Latest / Forge Fire Protocol Podcast / Spark: Idea Validation and the First Step Toward a $10M+ Business Exit Strategy

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Spark: Idea Validation and the First Step Toward a $10M+ Business Exit Strategy · Forge Fire Protocol Podcast

• 0:02
  Imagine breaking free from the grind and building a business that lights you up, ignites with purpose, and delivers the ultimate reward.
• 0:12
  Forge Fire Protocol gives ambitious entrepreneurs the proven five-step system to choose the right business, launch it successfully, scale it strategically, and exit on your terms.
• 0:26
  Turning vision into lasting wealth, forged in fire, built for legacy.
• 0:33
  Welcome to the Forge Fire Protocol.
• 0:35
  This is the first episode, episode number one.
• 0:39
  And what we're going through today is we're going to talk about the promise.
• 0:43
  We're going to talk about what the protocol is really all about.
• 0:46
  And we're going to take you through the beginning of step one.
• 0:48
  All right.
• 0:49
  So you've got three of us here.
• 0:50
  You've got Michael Sullivan, Stephen Moynihan and myself, Don LaPlume.
• 0:55
  I originally I wrote the book, The Forge Fire Protocol.
• 0:58
  And
• 1:03
  Build the business, choose the business, plan the exit, take you all the way through to that exit.
• 1:09
  It's a roadmap, a guidance system that isn't just a trail of breadcrumbs you can follow.
• 1:16
  This is a system that will guide you through every single step, help you to watch for certain pitfalls and guide you to make the right decisions, many of the right decisions anyways, all the way through the process.
• 1:31
  It can't tell you how to do every decision.
• 1:33
  That's important.
• 1:34
  There's things that you're going to run into in business that it has to come down to you.
• 1:39
  You have to make the decision.
• 1:41
  You have to take the action.
• 1:42
  You know, talking about action, we started this.
• 1:45
  This book, the book, The Forge Fire Protocol, has been in the process of being written.
• 1:50
  It was never started.
• 1:50
  It was never put on paper until June 16th.
• 1:54
  of this year it is now august 3rd just to give you an idea of time frame okay so uh from june 16th until now not only have we um have i written the book we have put it on paper uh we've created an ecosystem we're just about finished with an app we've got all sorts of different aspects of this and and we're building the community
• 2:15
  that will be there to help you make the right decisions and move forward in your business, okay?
• 2:21
  Whether you've got a business going right now or you're planning to launch a business, you don't even know what you're gonna launch yet.
• 2:26
  That's what we're here for.
• 2:26
  We're gonna guide you through all of that, all right?
• 2:29
  But it will come down to you following the protocol, taking the steps you need to take and making the decisions that you need to make.
• 2:36
  And some of those, quite frankly, you're gonna be on your own way, all right?
• 2:40
  But you're gonna have a lot of people to talk to, a lot of potential guidance,
• 2:45
  And you're going to have all kinds of tools to help you to make the best decisions for you and your business and your exit.
• 2:51
  All right.
• 2:52
  So with that, let's get into the Forge Fire Protocol, guys.
• 2:55
  Yeah, Don, can I say one quick thing that you were just saying that I think is very important?
• 2:58
  I just want to double down and reiterate what we were talking about.
• 3:01
  The most successful people I know and I've worked with, there's a common trait, and it's do it now.
• 3:08
  Okay, I'm gonna say it over and over again.
• 3:10
  Do it now do it now do it now.
• 3:11
  Okay, don't put off when what could be done today to tomorrow So we're going through this by the way You're gonna get access to tools that I believe honestly are unprecedented from what I've seen like and I'm not I am not someone who's gonna pump up anything.
• 3:23
  That's not ask my kids Okay, I will give you credit when your credit is earned and deserved, but if it's not I'm gonna tell you it needs to be better And that's okay
• 3:32
  But what's more important here is you're going to get access to incredible tools.
• 3:36
  Now, if you're not taking advantage of those tools, you're not going to get the results.
• 3:40
  The system is built by people interacting and taking the necessary action, asking questions, getting better, growing.
• 3:46
  But the important thing is doing it now.
• 3:49
  The analogy that I said to Don and Steve earlier is if someone comes to me and they've never hit a baseball before and they want their kid to be able to just...
• 3:56
  feel good and get some confidence at the plate so they can get up to the game, make contact, get on base, get hits and start liking the game and loving the game and having some success.
• 4:04
  Well, if they pay for five lessons, for example, and that one kid shows up for one lesson, another kid shows up for three, but doesn't do anything else that I tell them to do.
• 4:13
  But the other kid shows up for all five and that kid's going home and doing the work.
