What happens when the safety of a corporate job no longer aligns with your deepest aspirations? Steven Pemberton faced this crossroads in 2020 when anxiety attacks signaled he needed a dramatic change. Despite being on track for a six-figure salary as one of the youngest managers at a Fortune 100 company, Steven took the leap into full-time entrepreneurship—only to have Amazon shut down his account shortly after, leaving him $100,000 in debt with a warehouse full of unsellable inventory.
Rather than retreating to corporate security, Steven and his wife pivoted to Shopify with Facebook Marketplace as their acquisition channel. The results speak volumes: from $5,000 in their first month to over a million dollars annually within 18 months. Along the way, they've built Elevatum, an e-commerce growth consultancy helping brands scale holistically, while creating a giving program that provided Christmas for 137 underprivileged children.
Steven offers refreshingly practical advice on entrepreneurial resilience: "You can have emotions—they're like warning lights on your dashboard indicating problems—but you're still holding the steering wheel." He emphasizes the power of systems over individual effort, sharing how they automated their seven-figure business through strategic delegation and spreadsheets before incorporating AI tools that now supercharge their decision-making and client analysis.
For those considering a business partnership with their spouse, Steven reveals how complementary roles became their secret weapon—he handles vision and marketing as CEO while his wife excels at systems and operations as COO. The mindset revelation that transformed their approach? Understanding that building a business for impact beyond personal financial needs eliminates the dangerous plateau many entrepreneurs hit when bills are covered but growth stagnates. As Steven puts it, "The amount of good you can do with a million-dollar business is just a small fraction of what you could do with a $10 million business."
Ready to break free from limited thinking and build a business that scales beyond your personal capacity? Discover the mindset shifts, strategic pivots, and practical tools that can transform your entrepreneurial journey today.
How to connect with Steven?
Website: https://elevatum.digital/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@stevenkpemberton
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stevenkpemberton/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/skpemberton/
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