How to Protect Your Privacy While Growing Your Business

Sam Vander Wielen: [00:00:00] Can you build a successful seven figure business online while also staying safe and protecting your privacy? All we ever hear about is that in order to grow an online business, you’ve gotta share lots of content and be authentic. But, what if you’re worried about staying safe too? As a business attorney, I’ve seen firsthand the horrors that happen when business owners don’t take their privacy seriously.

That’s why I’ve developed these six steps to protect my own privacy as I’ve built my multi seven figure online business.

So over the last eight years, as I’ve spent this time building up my business, I have tried my best along the way to maintain my privacy. Both for my sanity and like boundaries and all that. Like I’ve never wanted, um, things to bleed over too much and like lose touch with like what’s real life and what’s like parasocial and all of that.

But also for my safety. I mean, that’s something that I’ve thought about even when I had very few people following me, it was pretty early [00:01:00] on that I would have people start to comment on my location, or I once had somebody comment on Instagram and say like, oh, I recognize where you are, I know where you live and it was like they like meant it well, but it was still creepy. Um, and I guess just even if they meant it well, it just made me realize like, oh, if they’re able to figure that out, like other people are too. And I think in the beginning I was really naive as to like, oh, who’s really seeing this? Or like, does that really ever happen? Does it really matter? And I realized that a lot of what we’re posting online is, you know, permanent, it has longevity, people can save it, screen capture, like do all kinds of things.

So it just made me more aware as time went on and I’m glad I started adopting some of the things that we’re gonna talk about today. Early on, and not like, oh, once I have an audience, then I’ll be a little more careful.

Then last week I got this email and it really, I don’t know, kind of shook, it really shook me in general ’cause it was really gross and like assaultive. But [00:02:00] also it really just like reset me as to being like, you know what? I need to be even more careful. There are some things on the back end that I want to tighten up.

So, an email subscriber on my, on my email list, sent me an email with an image of himself. I won’t go into detail ’cause it was really graphic and gross and honestly very assaultive. I didn’t even know a photo could be like that assaultive, but it was, and also sent me an email, a separate one, um, from his image with a very, very detailed description of what he would do to me if he you know, got access to me in some way. And it was really, it was really gross. Um, I felt bad for myself for having to read it, but also for my team for opening it like innocently and not knowing what was in it and the whole thing was just like, not, not great, but also it was an invitation just to like make sure like, Hey, do we have our stuff buttoned up, you know? It made me realize it’s always a good idea to check on how you’re doing when it comes to your privacy online.[00:03:00]

But I also understand that there’s this tension right between like, can you be a private person and like keep some things to yourself or hide certain details while also being successful online? Like you might be wondering like, isn’t that part of what makes people successful online? Do I have to share every part of myself in order to be successful online?

So today I just really want to dive in to some of these like small things that you can do to just protect your privacy, your personal details, your contact info. They’re just meant to be practical tips.

What I’m not talking about today though is like creating a faceless content business online or being totally anonymous online or you know, I sometimes get emails from people who admittedly are very paranoid and they don’t want their clients to know, who they are or like even know their name, let alone where they live like I’m not even talking about address. I, I mean, people don’t want people to know like the state or the town or anything like [00:04:00] that. And you know, what we’re talking about today is more, I would say for the like moderate person, the person who is like probably similar to me where I’m like, I wanna have an online business. I’m okay sharing certain things, but I don’t wanna be unsafe. Of course, like no stalkers, no creepers, nothing that’s unsafe.

But I don’t necessarily think you can build an online business if you never want anyone to see your face. You don’t want them to even know your name. Like personally, I have ethical issues with that, with you taking money from people and them not knowing who they’re working with and you know, also, just like the lawyer in me would also tell you that besides the fact that it’s impossible nowadays, you’re not anonymous, like if you exist, you are not anonymous. I could find, I am like number one, internet sleuth, not really, but like self-appointed number one, internet sleuth. And if I really wanted to find something about you, I could do it in a heartbeat. I find my husband constantly is telling me like, how did you figure that out? It takes me two seconds.

So there are so many ways, especially as a [00:05:00] lawyer, I know there are so many ways to find out things about people and if you wanna have an online business, there are certain things, like what we’re talking about today are the more public facing, like things that people shouldn’t be able to Google about you but at the end of the day, like when people write me and they say, I don’t even want my clients to know my name. I’m like, first of all, I kinda have an issue with that if people are paying you. But second of all, legally speaking, like it doesn’t matter because your business will always be tied back to you in some way like we will always be able to trace it back and if they ever hired a lawyer or something like that, they would be able to find it in two seconds.