• 4:17
  And I say, you know, just do this when you're at home, do this once a day, do this.
• 4:20
  And those kids that are taking the action, showing up and doing the work, those kids are going to be exponentially better.
• 4:26
  than the kid who showed up for one or three and wasn't doing all the work in between.
• 4:31
  So the bottom line is, and the only reason why I wanted to be long with this, is it is 100% essential that you understand.
• 4:37
  Do it now.
• 4:38
  Do the work.
• 4:39
  Follow the system.
• 4:40
  It will work if you follow it.
• 4:42
  If you don't, if you deviate, you start thinking, oh, I can do this part better.
• 4:45
  You're no longer following the system.
• 4:48
  Okay?
• 4:48
  And if you find something that's better, bring it to our attention, by the way.
• 4:51
  We'd love to hear it.
• 4:51
  Yeah.
• 4:53
  Yeah, Don and Mike, it's really beyond the chairing squad, the actionable operating system that we have here.
• 5:01
  And why just the pure motivation really fails at sunrise and how the Forge Fire Protocol really provides the definitive step-by-step $10 million exit blueprint.
• 5:12
  And that's what we have here.
• 5:13
  And when you're looking at motivational speakers, and we've all participated, and we've all watched them and get, you know, super hyped, the world class motivators like the Tonys, the Leses, the Eric's, they leave you, you leave the arena on fire.
• 5:29
  But when you wake up at dawn, you know, that the hype, it fades, and you're still lost and what actionable steps to take.
• 5:38
  And right here, we've got real execution pointing out.
• 5:43
  with a structured operating system, the inspiration without the mechanics really just leads to an expensive, high-stress job.
• 5:51
  So here at the protocol, you can see countless inspired techniques
• 5:56
  examples by all of us, by things that we each have done in the past and how we bring up that into the protocol and form a real blueprint and our Forgefire Academy.
• 6:08
  When you see that and the tools that are in there, you'll see enormous value that you've got here and the potential to do step-by-step all the way truly to that $10 million exit.
• 6:19
  That's phenomenal.
• 6:20
  And one quick thing too, is like, when you look at what
• 6:24
  the grand illusion of modern entrepreneurship is, okay?
• 6:27
  Whether you've read the book E-Myth and you understand the importance of systems or whatever you've done before, you've tried to, if you've ever paid attention, I'm very analytical.
• 6:35
  So I take a look at what's going on around me.
• 6:37
  I want to see what works, what doesn't work.
• 6:38
  Double down on what works and get rid of what doesn't.
• 6:41
  Okay, but there's, I want to confront the grand illusion of modern entrepreneurship, which is that most founders, they're not actually building empires.
• 6:49
  They're not actually building something that can sustain without them.
• 6:52
  They're just trading a single boss for hundreds of bosses who are called their customers.
• 6:57
  They're working 70, 80 hour weeks, and they have to.
• 7:00
  Why?
• 7:01
  Because no one cares more about a business than you.
• 7:04
  It's your business.
• 7:05
  It's your baby.
• 7:06
  And don't get me wrong.
• 7:07
  I know some extremely successful people.
• 7:10
  who have done that.
• 7:10
  I also know those same people that are in their 60s, 70s, and they're still the single person fixing all critical issues.
• 7:18
  They are still the single person getting the call at two in the morning, 10am, 10pm, and having to run out of the house and leave family dinners and leave different events because the customer has a crisis.
• 7:27
  Okay, what we're trying to help you do is build a system that will work without you.
• 7:32
  You know, it's funny that you mentioned E-Myth because I love the book.
• 7:35
  I mean, read it multiple times and the revisited and everything else.
• 7:39
  But here's the thing, right?
• 7:43
  A lot of us have something in life that we're really passionate about.
• 7:48
  We all have something, right?
• 7:50
  I shouldn't say a lot of us, all of us.
• 7:52
  And so a lot of times we're told, hey, you want to do what you're passionate about for work, right?
• 7:58
  For what your business is.
• 7:59
  I'm going to tell you, we're going to be a little contrarian here because this is not about a passion business.
• 8:03
  Passion business is something like, let's say you just love to bake.
• 8:07
  And so now you're going to, you know, launch bakery.
• 8:10
  Well, those two don't equate.
• 8:12
  Those aren't the same thing.
• 8:13
  Launching a bakery business is very different from loving to bake.
• 8:17
  Okay.
• 8:18
  It almost takes the love out of the baking, right?
• 8:21
  Because there's so many different aspects of running that business.
• 8:25
  In Forged Fire Protocol, what we're going to do, and it starts off with what we call Spark.
