Have Your Cake And Eat It Too Course Review

Kate: Tiffany Higgins is here with us today. She is the creator of a company called Have Your Cake and Eat It Too, and she’s got a course called The Bookkeeping Course for Stay-At-Home Parents. Although she has told me that there’s definitely a lot of folks who are not necessarily parents, but they are interested in the work-from-home life.

I just want to preface this interview by saying this interview and any others that we do are my effort to help you all make that education choice. I took a course. I did not take Tiffany’s course. I took Bookkeeper Business Launch. It’s hard to decide when you have to make this big investment so I thought the best way was just to go straight to the source and have Tiffany answer some questions for us. I think as you all get to know her many of you might find that she’ll be the perfect fit for you as you launch. 

I just want to be clear that I am an affiliate for her course. I will toss up my link now in the comments so you can go and see all of her course offerings. I don’t want to try to push things on people that I don’t really personally know, that’s important to me.

Anyway, now we’re going to dive in with Tiffany. I would love for you to just introduce yourself, Tiffany. Tell us about your background. 

Tiffany Higgins: Thank you so much for putting this Live together, I appreciate it. And it’s super awesome of you to have this group going and provide so much free support to everybody and allow them all to collaborate. It’s definitely something that we need in the bookkeeping and accounting community, to all band together and help each other out. There are tons of clients out there for everybody so we definitely have competition among each other, I don’t feel. 

So, my name is Tiffany Higgins. I was in everyone’s similar shoes about 5 years ago when I started up my bookkeeping business. It grew really, really fast surprisingly. I was just planning on picking up a couple of clients so I could stay home with my third child, and before I knew it my husband was quitting his job. It was really exciting.

I really leveraged a lot of different people and had some really awesome mentors during the whole process. I sold my bookkeeping business in January and I was actually going to go into a different route. Everyone tells you that you need to niche down and create a specialty so you can charge more and work less. So that was my goal originally selling my business in January and going into a specialty. 

As I was doing that I had a girl that was pretty new to bookkeeping. She had her accounting degree and she had worked at a CPA firm for a year, but didn’t really have any other experience beyond that, so she was doing some administrative work for me. She had a young baby at home and didn’t really want to work more, so she told me she was going to start up a business on the side. I thought that was perfect for her to be able to do that at home. And I was right there with all of my experience to be able to help her. The more I thought about it the more I thought that I could do that for other people, too. 

When you really think about bookkeeping compared to working as a W2 employee for somebody else where you’re maybe making like $40,000, or if you’re lucky $50,000 a year and you’re gone away from your kids 50 – 55 hours a week (counting your lunch, commute, and things like that). You really only need about maybe 5 to 10 clients to bring in the same amount and work a lot less. 

That’s when I decided to create a course designed specifically for people who really wanted to either work less and transition to working from home, or make more money working the same amount of hours. I took everything I learned over the last 4 years of owning my business and put it together in a course that I’m constantly improving and updating. I also offer support to people as well, so you don’t just go through the course and figure it all out on your own. I do continuous support.

In our support group we do Zoom calls three times a week and we talk about all things from marketing to actually doing screen-shares and working through client questions and work. However much support you want and need is there for you.

Kate: Wow, that’s awesome. You answered the question about what motivated you to create this course. Maybe you can explain more about that fork in the road where you didn’t niche in your actual bookkeeping business, but instead created this other business to help people.

Tiffany Higgins: When I first started out it’s hard to say, “Yes, I’m going to niche down and turn all these other people away.” I always wanted to do a niche or a specialty, but it’s hard to say no when you just want clients and money coming in. When I did decide to go down the path of really niching in I chose the cannabis industry to focus on. It was great and it has been great. But running a CPA firm is a lot of work and took me away from my vision of being able to work from home and be with my kids. 

So deciding to go the route where now I can be a coach, I can live more of the lifestyle that I wanted to live. And then also teach other people how to do that, too. That’s why I ended up not continuing on with my niche.

