Hi Business bestie,
If you’ve been following my Grant Journey, you already know the story.
✔️ I found a $5,000 grant opportunity.
✔️ I questioned the $25 application fee.
✔️ I asked a Facebook group of women entrepreneurs what they thought—and 34 women had plenty to say. 😂
✔️ I decided to move forward.
✔️ I worked with the professional grant writer on my team.
✔️ I reviewed and revised the responses.
✔️ And I hit SUBMIT.
But I promised my Elite subscribers something different.
Everyone gets to come on the journey. Elite gets a look inside the Playbook.
So I’m not going to spend this post retelling you everything that happened. Instead, I’m taking what I learned from actually going through the process and turning it into something you can use when you’re evaluating your next grant opportunity.
One woman following the journey called it a “real live case study.” That’s exactly what it became. Now let’s turn the case study into a system.
The Grant Behind the Playbook
Grant: Women Founders Grant
Award: $5,000
Application Fee: $25
Deadline for my round: August 31, 2026
Status: Submitted ✅
One thing I should also share: looking for grant opportunities isn’t new to me. Each month, I review my Grants for Small Business Owners list, on the 15th of every month, for opportunities that may be a good fit for both my business and nonprofit. But I don’t apply for everything I find. Finding the grant is only the beginning. Deciding whether it’s worth pursuing is where the work starts.
And that’s where this Playbook begins.
🔒 What’s Inside the Elite Playbook
I’m giving you the frameworks I wish every business owner considered before hitting APPLY:
✓ My “Should I Apply?” framework
✓ How I evaluate an application fee
✓ How to decide between DIY and professional grant-writing support
✓ How to turn a broad funding need into a specific request
✓ What to review when your grant writer sends the draft back
✓ What to save so you’re not starting from scratch next time
✓ What to do after SUBMIT
✓ My Grant-Ready checklist
✓ The downloadable It’$ My Money Grant Opportunity Tracker
You watched me do it.
Now here’s a system you can use to do it yourself.