• 8:29
  It's figuring out what the right business is for you to start.
• 8:32
  This is not about building a lifelong business.
• 8:36
  I don't care if you're in your twenties, your fifties, your seventies.
• 8:38
  I don't care where you are in age.
• 8:39
  It doesn't matter.
• 8:41
  What matters is what are your objectives?
• 8:45
  When you look at Forgefire protocol and what our promise is, okay?
• 8:50
  And I'm going to use that lightly because again, it's not about, we can't guarantee you your results.
• 8:55
  But what we can do is we can guide you, right?
• 8:57
  What this is guiding you to do is to create a business that you can have yourself replaced in.
• 9:05
  Like the most fun of being, of owning a bakery is doing the baking.
• 9:09
  If that's what your passion is, if you love to bake, right?
• 9:13
  But this is not about you baking.
• 9:15
  This is about replacing yourself and being able to sell a business.
• 9:19
  If you want to sell a business down the road,
• 9:23
  You can't sell it where you are the key cog, because if you're the key cog, then all you're doing is you're selling some assets and buying your own job, right?
• 9:36
  That's what you end up with.
• 9:37
  With Forgefire Protocol, you're going to build something that's going to incorporate systems, SOPs, everything that you need so that three to five years from now, you can put that business up for sale.
• 9:49
  sell it quickly for 10 million plus.
• 9:51
  That's the objective.
• 9:52
  That's the goal.
• 9:53
  Now, maybe you'll get 3 million.
• 9:54
  Maybe you'll get 1 million.
• 9:55
  I don't know.
• 9:56
  All right.
• 9:57
  It depends on what you build and the decisions that you make.
• 9:59
  But here's what I can tell you.
• 10:01
  All right.
• 10:01
  If you follow the protocol and do what you need to do and make the right decisions, you're going to have a business that you have been replaced in and now you can sell.
• 10:10
  And if you sold it for 5, 10 million dollars, what have you just done?
• 10:12
  All right.
• 10:13
  You've now made yourself truly unemployable for one, but you've made yourself
• 10:19
  So you've given yourself a nest egg to say, okay, do I want to continue and start another business?
• 10:24
  Do I want to spend some time on the beach?
• 10:27
  All right.
• 10:27
  You know, Mike, I think the three of us talked, we all love the beach, but will we spend the rest of our lives on the beach?
• 10:34
  No, I'd go batty.
• 10:36
  Like I could spend some time there.
• 10:37
  I could really enjoy it, but I would have to get back and do this again.
• 10:42
  All right.
• 10:43
  Because otherwise, I don't know.
• 10:44
  I'd go batty.
• 10:47
  Mike, I'll interrupt a moment.
• 10:49
  You've seen countless inspired founders crash because they really lack the foundational framework and technology, the technological systems to handle a real operational scale.
• 11:01
  Because you've talked about with Don and I, the instances where you've seen that and you've corrected it and then exponentially how it's scaled.
• 11:09
  Absolutely.
• 11:10
  And then the funny thing is you were just talking about the beach and I mentioned this to you guys, but I was sitting on a beach in Aruba a couple of years ago and thinking to myself, I could do my job.
• 11:19
  I could do my job and I could run everything else that I have going 100% from this beach chair underneath the palapa on Eagle Beach in Aruba.
• 11:28
  And then I was like, you know what?
• 11:29
  I'm going to buy beach chair operations.
• 11:30
  I have no idea what the heck I'm going to do with it.
• 11:32
  But because I have the thought right now, I'm going to buy it.
• 11:34
  And when I figure it out, I'll use it.
• 11:36
  But it's a cool idea because I could literally be sitting in a beach chair underneath the palapa 20 feet from the ocean in pure paradise and run a business.
• 11:44
  And the biggest thing is, is because it wasn't dependent on me being there.
• 11:48
  Again, the system was in place.
• 11:51
  It's absolutely essential.
• 11:53
  And one thing I just want to touch on really quick, too, just to make sure you people understand this is when we talk about passion.
• 11:59
  Okay.
• 11:59
  And it's not just not a passion business.
• 12:02
  Your passion could work.
• 12:04
  but not by itself.
• 12:06
  Like the passion, that could be the inspiration that gives you an idea of what to do.
• 12:10
  But now let's run it through the tools.
• 12:12
  Let's run it through the system.
• 12:13
  Let's make sure there's a viable market.
• 12:15
  Let's make sure that you're able, like Dawn said, to not get lost in the minutia of the day-to-day or maybe in the physical aspect of it.
• 12:22
  And you can handle and build the system that still produces that asset or produces that product or that produces that pie, for example, using an e-myth reference.