Kate: Okay. Well, now let’s dive into the actual course. You said a little bit is like webinars and stuff. But say someone buys your course, what are they getting?

Tiffany Higgins: I have a couple of different options now. If you join and enroll in the full course you’re going to get nine modules of information. 

The first module talks about learning the basics. Accounting 101, balance sheet basics, income statement basics. If you already know this stuff you can probably skip that module. It’s very basic and doesn’t go into a ton of detail because you learn all of that stuff as you go, and as you get clients and do the work. But it gives you the baseline knowledge to understand debits, credits, and the accounting equation and all that stuff.

Module 2 talks about QuickBooks Online. That’s the only program that I use so that’s the only program I teach on. If anybody prefers to use Xero or other programs it might not be the best fit because I only use QuickBooks Online.

Kate: No desktop at all?

Tiffany Higgins: I don’t use desktop but I have had a lot of experience. I’ve used it for about 19 years prior to switching. If people are using desktop, or they need to switch from desktop to online I can definitely train them and help them on that. I don’t like Xero so I don’t use that one at all.

Module 3 talks about how to set up your bookkeeping business all in one day. A lot of people that have already started have probably done some of that. But I do have a lot of partner programs that I have utilized over the years that were really beneficial in creating revenue streams in addition to just bookkeeping. So a lot of that stuff is in there as well talking about different partnerships that you can leverage in your business.

Module 4 talks about onboarding your first client. Basically the sales conversation and everything you need to do to totally streamline that process and get that person from an interested lead into a signed client. And what you need to gather from them to really get started on work. And, of course, always getting paid up front is definitely something that I preach quite a bit.

Module 5 talks about completing the work after you’ve on-boarded them. What it looks like for the back work and ongoing from month to month, and running financials, and understanding what that looks like, and what your clients are going to expect from you.

Module 6 goes over tax basics so you understand a little bit of the differences when you’re working with someone that’s just a sole proprietorship versus somebody that is an S-corp or a C-corp. It goes over just the basics that you need to know as a bookkeeper so you can have an idea of when to say, “Hey, you might want to talk to your tax accountant about this.”

Module 7 talks all about marketing. Constantly adding new marketing tips and strategies in there. Most things that I teach are free. I never used any kind of paid advertising or marketing when I was growing my business with the exception of an in-person networking group. It’s pretty much the only thing I ever paid for when I grew mine.

And then Module 8 is all about mindset. What I’m finding is, that’s the hardest part for pretty much everybody that’s starting out. Getting into the right mindset, understanding the ups and downs of being a business owner and that’s it’s totally normal to feel that way. But you can’t let yourself sit in it. You’ve got to push past it and keep going. And just really dealing with how to stay motivated, how to avoid that imposter syndrome, and really be positive and be in the right mindset for abundance and bringing clients your way. So I talk a lot about that.

And then in the support group we do the Zoom calls three times a week. Those are all recorded. Any confidential or sensitive information gets edited and blurred out. But then all those recordings are uploaded into Module 9, so even if you’re not in the support group you still can watch all the recorded calls.

Kate: Are you actually doing screen-shares in books? As a student I could watch like, “Oh, that’s how you add a bill,” or stuff like that?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes.

Kate: Wow. That’s super valuable because sometimes it’s that nitty gritty, you read the QuickBooks help article, but then to see it. It’s usually always easier than you make it out to be when someone who knows what they’re doing shows you. I could take an hour to try to figure it out myself or ask someone who knows to show me.

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, exactly. That’s my approach with it. You can definitely figure out all of this on your own. You can figure out everything in my course and everything we talk about in a support group all on your own. This just saves you a ton of time. I know for a lot of my students it’s like a weight off their shoulders knowing that if a client asks them a question they don’t have to feel scared, or on the spot, or anxious because even if they don’t know, they know they have people to come ask. I feel like I’ve seen it all being in business for the last 4 years. I’m sure that I haven’t, but it feels that way. It’s just kind of nice to have somebody to ask questions to.

