6 habits that made me a multi-millionaire — Silicon Valley Girl Podcast

Marina Mogilko: I'm 34 years old and one of my companies, my media company Lingua Marina, at the last fundraise was valued at $34 million. I also have another company. I didn't have rich parents. I'm actually an immigrant from Russia to the US, and I came here with nothing, just with my business or my startup idea.

There was a lottery that I won. I think I look good, honestly. Let's agree on that—I look okay. My parents always told me things that actually made me who I am, and I got a great education in mathematics. These are the lotteries I want, I guess. But a lot of things that I've achieved is the result of my habits and the consistent actions I've taken day in and day out over the years to get where I am today.

This is not a brag. This is to show you that this path is real. Building a multi-million dollar company is all about effort. It's all about believing in yourself, not thinking about what other people think of you, not relying on luck, but just being consistent in doing what you love. In this video, I'll share the six habits that I think have been super crucial in helping me reach this point.

I'll start with the one that's both the easiest and the hardest to master. But I can confidently say that without this habit, none of my success would have been possible, and that is believing that you can do something. There's this quote by Henry Ford that I absolutely love: whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right. Your mindset shapes your reality.

When I was growing up, my mom was always telling me, "You're the best. You're going to do it. You're the smartest." And honestly, I questioned her so many times like, "Mom, you're saying this just because every mom would say this to her kid." And then I realized that's not the case. Not everybody tells this to their kids. And because she told me that, with all my actions I was trying to live up to her expectations. She was like, "You're going to be the best at school." When I came to school, I'm like, "I have to be the best because my mom told me I have to be the best."

Of course, there are some disadvantages to this upbringing because I'm constantly working. I don't know how to rest. I feel guilty when I rest, and I can talk about this with my therapist. But also when I bring this topic up with a therapist, they point out that this is what made me successful.

Another phrase that I like to say to myself is "Marina, if not you, then who?" I'm trying to fight this school education system in the US. I feel like it's been around for tens of years and nobody did anything. Like, okay, then it's up to me because I don't want my kids to be sick in a couple of years, right? I'm not sure I'm going to be able to drive change, but I just feel that this is the right thing to do.

When I started social media, I was like, "Okay, there were videos about GMAT and TOEFL, but Marina, your experience is unique. Share it." And again, this comes from my upbringing, but if you didn't have a mom like I did, I just want you to be that person. I can tell you that you're unique and you need to go out and share your values with the world and make it a better place because if not you, then who?

Another thought that really helps me is understanding that successful people are as ordinary as I am. When I first came to Silicon Valley, I met this guy from Stanford, and I thought people who study at Stanford are aliens because they're super smart. That guy was smart, but he was normal. So you need to create that confidence inside you that you are worth achieving things, and that confidence creates a positive feedback loop.

Small wins build momentum and they lead to even bigger wins. If you believe something is possible, you'll find a way to make it. You just have to be determined. It sounds very cliché, but it is what it is. What I want you to understand is that self-belief isn't something you're born with. It's something you build. Start by setting small achievable goals and proving to yourself that you can follow through.

Here is another crucial tip: surround yourself with a positive environment. I stopped reading social media comments because yes, people are mocking me for being in Silicon Valley and not being able to build a billion dollar company. They're mocking me for my English. They're mocking me for my accent. They're mocking me for my mistakes. I stopped reading the comments. I have a team to sort this out. I am trying to do my best. Yes, I make mistakes, but I cannot let myself hear those comments and read those. I need to surround myself with encouraging and positive environment.

Those could be mentors. You can just watch videos. You can just read inspiring books. Read a book by Britney Spears, "The Woman in Me." Oh my God, like all the things she went through and she still had this power inside to continue singing and dancing.

Wrapping up this tip, I encourage everyone to visit America at least once to experience the energy and opportunities and incredible achievements that can truly inspire you to aim higher and live your best life. Definitely a trip to the US in 2013—that was my first time. When I came to the US, I was like, "Oh my God, this whole new world that I want to explore," and there was nothing that could stop me from that.

On to my second tip: consistency. The winners are those who do not give up. I've been doing YouTube since 2014. Since December, when I had my first baby, I didn't miss a week of uploads. And I already had three channels by then. When my second baby was born, I did not miss a single week of uploads. I started missing some weeks last year because my kids are growing up and they need more and more of my attention and my energy, and I just can't honestly sustain so many things because I also have businesses.

But I know that if I want to be successful, I need to be consistent. Not just consistent in posting—I need to be constantly experimenting. I need to be consistent in hiring the best people. I need to be consistent in constantly learning what's going on in the market. If you look at any celebrity these days, go back 10 years, 20 years—they've been working on the same thing. Jake Paul and Logan Paul were creating videos on Vine. Britney Spears started singing when she was four or five. It's a long-term work. It's not an overnight success.

For me, it doesn't matter if I'm sad or happy. Yesterday I had the lowest energy in the last six months, but I sat down and created a video, and that actually helped me feel more energy because this is something I like to do. When people ask me about social media, I'm like, "You have to be consistent. If you're like 'oh today I'm feeling tired, tomorrow is a busy day,' you're not going to be so successful with this approach."