• 12:30
  But what you're doing is you're sharing that love that you have and a passion and something you're interested in.
• 12:36
  But that only works because you've proven it's a viable product and a viable industry that's going to potentially get you that $5 to $10 million exit in three to five years.
• 12:44
  Okay, so if that can get you through that $10 million and you're in something you're passionate about, now what have you done?
• 12:49
  You've now established yourself as a successful business owner who can build and sell a business.
• 12:53
  You've also, in something that you care about, you're going to events, you're meeting up with other people in the same industry.
• 12:59
  So you're building a network in an area that you love and you've proven that you've been successful in this space.
• 13:05
  So now if someone else is in your shoes, you can help advise them.
• 13:08
  You can buy in with them.
• 13:09
  You can start your own business in anywhere you want, but now you've proven that you can do it.
• 13:15
  And the only way to go is up.
• 13:17
  A hundred percent.
• 13:18
  Now, by the way, along with this, I'm going to ask you all to do us a favor.
• 13:22
  I want you all to take a survey.
• 13:23
  We have a very simple survey.
• 13:24
  You can go to forgefireprotocol.com forward slash survey.
• 13:28
  And, and, and.
• 13:30
  Take that.
• 13:30
  We'll give you a free gift, a tool, or initially right now, over the course of the first week we're doing this, we're actually giving away a copy, a digital pre-release copy of Portrify Protocol book.
• 13:41
  But if you're listening to this after that, it may be a different tool.
• 13:44
  So understand that.
• 13:45
  But take the survey.
• 13:46
  That survey is going to do two things.
• 13:48
  It's going to make you think about your business.
• 13:52
  If you've got a business now, or if you're thinking about launching a business, it'll make you think about what's important to you in business.
• 14:00
  David Price- Okay, so go through that survey and it's also going to help us that's the other part, because we use that data that we get from that process won't mention your name unless.
• 14:08
  David Price- You know you tell us doing in a different scenario down the road, but we're not going to mention your name, but we use that data because.
• 14:15
  David Price- That helps us in the academy so part of the Fortifier protocol ecosystem is a full academy.
• 14:21
  for everyone who wants to have access to that, they're able to get all kinds of great stuff, including the tools, including the lessons that go along with the book itself.
• 14:31
  So, but let's, look guys, let's get into Spark, okay?
• 14:36
  Spark is where you're coming up with an idea.
• 14:40
  Now, some of you already have a business and that's okay.
• 14:43
  Follow along, stay with us.
• 14:45
  We've got plenty of stuff here for you if you've already got a business.
• 14:49
  But even if you've been in business for a while, I want you to think about this.
• 14:51
  I want you to go through the Spark process with us because you're gonna look at your current business in a whole different way, all right?
• 14:59
  And it's gonna give you ideas on maybe some tweaks or changes that can really free you up and multiply yourself where you can not only potentially increase revenues,
• 15:10
  um, positioning, positioning yourself for a great exit, but also, uh, will help you just to have more time away from the business.
• 15:19
  All right.
• 15:20
  So let's, let's, let's get into spark.
• 15:22
  And spark is all about figuring out what is the business to start?
• 15:25
  Where, what is that idea?
• 15:27
  Right.
• 15:28
  And, and we go through that.
• 15:30
  We w we're actually going to pull up a, a chart, a checklist in just a little bit to go through.
• 15:34
  Uh, but first, um,
• 15:37
  You know, think about this and you guys, you guys have all started businesses.
• 15:40
  I can tell you, I, you know, one of the businesses that I launched with a company called Rino XR studios, and I don't have it anymore.
• 15:49
  That particular company, I literally, I gave it to an ex partner of mine.
• 15:56
  And the reason for that, there's a lot of reasons behind it.
• 15:58
  I'm not going to get into all of those, but that particular business was a web three company
• 16:03
  focused on a metaverse platform.
• 16:05
  We actually had our own metaverse platform that we built out.
• 16:08
  And it was pretty wild.
• 16:10
  It was really intense.
• 16:12
  And it was hyper-realistic.
• 16:14
  So if you had a computer that could handle it, you were great.
• 16:18
  The challenge was in that business that very few people had a computer that could handle it.
• 16:23
  And so we were creating virtual GPUs and trying to get subscribers for that.
• 16:28
  But we were ahead of our time.
• 16:30
  definitely ahead of our time so when you think about businesses and you think about what what is it that really i should start one of the things you want to be looking at is well is it the right time for this business right is this the business that is going to take off where where where is this business um and and is it something that i'm prepared to do all right there's there's a lot here so i know i'm going to pull this up but you're going to say something mike
• 16:57
  No, I was just going to say, one of the things as you're pulling that up that we've gone over a lot too is, as you say in the book, where we start to take a look at those seven characteristics of a $10 million exit asset.