Kate: This is not specific to Tiffany’s course, but this concept of saying, “I don’t know, but I know that I can figure it out,” that is a good line to be able to say when you’re in this business. Do not pretend that you know everything because your clients are going to see through that. Even Tiffany is going to have things she might not know. like she said, she was using Desktop for 19 years so she’s clearly been around the block, and there will be things that even the most experienced person has to be like, “Let me get back to you on that.” So that’s just advice for anyone whether you take a course or not.

So is there anything else about the course? Did you get to Module 9? 

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, Module 9 is the recorded Zoom calls.

Kate: Okay, that’s right. I know you have a couple of different levels of courses. Would now be a good time to talk about that?

Tiffany Higgins: Yeah, sure! I do sell the marketing module and a Learn QuickBooks Online module separately. I have a new mini-course that I think everyone will be really interested in. it is a walkthrough of a full year’s worth of books from scratch. Using QuickBooks Online to import all of the transactions from three checking accounts and from a credit card. Putting them all in, and then importing them into QuickBooks and doing the whole process. I walk them through the whole process telling them how to code everything. A lot of efficiency tips because I’m an efficiency expert. I use QuickBooks Online as efficiently as possible so I’ve got a lot of work-arounds in there. But also as a bonus, it’s actually my business books from 2018 so you can actually see exactly what my business brought in, what I made, and even how to tie the balance sheet to the tax return from 2017. You really get to see the whole thing, but it also shows you how much you can make doing this. What your business really could look like. I didn’t have any payroll or employees, just my own payroll for myself. So you can really make some good money without needing employees.

Kate: Okay. You have the whole package. But then some people who, maybe they know QuickBooks and believe in what you say about the marketing side could just get the marketing piece. That’s cool. All that can be found at the Teachable site?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, using the affiliate link you should be able to click on any of that.

Kate: Perfect. I have a few more questions for Tiffany, but I also want to say if anyone has any questions type them in the comments section and we will get them. As far as I can tell no one has asked one yet. 

Okay, Tiffany, what sort of student is most successful in your course? And then conversely, are there any potential students that you found maybe are not a good fit for your course?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes. So far what I found to be the most successful students that go through my group are the ones that are really determined to quit their job. You have to really keep focusing on your why. 

I have a student that has missed out on a lot of her daughter’s activities because of her job and the commute that she has. Every day she wakes up and thinks about that, she listens to motivational stuff on the way to work. Helping her reach those goals and trying to figure out how to balance working full time, finding clients, and still being able to be there for her daughter, those are tones I feel like I’m able to help a lot because I understand the struggles of balancing it all. I can really relate to her and her feelings. I’d say those are my most common clients are ones that are really wanting to be back home with their kids and connect more as a parent, and trying to juggle it all and make that transition. 

Kate: Any folks that aren’t a good fit?

Tiffany Higgins: I don’t know. You have to be coachable, and you have to have an open mind. I know a lot of people struggle with the road blocks in limiting beliefs and things like that. But I think just hg an open mind and knowing that there’s more ways to do it, but this is just the way that I teach. So you can take the pieces from what I teach and make it your own and do it however you want. I’m sure there are people that would probably rather work with maybe somebody more manly? I don’t know. 

Kate: Well, you do keep saying feminine pronouns. Do you find that men aren’t a good fit for your group? I know that there are some people who work a business strictly on targeting women, so that’s fine if not. What are your comments on that?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, I have a handful of dads, and even a couple of grandpas in there. They seem to do really well, too. I don’t talk specifically to moms, but the majority of people that are in my group are moms. And I do target my marketing towards moms just because I can relate to that so much more. I’ve got quite a few husband and wife teams in there as well.