So really, let’s just talk today about the public facing, kind of staying safe, being smart, but also balancing it with understanding that there really is no anonymity. Is that. Is that how we say it? There really is none of that these days with being online and also, yeah, just balancing it with being practical that you want to have an online business and part of that is being online and being seen, but I don’t think that means you have to be unsafe.

So, let’s get [00:06:00] into the six steps you should take in order to grow your business, but stay safe online.

Number one, I want you to change your email footer address. Okay, so legally you’re actually required to have an address at the bottom of any of your marketing emails, like the emails that go out to your email list, but you’re not legally required to use neither your personal address or the address that you even used to register your business.

But when it comes to the address that you use at the bottom of your emails for your marketing emails, it can be anything like a PO Box, a box that you get at a FedEx or UPS store or even your 9-5’s address, if they’ll allow you to use it, of course, ask for permission. If you use Kit like I do for your email marketing, then Kit even allows you to use their mailing address as your digital address, and they’ll even send you your mail if you get something important.

One more hot tip on this step, if you do go the PO Box or the FedEx Box route, then I highly recommend getting a PO Box in a town that maybe isn’t [00:07:00] located exactly where you are unless you live in a big, big city and it makes it harder to find you.

I know some of my customers inside the Ultimate Bundle® have also mentioned that there are virtual mailbox solutions out there as well.

Number two, we’re going to develop some social media best practices. The first thing is that you’re never going to post in real time, so that means if you’re at the coffee shop, at the gym, at the restaurant, at the concert, whatever the thing is that you’re posting about, let’s not post while we’re there, let’s post once we get to another location and we’ve already left that place.

Side note, not posting in real time is actually better for your content. It will help your content perform better in the long run because stories should be stories, right? So like on Instagram, for example, instead of posting one story here, one story there throughout the day to show and almost like follow along on your day, which, you know, a stalker could also follow you along too. But instead of doing it that way, post them all at once, once you’ve left those places so that you can actually curate a beginning, a middle, and an end to your [00:08:00] stories.

The second thing is to be careful about talking about future plans, especially when they come to you not being home or talking about being in a future location in your future plan.

So, if you have a vacation coming up, instead of advertising that ahead of time, switch your content to be about the vacation you just had last week.

Last but not least for social media best practices, make sure that you also keep in mind when replying to comments or dms on Instagram, sometimes people will ask you like really specific information. Somebody once posted a very specific comment about where I lived, so I deleted that. Other times I get dms that in my opinion or just like a little over the boundary and it’s okay to just not reply or it’s okay to say I don’t feel comfortable sharing that, but thanks so much for reading or something like that.

The third thing we’re going to do is turn off our Instagram location sharing. So this is a new feature that Meta rolled out related to Instagram maps, which actually posts a pin on the exact location that you share content from. [00:09:00] I swear to you, it’s like a bunch of Meta execs got together in a room and they were like, you know what’s really missing from this app? The ability to pinpoint people’s locations without telling them about it. I told my email list the other day, I swear there must have just not been any women available for this meeting. If you don’t know about this new Instagram feature already, then I highly recommend going into the settings of your Instagram app and turning this feature off. Of course, they’ve made it super easy to do. So, i’ve actually included a link to an article down below where you can follow the step-by-step instructions to go turn this feature off.

The fourth thing you should do is not use your home address when forming your business. So whenever you form your business in your state, oftentimes whatever information that you provide to them or certain like sets of that information that you provide to them actually becomes part of public record. So people can go onto your state’s website, look up the name of your business, and then immediately see your address, your contact information, all that good stuff.

The first thing to keep in mind is that when you file, you should be taking note [00:10:00] on the form or the application, what is made public and what is kept private because if they keep your address private, then use your home address no problem. But if they make it public, that’s a really good thing to know.

In some states in America, you’re allowed to use a PO Box as the address for your business, or you can use the street address of the place where you have your PO box and that’s kind of a way around it a little bit. Um, but in other states, you’re actually not allowed. You’re explicitly told that you’re not allowed to use a PO Box address.

In those cases, I would explore whether it’s okay to use your registered agent’s address. Your registered agent is the person who can receive service of process on your business’s behalf. That’s like what happens if you get sued.

Obviously, you could consider getting a office outside of your home if that’s within your budget or make sense for your business or you could explore alternative registration options like registering your business in a state that has stronger privacy laws like Wyoming. Of course there are pros and cons to doing that when you don’t actually live in Wyoming or operate your business out of there. So I always recommend [00:11:00] consulting with your own attorney and talking with your accountant too.