• 17:08
  What does that look like?
• 17:09
  So people, as they're running through the spark and they're thinking about ideas, also trying to understand what is the ideal customer?
• 17:15
  What are we trying to build?
• 17:16
  What's the outcome that we want to get to?
• 17:18
  And taking a look at the different steps in those seven characteristics is really essential.
• 17:23
  Because you can start to understand what you want, what you don't want.
• 17:26
  And as the ideas are coming to your head and as you're working through them, you can eliminate the ones that aren't going to work.
• 17:32
  And again, too, I mean, a great example, too.
• 17:34
  But I was listening to someone else speak the other day.
• 17:36
  Actually, it was a billionaire.
• 17:37
  I was listening to a billionaire give a conversation the other day in the car business.
• 17:41
  I won't mention his name.
• 17:42
  But he was talking about how, you know, who's more successful?
• 17:46
  Elon Musk, who builds a bunch of rockets that blow up and learns from every single one, a Boeing who takes five years to build the perfect one, and then it doesn't work.
• 17:56
  Well, Musk has all that feedback in that loop, and everyone looks and says, oh my God, it blew up.
• 17:59
  It's not safe.
• 18:00
  It's not this.
• 18:00
  It's not this.
• 18:01
  He built it with the intent that it's going to blow up.
• 18:04
  Understanding.
• 18:05
  That was part of the process.
• 18:06
  That was part of the learning process.
• 18:08
  And if you listen to Musk talk,
• 18:10
  Whether you like him or not, it's irrelevant.
• 18:12
  What's important that he says all the time, and someone said, you know, are you upset by some of the times where you could have had more success, but you didn't?
• 18:21
  And he said, no, I'm more frustrated.
• 18:23
  This is me paraphrasing.
• 18:24
  He's like, my biggest regret is not failing more.
• 18:28
  The times where I could have failed and got more feedback, but I played it safe because I thought this was working.
• 18:33
  when I should have just kept on going and iterating and improving and trying to exponentially improve.
• 18:37
  That's why he gets stuff done in remarkable time and why he reduces results and has conversations.
• 18:41
  The fact that Mars was even on the discussion, was even being discussed, is insane compared to where NASA was.
• 18:48
  So the bottom line is, though, is just this.
• 18:50
  Understanding that mentality is essential.
• 18:53
  And that's part of the protocol, by the way.
• 18:54
  Rapid iteration.
• 18:56
  And I think he talked about building.
• 18:59
  He's building a chip plant.
• 19:01
  right we are a fab plant where where every aspect of that chip manufacturing is from design all the way through is in one place where he can do massive iterations he's going to leapfrog company after company that have been doing chips for decades because of that rapid iteration and there's there's so much to be said for that and yeah you're gonna have a lot of mistakes
• 19:26
  But they're not mistakes.
• 19:28
  They're learning experiences.
• 19:30
  Right.
• 19:30
  Right?
• 19:31
  That's how – I've never met anyone.
• 19:33
  I've never met one person in my life in baseball who batted 1,000.
• 19:37
  I've never met one person in football who never threw an incompletion or never dropped a pass or never missed a block.
• 19:43
  I've never met any successful business owner who never made a mistake ever.
• 19:48
  And the most successful are the ones that make the most mistakes.
• 19:52
  And they learn from it.
• 19:53
  They don't keep on repeating the same mistakes.
• 19:54
  Right.
• 19:55
  Exactly.
• 19:55
  There's a big difference there.
• 19:57
  Yes.
• 19:58
  So let's, I did pull this up.
• 20:00
  Were you going to say something?
• 20:01
  Go ahead, Steven.
• 20:04
  No, I'll let you go ahead and pull that up.
• 20:07
  All right.
• 20:08
  Well, you guys see the screen, right?
• 20:09
  You see the seven characters?
• 20:11
  Okay.
• 20:12
  So guys, this is one of the tools that you're going to get with the protocol.
• 20:16
  But this is the seven characteristics of a $10 million exit business.
• 20:20
  And so this is a decision tool.
• 20:23
  All right, that's what this is.
• 20:25
  So when you're thinking about a business idea, you wanna score that business idea.
• 20:29
  How does it rank on these seven characteristics?
• 20:33
  Okay, one from one being weak to 10 being excellent, right?
• 20:38
  And only idea scoring 50 or higher.
• 20:41
  So you can see it right there, 50 or higher deserve a full 72 hour market test.