Kate: Awesome! I took Bookkeeper Business Launch. I’ve never heard anything bad except there’s been one criticism that for someone who might just want to go work for someone else, like who maybe realizes after they purchase the course they don’t want to be an entrepreneur, that course that I took is not geared towards people who want to be a bookkeeping employee. That’s a fine way to go. There are some people who don’t want the stress. Like you said, all the limiting beliefs, and all the fear. That stuff is real. It is hard to be your own business owner. You have no one giving feedback. Your husband doesn’t actually get it, even if he’s awesome and wants to give you a hug. There’s a reason why most people in America are employees not employers, and that’s fine. If someone knows that they just want to get hired as a contractor for someone else, what do you think? Your course or not your course?

Tiffany Higgins: The mini-course would probably be really great for them.

Kate: Okay. Which mini-course?

Tiffany Higgins: It’s the one where it walks through the full year of my books doing the bookkeeping from scratch. That would probably teach them the widest array of stuff. The full course really focuses more on being a business owner and how to come at it from a business perspective. But the mini-course would be good for people that just want to understand how to do the whole process from start to finish. 

I would always recommend getting your QuickBooks Pro Advisor, too if you want to be an employee for someone. Those two things would probably make you pretty prepared to go in and work for someone.

Kate: Okay. Can you share one of your favorite student success stories?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, Megan, she just had a Facebook Live in my group. She bought the program when I first launched back in May. She admitted that it was about June 25th before she really even started going through the modules because she was scared, nervous, and didn’t think she could do it. And, of course, when I started out I didn’t realize that being a mindset coach was going to be the biggest role that I would have to take on in encouraging people to be brave and do it.

But once she finally decided to do it she had her first client in three weeks. She is only about two to four clients away from quitting her job. I would say her first client was mid-July. So it’s been not even 3 months and she’s that close to quitting her job.

Kate: That’s a great story. All right, one question I have is about cost. How much does your course cost as of October 2nd, 2019?

Tiffany Higgins: The full course costs $997, or you can do three payments of $399. Once you get the full course you also get access to the mini-course for free. So you basically have access to everything that I offer. If you enroll in the full course you can also join the support group. But that’s separate, it’s $49 a month. So people just add and cancel that any time. They can join any time. They can stay in as long as they feel it’s helpful. The support group is only for people who have enrolled in the full course though.

Kate: Okay. I have a couple questions here from the group. Melanie asks, when purchasing the course do you get access to the group forever or is there an expiration? Such as the Zoom calls, and the ask questions, and the guidance. What’s the time frame?

Tiffany Higgins: Yeah, so the course you have forever access to it including all upgrades. I’m constantly going in and adding stuff, new tutorials and tips and things like that, and the marketing section is always growing. Of course the Zoom section is growing every time we have Zoom calls. So you have access to that forever. If you’re in the support group you can just pay when you want to join, and stay in there as long as you want to.

Kate: Okay. Nisa asks, are the mini-course or the marketing sections available for purchase separately or is it all part of the full course?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, you can purchase the other stuff separately through Kate’s affiliate link, too.

Kate: But if they purchase the full course they get everything you offer. There’s nothing excluded from the full course purchase except that mentoring group?

Tiffany Higgins: Correct, yes.

Kate: Okay. I’m just going to dig in here. If I purchase the course I get the portal, and it has the Zoom calls in it as Module 9 you said.

Tiffany Higgins: Yes.

Kate: Then I pay for 3 months of the mentoring group, and let’s say I even have my own question session with you so I’m even maybe on the Zoom calls. Let’s say after 3 months I don’t want the course, I’m still able to listen to all those Zoom calls. I just don’t get that live participation and ability to ask my own questions?

Tiffany Higgins: Correct.

Kate: Okay, cool. What kind of student community do you have?

Tiffany Higgins: You mean like size?

Kate: Sorry, no. Are people helping each other? Is there a Facebook group that’s different than the mentoring webinars?

