Latest / The Matriarchy Would Never | A Promote Yourself to CEO Podcast Series / 3 Common Mistakes That Can Cause Your Scaling Business to Implode

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3 Common Mistakes That Can Cause Your Scaling Business to Implode · The Matriarchy Would Never | A Promote Yourself to CEO Podcast Series

0:01
SPEAKER_00: Y'all, there is a lot of really terrible advice out in these internet streets these days that is causing entrepreneurs who are focused at scaling at all costs to blow up their business.
0:14
SPEAKER_00: And not blow up in the look at me, I'm an overnight success story making millions of dollars.
0:20
SPEAKER_00: So now I can live the entrepreneur lifestyle with my Tesla and all my luxury vacations and all the things.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about blow up as in their business has imploded.
0:30
SPEAKER_00: They are constantly putting out fires.
0:33
SPEAKER_00: They are feeling so stressed and so overwhelmed at the cash-eating monster that they've created, at all the things constantly breaking in their business, at all of the effort and work it takes to try to keep up with this unsustainable approach to growth.
0:49
SPEAKER_00: So let's do this differently.
0:50
SPEAKER_00: Let's avoid these mistakes.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: In today's episode, I want to share the top three things that I'm seeing that are really causing problems when it comes to scaling your business.
1:01
SPEAKER_00: Are you ready to grow from stressed-out solopreneur to confident CEO?
1:06
SPEAKER_00: You're in the right place.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Rachel Cook, and I've spent more than 15 years helping women entrepreneurs sustainably scale their businesses.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: If you're serious about building a sustainable business, it's time to put the strategy, systems, and support in place to make it happen.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: Join me every week for candid conversations about stepping into your role as CEO, the hard lessons learned along the way, and practical, profitable strategies to grow a sustainable business without the hustle and burnout.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: Hey CEO, welcome back to this installment of the Truth About Scaling series here on Promote Yourself to CEO.
1:45
SPEAKER_00: I was really thrilled with the feedback and the conversation started from the first few episodes when I opened up this conversation.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: And I think that there is a lot left unsaid.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of look at me, look at me when we're talking about scaling and no conversation about what it really looks like behind the scenes or how those businesses are actually doing.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of the Instagram effect, right?
2:10
SPEAKER_00: We see the highlight reels, we see all the talk about the seven-figure businesses, eight-figure, nine-figure, ten-figure, gosh, it just keeps going up and up and up.
2:19
SPEAKER_00: But we don't really talk about what it looks like to run those businesses.
2:24
SPEAKER_00: And that's what I want to continue diving into in this series.
2:27
SPEAKER_00: If you didn't hear the first couple episodes, go back, listen to them now, because it really sets a stage about where I'm coming from when we're talking about the truth behind scaling your business.
2:39
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you're ready to grow your business and you went through my business growth checklist like I recommended, again, you can grab that over in the show notes, absolutely free.
2:48
SPEAKER_00: Then we want to make sure your infrastructure is in place and that you're being smart about how you are approaching growth.
2:56
SPEAKER_00: Because the truth is going after hypergrowth for an extended period of time where you're focused on doubling or tripling or 10xing your business, it isn't always sustainable, especially for a lot of the entrepreneurs I see.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: Because let's face it, none of us that I know have a massive pot of gold where we can just sit there and spend to our heart's content.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: We have to be smart and strategic about how we are approaching growth so that we can do it in a more sustainable way.
3:26
SPEAKER_00: So today I want to talk about the three biggest mistakes I see when it comes to growing your business.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: When it comes from getting from that success stage in the business growth checklist to the scale stage.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: And if we're not careful, we can make it harder on ourselves and on our team than it needs to be.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: Specifically, we can get to the point where these mistakes will blow up your business and not the, oh look, my business blew up overnight.
3:54
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm a millionaire.
3:55
SPEAKER_00: More of the, oh no, now my business is imploding because the infrastructure isn't in place and I wasn't ready for this level of growth for the number of clients I'm currently trying to take on.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: I don't have enough team to deliver what we promised them.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: People are getting mad, people are quitting, and my business is now a runaway train.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: I have no control over it.
4:14
SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about these three key mistakes that I see entrepreneurs making so that you can benefit from their mistakes and we can be more strategic.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: We can be smarter about how we are approaching sustainable growth.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: The first mistake I see is entrepreneurs creating a cash-eating monster.
4:34
SPEAKER_00: If you're in this boat, you know it because at the end of every month, you look at the revenue you're bringing into your business, and it might be a great amount of revenue.
4:44
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you could bring in tens of thousands of dollars and still feel like, why am I not paying myself what I really want to pay myself?
4:53
SPEAKER_00: Why does it feel like no matter how much money I'm bringing in, I'm never actually getting ahead?