• 20:45
  When we talk about rapid iteration, the first part of the iteration is you're gonna have something to iterate, right?
• 20:50
  So you're gonna come up with these ideas.
• 20:52
  Then you're going to take those ideas and grade those, basically.
• 20:57
  Get a score.
• 20:57
  And if it's 50% or higher, those can go into a 72-hour market test, which we're going to show you how to do.
• 21:02
  So this helps you to rapidly iterate, say, yes, this has legs.
• 21:07
  It's going to work or it should work.
• 21:09
  And now you can move forward on it.
• 21:12
  But if not, why waste time and money?
• 21:15
  Let's move to the next step.
• 21:16
  All right, let's go, let's look at a different business.
• 21:19
  Because the goal is three to five years, you're exiting with a $10 million sale.
• 21:24
  That's what you're looking for.
• 21:25
  All right, so to do that, you don't want to waste time.
• 21:27
  You get three to five years, all right?
• 21:29
  I don't know how old you're going to be in three to five years, but I know for me, even if it took me five years to get to that point, that's a pretty good situation.
• 21:38
  Before you repeat, could I just add one very quick thing?
• 21:40
  I need you guys to listen to what he just said.
• 21:42
  Okay, let's stop BSing.
• 21:44
  Let's stop posturing.
• 21:45
  Let's stop pretending while we're here and we're listening.
• 21:47
  If you're not in and you're not active, you're not going to get a successful business in three to five years.
• 21:52
  It's not happening.
• 21:53
  You need to be committed and you get to say, this is me.
• 21:56
  This is what I want.
• 21:58
  And then when you say, this is what I want, then you got to make a decision, a firm decision.
• 22:01
  And say, this is what I'm going to do.
• 22:03
  Not this is what I want.
• 22:04
  You start with that.
• 22:04
  Okay, I want that.
• 22:05
  That makes sense.
• 22:06
  Good.
• 22:06
  Now decide.
• 22:07
  Am I in?
• 22:08
  You got to be in and you can't have a toe in the water.
• 22:11
  You got to be all in.
• 22:13
  That is what it takes.
• 22:14
  David Ayer, Ph.D.: Yeah, you're really reaffirming that attack at dawn isn't a motivational slogan.
• 22:21
  You know, it's really an operational directive to make decisions, move forward before the market moves against you.
• 22:27
  And, Don, here, as you break down the seven characteristics of the $10 million exit from chapter one and selecting the right medal.
• 22:36
  As you explain why the high gross margins, low physical overhead and transferable systems are non-negotiable.
• 22:43
  You really see that in here, in this form.
• 22:47
  Yeah, you do.
• 22:48
  And look, you might not be at that point yet.
• 22:53
  You might say, hey, look, I wanna be there.
• 22:54
  Maybe I'm six months away, maybe I'm a year away, that's okay.
• 22:57
  You can be part of the protocol.
• 22:58
  You can follow along.
• 22:59
  You can get into the academy.
• 23:00
  You can plan, right?
• 23:02
  We didn't say you had to take action today.
• 23:05
  Now, we recommend you take action right away.
• 23:07
  But whether you're ready to do this now or you're going to be ready to do it in three years, that's up to you.
• 23:13
  This is still here for you, okay?
• 23:15
  But what we're going to do is those who are ready to run, we're ready to run and we're going to run with you.
• 23:20
  And by the way, I got to say this, right?
• 23:22
  I said June 16th earlier in this was the date that I started the book.
• 23:26
  That's the date also that I started putting it on paper, right?
• 23:30
  That was also the day that we set aside and said, all right,
• 23:34
  Let's launch the protocol.
• 23:36
  All right.
• 23:36
  June 16th is now August 3rd.
• 23:38
  So this has been less than two months.
• 23:40
  We didn't waste time putting all of this stuff together.
• 23:43
  No, and that's in 2026 for when we're down the road and people are understanding.
• 23:47
  Same year.
• 23:48
  But also, like you said, like, if you are not ready today, okay, you need to do this assessment about your existing business.
• 23:57
  That first line right there, high willingness to pay and clear pain.
• 24:01
  I have used that to double, triple a company's revenue because they were going after the wrong clients.
• 24:08
  That one step.
• 24:10
  And that's not just project revenue.
• 24:12
  That's monthly recurring and annually recurring revenue.
• 24:16
  Oh, my favorite stuff.
• 24:17
  So as you're getting into that, like I'm saying, you guys, when you go through these tools, do them on your existing company.
• 24:23
  As you said, you don't, there's so many golden nuggets and I hate that phrase, but there are so many golden nuggets that were in here that are just waiting for you to be taken in and absorb.