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, I have a free Facebook group that’s called Have Your Cake and Eat It Too, and we have close to 5,000 in there now. It’s a lot of people that want this to work for them. Some of them have bought the course and haven’t joined the support group yet. Some of them are just still thinking about it, or they’re on the fence, or they’re researching, “Do I want to become a bookkeeper?” I do Lives in there three times a week, and I usually have some kind of guest speaker or a student who’s in the support group come on and share their experiences. 

And then I also have the other group, which is the paid support group. And it’s called Piece of Cake Support Group. That’s the one that has all the students that actually want to participate in the live Zoom calls. Both groups are super supportive. I’ve even had several students mention that they are so surprised with that many women together (because most of them are women) that nobody is hateful, or catty, or starting fights. Everyone has been so supportive about it and just helping each other. Both the free and the paid group. have been a wonderful community.

Kate: Awesome. If you have any more questions now is the time to ask. I’m going to put the link to her site up again so you can see all the courses. Anything I’ve left out, Tiffany, in terms of stuff you would like to talk about?

Tiffany Higgins: I think maybe the only other thing I would mention is I haven’t seen BBL or the Bookkeeping Life courses at all. I don’t know really how mine compares to theirs. I don’t think BBL offers ongoing support like I do. I don’t know if the Bookkeeper Life one does. I think that’s probably the one thing that maybe sets me apart from them a little bit. But I do also plan on continuing to grow the course and the information in the course until it is comparable to BBL, at least from the core standpoint.

I think BBL is like this as well, but at whatever price point you buy it, when there’s improvements to the program you don’t have to pay anything extra for that. You just have access to it. That’s one thing that my course is doing as well.

Kate: Awesome. That’s kind of been my experience with the course. I think that’s fair. People are taking a little bit of a risk with a newer course. But I think there could be a really high payoff. I’d just like to go back to something you said at the beginning, when people take your course it feels like a weight is lifted off their shoulders. That’s kind of how I felt when I started my education journey for this line of work over 2 years ago now.

When I woke up at 5:00 in the morning, because I knew I had about two hours before my kids woke up, I didn’t waste any time. Because I had a course I knew exactly what I was doing when I fired up that computer. I didn’t have time to spend 30 minutes thinking, “Am I going to form my business today? Am I going to learn a little QuickBooks today? Am I going to decide between QuickBooks and Xero today?” I just did what I was told because that was the phase of life that I was in.

Like you said, everything that I learned, and everything that you’re going to teach, can be learned for free. But sometimes that investment inn that coach, whether it’s you or someone else, is worth it just to lift that weight off your shoulders. It was great. I could see my progress, and I knew I was going somewhere instead of like, “Oh, I researched something for 3 days that turns out I never needed to do.” I didn’t do any of that once I made an investment in training.

Tiffany Higgins: Yeah, and it’s just nice to have somebody say, “You don’t need to worry about that. Move on to the next thing.”

Kate: Exactly. You’re just putting off the hard work of actually being a business owner and getting clients, which is hard. I mean, you’ve got to do stuff that’s uncomfortable. So to have someone say, “Just go do it. You will survive.” 

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, absolutely. That’s another thing. You reminded me of something as well. Module 3 is setting up your bookkeeping business in one day. So I want them to speed through that process. Don’t take 3 weeks to set up your website, don’t take a lot of time to decide what you want your domain to be. Just do it. The most important part of this whole piece is getting paid. Finding clients so you can make money. 

That’s really why I created the support group, so that everyone could zoom through the course and find that client. What I’m seeing is every single one of my students has at least one to two contacts in their current circle of friends that want to hire them. Almost everybody is finding their first couple of clients just from their current Facebook friends or some kind of acquaintance they know. Go ahead and capitalize on that. Get them on. Start making money right away, and I will walk you through everything you need to do to help that client in the best way possible. It’s the same month after month after that. 

