all the things you need to be successful at credit repair. It really is the greatest thing we have ever built, and it will change your life. So, I recommend you do it right now. Stop everything, pause this audio, go online and go to CreditHeroChallenge.com. That's CreditHeroChallenge.com, and join the next challenge. And there's a challenge that starting in just a few days. So, go get started right now at CreditHeroChallenge.com.