$5M marriage proposals business, $400k baby plates, and a simple business that grew 1,600%

Hey starters - happy Thursday!

This week, we're featuring 3 amazing case studies + some new business ideas that are taking off:

#1: Michele has made $5M by helping people plan marriage proposals:

We spoke with Michele from The Heart Bandits - the world's first marriage proposal planning company!

After personally receiving a sub-par proposal, Michele realized there weren't many resources out there to help people come up with a great proposal idea.

Michele is now offering her services to customers in over 5 continents and making $360K/year with just two employees. 

Her secret? A viral press loop - after every amazing proposal, Michele pitches the story to the media, gets featured, which then drives more customers.

Read the full story here.

EDITORS NOTE: Want to learn more about getting press coverage for your business? I wrote a step-by-step guide here.

#2: Karen raised $400k to innovate on plates for babies

We caught up with Karen Braveheart from Prodigi Kids - she's designed an innovative baby plate that stays in place. 

She brought on university students to design her first prototype, which later proved her idea was worth bringing to market.

Karen just went to market and is now making $42k/year with just one employee. 

Learn more about Karen's wild 10-year ride here.

#3: Aaron and Lior 20x'd their business in two years selling weighted blankets:

Remember our interview with Aaron & Lior, founders of Hush Blankets?

We caught up with them to see what they've been up to - and needless to say, they've been busy. 

They've increased sales by more than 20x (1,600% growth) in the last two years and they've grown from 2 to 20 employees.

Aaron attributes their massive growth to two main changes:

• ​Scaling through "less-popular" marketing channels (TikTok, offline ads, etc).
• Focusing on building an SMS list over an email list - they saw open rates increase to 99% with a CTR in the 20% range

Give Aaron and Lior's story a read - they share some pretty amazing stuff you can't miss!

Aaron and Lior, the founders of Hush Blankets

#4: What's trending? Tutoring businesses (and mom & dad pulling their hair out):

As of late, parents around the US were informed schools may not reopen for the fall - a less than ideal situation for most parents.

What could this mean?

We've seen a big spike in search trends for tutoring businesses as parents are searching for experienced tutors to support their children's education during this time.

Want to learn more about starting a tutoring business? Check out the full guide here.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This guide is a part of our 1,000+ business ideas.

#5: 45 Profitable Home Based Business Ideas (2020)

Most of us are sitting at home... still.

And it looks like we might be at home until the end of 2021, at least!

We put together a list of 45 business ideas you can start from your couch.

Find your perfect idea here.

#6: Are you ready to boost your revenue?

I want to give a shoutout to our long-time sponsor Klaviyo.

Using Klaviyo will open up a massive, untapped sales channel and bring you closer to your customers!

I'm a huge fan of the product (I use it for Starter Story and love the segmentation/drip features). I've also been able to collect so many emails using their website form integration - my list growing over 3k/month now 😲

Here are just some of the impressive businesses we've interviewed that use Klaviyo for email marketing and are raving about the product - all great interviews you should check out as well!

• Brumate ($1.1M/mo at 23 years old)
• Sheets & Giggles ($76k/mo in just 6 months)
• Beardbrand ($100k+/mo - 1.5M YouTube subscribers)
• Abs Protein Pancakes ($25k/mo passive income business)
• Xero Shoes ($460k/mo - featured on Shark Tank)
• The Longhairs ($30k/mo)
• Framed Tweets ($25k/mo)

Level up your email marketing with 👉 Klaviyo!

(And thank you for your support 🙏)

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Thanks for reading! See you next week.

- Pat Walls, Founder @ Starter Story

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