The fifth thing you want to do is check the privacy controls on all of the apps and digital tools that you use. When I first started my business and I set up my business Stripe account, I used my phone number because it was the only phone number I had to set up my account and because it was required by Stripe to set it up. Well, little did I know that they actually make that phone number public when somebody buys your product and fast forward months and years later when I started getting random calls from customers in the middle of the night or people crossing boundaries contacting me, and I was like, how did you get my number? It took us a while to realize that stripe made that public. This was a great reminder to set up a free Google phone number, which I promptly did, and I highly recommend you doing as well for any places where it’s required to use your phone number, but you don’t wanna make your personal phone number public.

But it’s also a great reminder that when setting up any online tools or programs or apps that you’re using for your business, go into the privacy controls and check to see what’s [00:12:00] public. I actually just did this yesterday with WhatsApp because I use WhatsApp for a couple of different like business chats among friends, and I didn’t realize that when you go into the settings and go to privacy, everything was made public to everyone, anyone could find my profile, they could see my contact details when I was last online, and anyone could call or text me. So I went ahead and made all of that private to contacts only, but I never would’ve known until I got that really nasty email a couple weeks ago.

The sixth and final thing you’re going to do is make a plan. We’re gonna make a plan now of what you’re going to do if you ever experience a situation like I did a couple of weeks ago, getting a really nasty email from a subscriber that was really assaultive and gross, and I wanted to make sure I had all my stuff in a row. So here’s the plan that we’re going to come up with.

First things first. If you ever get a comment or an email or something like the one that I did, I think it goes without saying, but don’t reply, this is really important for legal reasons. You don’t wanna engage with [00:13:00] this person, but you also don’t wanna give them any additional information, maybe even about your IP address or your location.

Depending on how they contacted you, you also wanna go ahead and save any data related to this person’s contact. So like save their email because like the email that I got had come through my email list, I went into the email list and we made sure we saved um, because in Kit we can see their location and a lot of data about how they came into my email list, so we saved all of that. Make sure you back everything up. Save whatever you’ve got.

The next thing I would recommend doing is blocking this person, whether it’s on social media or in your email. If you use Kit like I do, you can actually go in and block a subscriber from ever being able to join your email list again with that email. I also saw that this subscriber who had emailed me a few weeks ago came in through what’s called Kit’s Creator Recommendations, which I use to grow my email list by people referring to me from my friends, and I was able to actually see who this person was referred to me by and contact them to give [00:14:00] them a heads up so that they could remove this guy too.

Last, but not least in the most serious of cases, you can report this person to the authorities. So I wanted to share this because actually I put out a question box on my Instagram the other day asking, what questions do you guys have about privacy and staying safe online? And someone said, are we allowed to report this to the authorities? Like what do we do?

One of the things that I learned the most in this case that just happened to me is that first of all, the email that the guy sent me, showing himself fully to me, that actually is illegal and you’re not allowed to do that, news alert. Um, and, and also the, the email that he followed up with as well and so what you actually do is you report it to the authorities where you live.

So, because I use Kit for my email address, I was actually able to see this guy’s address and with a quick google search, I found out exactly where he lived. It was pretty easy to find him, and he posted all of his information on Reddit too. Um, but I actually, you know, at first considered contacting the authorities where he lived, only to find out that you [00:15:00] actually contact the authorities where you are located.

I would say when in doubt, everybody was really nice about it. I was so uncertain and honestly I felt really embarrassed by what happened and kind of like, I shouldn’t be taking it so seriously or should just be brushing it off, you know, typical woman stuff. I think unfortunately it’s, it’s, you know, that programming is in there somewhere. But I felt really embarrassed about reaching out and like complaining about this and it seems so stupid and not only was it highly illegal, but everybody was just really helpful and kind about it, so I think if you’re not sure if something is on the edge of like, is this okay? Is it not okay? Always feel free to reach out. The other good point about reaching out to your local authorities is that you can start building a record of this.

So if this was something maybe, uh, on a smaller scale, if it happened to you and you report it, now we start to have record so that if it happened again, God forbid it starts to creep into harassment territory, so you sometimes need like multiple attempts depending on what happens. A [00:16:00] single event can be harassment, but sometimes when they’re smaller, um, some jurisdictions will require multiple instances of this happening. So it’s just good to have record. You will always have record that you’ve reached out, that you’ve called, that this happened. When in doubt, reach out.

In order to get more tips like these about how to grow a highly successful online business, but also keeping it safe, make sure you click down below to subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, Sam’s Sidebar.

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