6 Free (or Cheap) Tools We Used to Make More Money & Get Out of Debt

Employment gives us a lot — a sense of security, a regular paycheck, health and life insurance and other perks, but what about our dreams? How much do we give up to be employed by someone else and work on their dreams? How do we change so that we’re both financially free and personally happy?

We paid off $51,000 in credit card debt and became financially free. When we started our dream business three years ago, our goal was to build a business so that — from anywhere in the world — we could help others become financially free. We decided we wanted geographic freedom along with financial freedom. We’ve achieved this through our writing, speaking, videos and podcast.

The same tools that keep us digitally connected to grade school friends and celebrities are also a source for information and a platform to grow a business.

The barriers of entry to start a business today are lower than ever. With a tablet, a website and a few social media accounts, a few hundred dollars spent on moderately sophisticated recording equipment and basic editing knowledge gleaned online, you may be able to turn your hobby into a successful blog, podcast or video show.

The trick is learning how to monetize these mediums. This can be done with affiliate marketing, sponsorships and branding that provide multiple (horizontal) income streams, eliminating the risk of the single (vertical) income stream. But the first step comes in learning about your given industry and what the leaders of a platform or marketplace are doing.

Below are the six tools we still use today to help grow our business.

1. YouTube

YouTube isn’t just for music videos and beauty video bloggers. YouTube is for ME: motivation and education.

Whether we’re paying full or partial attention, motivational videos keep us positive. Starting your own business isn’t easy and there are times we get negative. Negativity must be remedied. As Willie Nelson once said, “Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll start having positive results.” And we’re always looking for positive results.

We’ve used YouTube as a teacher. It’s taught us about creating tags and categories for our website, how to manage lists in Twitter and video editing. We’ve spent hours studying public speakers on their style, tempo and delivery.

If you want videos that both motivate and teach you the art of public speaking, you can’t lose by YouTubing anything with Lisa Nichols.

2. Podcasts

Podcasts supplement YouTube and offer access to today’s leading minds for free and on your own time. Listening while we work, drive or exercise allows us to challenge ourselves to new ways of thinking, which helps us in our personal and professional lives.

Want to know what Mark Zuckerberg is planning next for Facebook? Want to learn what Tim Gunn thinks of today’s fashion? Want to hear what world leaders think of today’s current affairs? Podcasts can be your answer. Two of our favorites are Sean Croxton’s “The Sessions” and Stephen Christopher’s “Business Revolution.”

3. Apps

Can’t afford a personal coach? Neither could we, so we turned to apps. Apps are a great alternative and can be the tools that help get you to where you want your career to go. With just your phone or tablet and the right level of engagement, some business and life coaching apps can be as helpful as some business and life coaching humans.

4. Books

Nothing beats books. Though certainly not new, the accessibility of books is new. On Amazon alone, an average of 1.064 million digital books were downloaded each day, as of January 2016. There are many free books available on Amazon or at your local library. Here’s another secret: Don’t only source your books from the bestseller’s lists. There are great books being published independently. Give someone lesser known a try. Two such books are “True to Your Core” and “Discover. Act. Engage.” These are both powerful books that haven’t been picked up by a major publisher yet.

5. Facebook Groups

Facebook is more than cat videos and memes about the drudgery of the 9-to-5 grind. Facebook groups offer valuable information and support. Whatever your specialty or niche, you can likely find a Facebook group for it. Within these groups, people share their successes and failures, ask questions and throw out ideas. These are motivating and inspiring discussions that can have a much wider reach than they did before the days of social media.

6. LinkedIn Groups

You can do more with LinkedIn than create a digital resume. Like Facebook, but on a more professional level, are LinkedIn groups. LinkedIn groups are especially good for career guidance and networking.

To be fair, you may already be aware of some or all the tools we mentioned. What we hope we’ve demonstrated here are our ways to help you embrace what’s available to you and get you closer to financial freedom.

[Editor’s Note: Saving money and paying off debt can be an important part of any financial plan and can even benefit your credit. You can see how your spending behaviors are affecting your credit by viewing two of your free credit scores, updated every 14 days, on Credit.com.]

Image: Jacob Ammentorp Lund