This habit of consistency isn't just something I apply to YouTube alone. It's how I approach every goal that I set for myself. When I commit to something, I take steps in that direction every single day—no excuses. There is no "I don't feel like it" or "it's not the right time." If I consistently get the feeling that I don't feel right about this thing, then I stop doing it. But if I told myself "Marina, you have to be a fashion icon" and I told that to myself in 2022, I'm not a fashion icon and I'm far away from that, but I'm working on my style. I'm working on everything. It's a process, and what I don't like to do is saying to myself, "Okay, Marina, I want you to visit the Met Gala."

When I say this, I do not create a deadline because I know it's a process. Again, maybe I never visit the Met Gala, but I'm definitely enjoying the journey of experimenting with my style, experimenting with creative people, and doing photo shoots, etc. I've said this so many times on this channel: success doesn't go to the brightest or the most talented. It goes to the person who keeps hitting the same point over and over again without giving up.

Consistency isn't glamorous, but it's the key to turning dreams into reality. Keep showing up and the results will follow. Persistence is something that my investors mentioned when they decided to invest 1.7 million into me as a content creator. Remember that I told you my media company's valued at $34 million? That's based on that investment. They saw that I'm consistent with my channels, that I go beyond just creating content. I try to start businesses. I try to experiment. This is what they like. So if you're willing to build a career, you have to be consistent.

Anyway, let's move on to the next point. I've come to understand that my superpower is generating new ideas and being in front of the camera. Anything outside that—editing, scheduling, logistics, operations—I delegate it as quickly as possible. Remember, when I feel that some activity drains me and I never enjoy it or maybe I enjoy it only 20% of the time, I just get rid of it.

But some activities you just can't get rid of. You need to do your taxes. You need to do your finances. You need to keep your stats up because if you have the numbers, you can control things. Delegating is how I ensure I stay focused on what I do the best. I have a to-do list, and after the to-do list, I have a phrase: "Are you doing something that brings in the highest ROI?"

Because sometimes I have things on my to-do list that could have been done by somebody else, an assistant. I could have been doing videos instead of that. So I'm always tracking the ROI, always measuring how I feel inside, and if I don't like something, I just delegate it.

It didn't come to me like that. There was so many things I did by myself for many, many years. But then when I started generating revenue, I started valuing my hour in a dollar amount, and that made it easier to delegate. I know that as a creator, if I make this video, I'm going to make X dollars. So I could pay somebody else to clean my apartment, do this, do that. Sometimes I enjoy those activities myself and I do them.

I mentioned earlier that my three YouTube channels consistently have videos coming out. Now here's the secret behind that consistency: it's a team of 50 amazing people who helped me grow my media company and help me thrive. You might think, "Of course it's easy for you to stay consistent with a team like that." But here's the truth: I wouldn't have had this team or this level of success if I hadn't made the decision to delegate early on. I started really small. I paid a school kid to edit my videos, and he charged me like $7 an hour. He was in Russia, so it was maybe even $3 to $4. I don't even remember, but it was really cheap. And for him, that was a lot of money. We worked for several weeks, and then I switched to a more professional editor.

So basically, the key takeaway from here: look for tasks that can be delegated or outsourced affordably. Maybe you outsource to AI. Right, there are so many tools. The goal is to free up your time for your superpowers.

Okay, the next tip: counting money and regularly investing. A lot of people tell me, "Marina, you were too focused on money. That's the metric." That's the metric that I track. I track my happiness level, and I track money because money is also a signal of how my business is performing, how my content is performing. I know exactly how much money I have, how much I'm spending, and on what. I know what's the ROI on each product that I'm running. I know how much every video costs to make and how much it brings in revenue.

It's always been this way, and it's been this way for several years now, whether I was managing millions of dollars or a lot less several years ago. So count every dollar. Start investing even if you don't have a lot of cash. It's all about building the right platform. If you have $100 to invest today, start a Wealthfront account, start a Coinbase account, buy a little bit of crypto. Just build this habit. Regular investing transforms your income into a wealth-building engine.

I first invested in 2020, and this year I saw amazing returns. I was like, "Oh my God, this really pays off." It's not just about earning more. It's about making your money work harder than you do. While this isn't financial advice, here are a few things that I'm investing in:

The easiest thing is to invest in the S&P 500. Just buy it regularly, like once a month. A little bit of crypto—for me it's like maybe less than 5%. Buy some stocks of the companies that you believe in. I bought Google because we're watching this on YouTube, right? I bought Nvidia because they are building something that's crucial for the new economy, for AI. They're building chips. I invested in Tesla. That wasn't the best decision back in 2021, but now it's actually generating profits. So really, just be consistent. But those individual investments, they're less than 10% of my portfolio. Most of my portfolio is in the S&P 500. I'm not a risky person, and I don't have time to just explore what's going on in the market, so S&P 500 is a regular investment. Some of the investments I'm just playing around with—companies or crypto.