• 24:32
  And then when you apply them to your own business, you're going to look and say, like, for example, I was in a business where I said, I'm not doing residential anymore.
• 24:38
  Besides people, our friends or family or like one-offs or people like just care about and like, there's no money in me doing residential.
• 24:46
  Why would I do something for that and compete with someone?
• 24:49
  I'm not competing with people on this.
• 24:50
  It's not worth it.
• 24:52
  I want this.
• 24:52
  And by the way, I'm not just doing corporate.
• 24:54
  I want corporate in these categories.
• 24:57
  Yeah.
• 24:57
  Because they're going to pay more money.
• 24:59
  They have bigger issues that I can fix issue.
• 25:01
  The bigger the issue that you can resolve, the more money you're going to get paid.
• 25:05
  And you just got to get to the right client.
• 25:08
  Yeah, Mike, you've hit also on why passion alone is a dangerous trap.
• 25:13
  You know, if a business model requires 15 employees just to stay afloat, it may be more of a cage versus an asset.
• 25:19
  And you've experienced that before.
• 25:21
  Yeah, big time.
• 25:23
  I've gone into places before where the whole structure was wrong.
• 25:28
  They were having difficulty handling incoming calls.
• 25:31
  They didn't have anybody who was at the...
• 25:33
  So in a situation like that, if your incoming calls is the issue, first of all, we can do 90% of that with AI nowadays.
• 25:39
  But before then, you couldn't.
• 25:40
  So what we had to do was restructure the way that the support team was set up and put more people handling the calls and handling the simple and easy things.
• 25:49
  So lower pay,
• 25:50
  entry-level people who had the right attitude and the right demeanor that were able to handle that volume and solve that problem.
• 25:57
  And then if they couldn't solve the issue, and by the way, we taught them how to handle 90% of the basic issues.
• 26:01
  We also made sure when we hired them, they could.
• 26:03
  That before they hand it off to the second person, now that funnel turns like this.
• 26:07
  So everyone up here is handling all the vast issues.
• 26:09
  Then the ones that can't get escalated, get escalated to a smaller amount of people at this mid-level.
• 26:13
  And then if that can't get resolved, then there's one or two people down the bottom here in a small business.
• 26:18
  That would be the buck stops here who's going to get in and be that person who fixes the problems that no one else wants to fix because they're that person.
• 26:24
  But it has to get through the other tiers to get there.
• 26:26
  And that simple switch of a system eliminates a lot of the bloat and overhead that really could be run with the team probably half the size but just designed more efficiently.
• 26:36
  A hundred percent.
• 26:36
  And when you, when you look at, and I've pulled that down for a reason, right?
• 26:39
  Cause we're getting close to time on this, but let's look at those seven characteristics.
• 26:44
  Yep.
• 26:44
  Yeah.
• 26:46
  We'll get into seven characteristics.
• 26:47
  We're actually going to get into that in the next episode.
• 26:48
  We'll kick it off with those, but, but you at least had a little taste.
• 26:52
  You're going to, you're going to get the whole thing in the next episode, but each of these episodes we're planning for about 25 to 30 minutes.
• 26:59
  Okay.
• 27:00
  So, so we want to keep them short.
• 27:02
  We want to be able to have you planned, but here's, here's,
• 27:06
  You know, I can tell you what.
• 27:09
  So one of the companies, I own several companies.
• 27:11
  One of the companies that I own is a resiliency company.
• 27:13
  We focus on energy efficiencies for commercial and in some cases residential.
• 27:19
  So we'll do some residential solar and commercial solar.
• 27:21
  But we do a lot more.
• 27:22
  One of the big things, and this is exactly what you were talking about, Mike.
• 27:26
  We evaluated what we were doing.
• 27:29
  And when you're competing on, let's say, residential solar, as an example, a lot of competition out there.
• 27:37
  and not a big deal.
• 27:39
  I'm always good going against competition, but all of the competition is trying to get those sales.
• 27:46
  We stepped back, we looked at it, we said, okay, all right, we could advertise, we can promote, we can do all sorts of different things along with referrals and get a lot of this business.
• 27:56
  However, is there a better way to do this, that we can get in front of more people?
• 28:01
  And that was how we launched our inspection service
• 28:06
  for solar systems, our repair service.
• 28:10
  Those are things that are so needed in the industry right now.
• 28:13
  We got all kinds of calls as soon as it was released.
• 28:18
  And we were getting calls beforehand, by the way, which, by the way, that was a hint.
• 28:22
  All right, when your company's getting all kinds of calls, hey, can you fix my system?