I think that’s why I’m so excited about this, because some of the parents that I do help only want five clients. That way they can maybe work 5 – 6 hours a week and spend the rest of the time with their kids. They don’t need to know everything about everything in the bookkeeping world. They need to know how to help those five clients really well. That’s it. That’s what I get excited about, just helping them learn that. And then they can build on it later. They can learn more. They can keep doing continuing education as time allows. But at least then they’re probably bringing in $1,500 a month helping those five clients.

Kate: Yeah, for me as I look at my parenting journey, the reason I started 2 years ago was because 4 months after I started going down this path my youngest kid was going to be in pre-school 3 days a week. If you take a really long-term view, this is not a quick buck, people. I mean, you’re not going to make a ton of money in a month, there’s other ways to do that. But if you have a longer-term view and you’re like, “In half a year or a year if I can have five clients that will be great,” and then pretty soon you’re looking back 10 years from now and your business is maybe bigger than you ever thought it was going to be. But that’s because you’ve managed your life, and your family has changed in ways that you couldn’t have imagined. It’s a great flexible business.

And you can ramp back. You know like, “Oops, got the extra kid that I wasn’t expecting.” Maybe you cut back and you just maintain more bare bones, maybe you get rid of some clients and then you could grow the whole thing again.

Tiffany Higgins: Or sell it.

Kate: Yeah, or sell it. Yes.

Tiffany Higgins: Yeah, when you sell a bookkeeping business you usually get one-times revenue, especially if you’re set up with recurring revenue. It’s pretty nice to be able to do that.

Kate: Awesome. All right, I got a couple of quick questions here. Michelle asks, is this course self-paced? 

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, it is self-paced so you can watch it in little segments and pause it and come back to it whenever you can. So it’s perfect for being interrupted with little kids or whatever.

Kate: All right. Melanie asks, do you provide guidance in pricing? It seems that’s where most new owners struggle from what I’ve seen.

Tiffany Higgins: Yeah. So I had a lot of luck with putting things into certain packages. There’s a lot of different ways that you can do bookkeeping for businesses. I found a really special area for me was to just help people be prepared for tax time. We don’t dive into a lot of businesses that actually need accrual accounting or things like that. It’s mostly just cash-basis bookkeeping. It’s pretty easy to put that in packages. I had a lot of luck with that growing my business. I can really on-board quite a few people at a time just lumping them into packages. But yes, we go over the pricing in the course and we talk about that a lot in the support group.

Kate: All right. We’ve got one more question. Vandi asks, is there guidance for how to bring a client on? Including what information you need to get from them, reviewing their books, the engagement contract.

Tiffany Higgins: Yes. Module 4 walks all through that. It talks about initial conversation, how to win them over as a client; We have lots of different options on how to do that. And then once they say, “yes, that all looks good,” there is a whole set of procedures that are outlined in the course on exactly what you should do in what order to streamline that whole process and get started right away. But the number one thing is getting the engagement letter and the bank draft authorization signed before moving on to any other steps because you’ve got to get paid first in this industry.

Kate: All right. Well, I think I’m going to wrap this up, Tiffany. Is there anything else you want to say? I think this has been super informative. I thank you for your time. I know your busy and you’re really growing this and helping a lot of people. 

Tiffany Higgins: I’m trying.

Kate: I’ve kind of fallen into managing this Bookkeeping Side Hustle group. I want to provide good information. I hope people think this is good information. If you have any other questions, folks, tag Tiffany in our side Hustle group. She’s there and she can answer. There are current students as well that I am sure would be able to chime in, too.

Tiffany Higgins: Yes, absolutely. 

Kate: Awesome. Well, guys, we’re going to wrap up. I’m going to toss the link to the course one more time. Otherwise we’re going to say goodbye, and happy entrepreneuring guys. Get out there and go make some money somehow. If it’s not bookkeeping, leave this group and go find whatever your business is. Let’s all go succeed.

Tiffany Higgins: Yes! Absolutely, all right. Thanks! Bye.

Kate: Thanks, Tiffany. Bye.