Apart from that, I have two spreadsheets that I update every month. One spreadsheet tracks all of my income and all of my expenses. The second spreadsheet tracks my investments and savings—like what's going on, what's the value of them, etc. For me, it's meditation honestly. It's better than meditation—just doing numbers. Maybe because I come from a mathematical background, but I really, really like doing spreadsheets and seeing what's happening to my net worth, seeing what's happening to my income. It also gives me an idea of, you know, maybe this product has to be eliminated. It's no longer generating joy and money.

If you're looking for a very easy book to read on investing, I'd recommend "Money" by Tony Robbins. That was the first book I read on investing, and it changed my whole mindset. It's a great place to start. Of course, it doesn't include all the information that you need, but it just gives you this mindset of like, "I need to take care of my finances and my retirement." We did estate planning after that. I bought my life insurance. Like, all of those things I figured them out while reading that book.

The next tip is experimentation. Next year I'm launching a food company, a snack company. Anytime I'm launching something, people be like, "Marina, but you are an English teacher. Marina, but you're this. Marina, but you're that." What I've learned in the past two years is that your past experience should not dictate your future endeavors.

Yes, it's great to have experience. I know I'm not going to give up on my social media. I love it. I honestly enjoy it. But just because a lot of people know me for teaching English, it doesn't mean I can't start a snack company. Yes, I don't understand a lot of things in producing snacks, but I have a great co-founder who's done it for years. I understand marketing. I understand the problem that America faces with the current state of the food industry and the rate of diseases and obesity in kids. So I know what I want to solve.

You have to be happy. We only have one life, and you have to really enjoy what you're doing. You have to see the meaning. If you've been teaching English for 10 years, it doesn't mean you have to teach it for 11 years. Maybe you still teach it, but you also find another teacher who can replace you on your channel. That's what I'm doing. We have a teacher who helps me with some videos, and she makes them for my channel so I can focus on other things.

It's okay to experiment. Do it. Even when it comes to YouTube channels, I never make the same videos. I try to experiment. I try to come up with new ideas. I try to rebuild my studios. I try to experiment with my outfits. Just because it makes everything much more exciting.

One of the things you could start—if you're working a 9 to 5—try to start some kind of business, try to build a side income, try to do consulting. Like, whatever something exciting and challenging has to constantly be part of your life.

I started singing classes again. Oh my God, I'm so sweaty every time I sing. I've been singing since I was seven. See how I'm like protecting myself? But because of the way they taught me to sing or because we never worked on the psychological side of it, I still have fear of the stage. I've sung on the stage maybe over a hundred times, and we're still working on how to feel free with my voice, how to remove all the comments from my head about my voice and my singing. So maybe someday I'll start singing on this channel, but no—not every experiment will succeed, and that's okay.

The key is to learn from every attempt, track what you did, what happened, what are the metrics, so you can improve next time. Also detach yourself from the outcome. Experimentation isn't about perfection. It's about learning.

I always ask this question to founders that I interview on this channel: "When do you give up on the idea? When do you stop trying?" The best entrepreneurs tell me that you stop trying when you build a billion dollar company, and it's all about understanding that this is something you just have to do. There is no other way.

Sometimes people ask me, "Do I have to start a business?" I'm like, "You only start a business if you know you can't live without it." So do things you know you can't live without. I know I can't live without singing. I know it's not a business, but I'm going to do it.

By the way, some of my experiments became my best ideas. Like asking people how to pronounce brand names—that was a wild idea. Interviewing investors and entrepreneurs was just a wild idea because entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley—there aren't too many interviews with startup founders. What else was a wild idea? Moving to the US in general, anyway.

Make it a habit. The most successful people experiment constantly, and it's not a one-time thing. It's a mindset.

And the last but not the least—my favorite rule—is the rule of 5 seconds. If you came up with an idea, do something within 5 seconds to make it work. For example, what happened last year? I had this crazy idea like I wanted to start a physical product. So my first action was to research what type of products creators are launching, how much they're making—like research at least. Then I kept researching, kept researching, and my co-founder approached me. Because I'd had this idea for a while and I was working on it, just perfect timing, and we clicked and we started doing the new company.

But don't wait until you're ready because a lot of people like, "Oh, this is not the best time. We're thinking about the third kid. I don't know if this approach should be applied to expanding the family." But a lot of moms tell me just do it, just go for it. A lot of moms have four kids. But basically, you don't need to have everything figured out to take the first step. Failure is an inevitable part of success.

Even when it comes to fertility, we couldn't get pregnant for the first four years, but I knew I wanted a child, right? And we went through so much, but we finally got Emily, and it's the best miracle in life. Imagine if I was like, "Oh, maybe the universe is telling me I'm not supposed to be a mom." Come on! If you know something inside that you have to be or have to do, just keep doing it.

So anyway, take risks, start acting fast, and believe in yourself. I wanted to wrap up this video with a phrase: I believe in you, and you're going to make this world a better place.