• 28:27
  Right, in the end, before was always no.
• 28:29
  Right.
• 28:29
  And they're like, we can't find anybody to fix this.
• 28:32
  okay that's that right there's people willing to pay money they need it done nobody else is doing it all right and and here's the beautiful thing from and that company does a lot more than than solar but just looking at it from this one little piece one little aspect of its business when we went from just selling the the solar side of it to repairs inspections
• 28:58
  and all of that, what it did was it put us in front of a lot of additional potential clients.
• 29:03
  Now they already had solar, you say, well, you can't sell them solar if they've already got it.
• 29:06
  Well, in some cases they do need upgrades, but we've got a revenue stream from the inspections.
• 29:11
  We get a revenue stream from the repairs.
• 29:13
  And here's the beautiful thing.
• 29:15
  Every one of those people is a happy client.
• 29:18
  It was very easy for us to service and very fast.
• 29:22
  And what those are doing is they're bringing us in a ton of referrals.
• 29:27
  So they're paying us to market for us, for them, for us.
• 29:30
  Right.
• 29:30
  But think about that.
• 29:31
  Your goal wasn't to do the lowest price that's going to get a one-time win.
• 29:34
  No.
• 29:34
  I don't want to be the highest.
• 29:35
  I don't want to be the lowest.
• 29:36
  I want to be fair.
• 29:36
  You want to be the best value that they can possibly get and provide the best service.
• 29:40
  Our goal is 20, 30 lifetime, 20 year, 30 year lifetime customers.
• 29:43
  That's the goal.
• 29:45
  It's not one-time transaction, win this one deal.
• 29:48
  And that's essential.
• 29:49
  I think so many people just get nervous and just start dropping price, dropping price, dropping price.
• 29:53
  You're being transactional for a one-time purchase.
• 29:56
  And you're not going to have a customer for life.
• 29:58
  If you just have to over... Again, same guy, that billionaire I referenced earlier.
• 30:01
  He said, what's the number one key to business?
• 30:04
  Who has not heard this before?
• 30:06
  Under promise and extremely over deliver.
• 30:08
  Yep.
• 30:09
  Every time.
• 30:09
  Every time.
• 30:11
  By the way, that's what you're going to see in the Forgefire Protocol.
• 30:13
  Yep.
• 30:14
  All right.
• 30:14
  You are going to see... We are going to...
• 30:16
  we're going to deliver.
• 30:17
  All right, that's what this is about.
• 30:19
  So we are at time for this episode.
• 30:23
  We are going to come back.
• 30:24
  So episode two is going to be on the seven characteristics of a $10 million exit.
• 30:29
  Now you start on screen, sorry to put it up early, but you know what?
• 30:31
  That's okay, you start on screen for a bit.
• 30:34
  You'll catch that in the next one, but we're going to break down and go through all of those seven characteristics.
• 30:39
  And we're going to help you to find and figure out what the right business is.
• 30:42
  And again, if you are already in a business,
• 30:45
  Well, see where it stacks up against those seven characteristics.
• 30:49
  See what you can tweak.
• 30:50
  Maybe there's something that you can change, like I did on my resiliency company, and make it so that those items or that section of the business now fits into one of these characteristics and you're getting a good score.
• 31:03
  Yep.
• 31:03
  Just be open.
• 31:04
  Be open to the feedback.
• 31:06
  Be open to learning about what we have here and what the tools can provide you and be open to implementing.
• 31:11
  It'll make a massive difference.
• 31:14
  Dan and Mike, really, as we conclude, we want to emphasize that sitting on the fence with a bad business idea is really a decision to waste your time for the next three to five years.
• 31:24
  And when you look at the protocol, it isn't a book you read.
• 31:28
  It's a blueprint you execute to secure your $10 million buyout on your terms.
• 31:34
  100%.
• 31:35
  Well said.
• 31:36
  Yes, indeed.
• 31:38
  So with that, we'll see you in episode two.
• 31:42
  That's it for this episode of the Forge Fire Protocol podcast.
• 31:46
  Take at least one step from today's episode while the fire is still hot.
• 31:51
  Don't let the insight cool.
• 31:54
  Our goal is delivering real value for you and your business.
• 31:58
  Subscribe now to never miss an episode and help other ambitious entrepreneurs like you find the show by leaving a review on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.
• 32:10
  Want the complete five-step system, the tools, the scorecards, and the exact playbooks we use inside the protocol?
• 32:18
  Head to forgefireprotocol.com and sign up now to step in to the full forge.
• 32:24
  Because we are Forged in Fire, built for legacy.
• 32:34
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