5:00
SPEAKER_00: I'm never actually able to reap the rewards from this business.
5:04
SPEAKER_00: You might also, on the other hand, be thinking, how is it that I just don't have the money to do the things I want to do in the business?
5:12
SPEAKER_00: Money's something that can quickly start to disappear if you're not paying attention.
5:16
SPEAKER_00: And if you're like, well, I can't invest in this coach I need, I can't invest in the service provider I need, I can't invest in the team that I need, I have created a cash-eating monster.
5:27
SPEAKER_00: And we have got to figure out how to stop it.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: So, how does this happen?
5:31
SPEAKER_00: How do we end up creating these cash-eating monsters in our business?
5:34
SPEAKER_00: One of the first things I see, especially for earlier entrepreneurs, less experienced entrepreneurs, is that they tend to overspend in technology because a celebrity entrepreneur, influencer entrepreneur recommended something.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: And the recommended system or tool or SAS product is 20 bucks a month, 50 bucks, 100 bucks, 200, 300.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: It just goes up and up and up.
6:03
SPEAKER_00: And they felt like they needed that particular solution, but they didn't think about the long-term implications of that.
6:11
SPEAKER_00: Before you know it, you've added up, you know, a whole suite of these tools, a whole stack of tools you use to run your business.
6:19
SPEAKER_00: And all of them have monthly or ongoing recurring subscriptions.
6:22
SPEAKER_00: And suddenly you're spending thousands of dollars a month on technology that you're not fully using yet.
6:28
SPEAKER_00: You don't even really need them yet.
6:30
SPEAKER_00: Because if your business isn't ready for that level of sophisticated technology, then you're missing out on the opportunity to deploy those resources, that money into another area of your business that would actually help you to grow.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: It's tied up in something that's not revenue generating.
6:51
SPEAKER_00: So, where could this be happening for you?
6:53
SPEAKER_00: Well, if you're following any of the major influencer entrepreneurs, and I call them influencer entrepreneurs because they're not actually working high touch with people.
7:03
SPEAKER_00: They're monetizing their fame and their lifestyle as an entrepreneur.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: But one of the ways they do that is through affiliate links to software.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: And you've probably seen this.
7:13
SPEAKER_00: They'll recommend software that, again, this software is going to be a monthly recurring subscription.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: I often see this with like an email marketing software.
7:24
SPEAKER_00: And you might see these influencer celebrities recommending that you need something with all the bells and whistles.
7:31
SPEAKER_00: So for a long time, it was Infusion Soft, which I believe has renamed itself to keep, then Entreport.
7:39
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of these very sophisticated platforms where honestly, email marketing is just one small part of what is possible to do with those platforms.
7:51
SPEAKER_00: But people are using them, they're buying them, thinking this is what I need to grow my business.
7:57
SPEAKER_00: And they're only using a small percentage of what that platform can actually do for them because they are not ready for it.
8:04
SPEAKER_00: So these softwares are not cheap.
8:06
SPEAKER_00: They're pretty expensive and they're very, very robust.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: They're very sophisticated.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: So when does it make sense to invest in a more sophisticated technology solution?
8:19
SPEAKER_00: These make sense when one, you actually have the audience size, the email list size, the community size that will pay for the cost of the email marketing platform.
8:31
SPEAKER_00: But two, when you have the sophistication and automation needs that these tools can provide.
8:40
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
8:40
SPEAKER_00: When your marketing strategy and sales strategy is actually sophisticated enough that you can use and leverage those tools, that is different.
8:51
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
8:52
SPEAKER_00: Those types of tools usually require a pretty high level of expertise to do a lot of those automations.
8:59
SPEAKER_00: And most small business owners, most entrepreneurs don't need it, right?
9:04
SPEAKER_00: It is way too much for us.
9:08
SPEAKER_00: You might even find that it's so sophisticated that you have to find somebody to hire to set it up or even to manage it on an ongoing basis.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: So this is like going to buy a Ferrari instead of a Camry.
9:27
SPEAKER_00: So going for something that is so souped up, so over the top, so flashy, and you don't really need it to do what you're trying to do.
9:37
SPEAKER_00: You just need to drive from home to the grocery store to pick up kids, to go to activities, to go to your office, and to come home, right?
9:47
SPEAKER_00: So we want to be more critical in analyzing what solutions are actually the right fit for our business because there's probably something more streamlined and simpler out there.
9:59
SPEAKER_00: I don't want you to go necessarily for the free option.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: The free option, if your business is more established, usually is geared at getting people just to try the technology solution or to get newer stage entrepreneurs, more startup stage businesses to start and then grow with them.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: And I think there's just so much missed opportunity here to just be more critical when you're looking at your email service provider, when you're looking at where you're hosting, let's say, all of your content or all of your online courses.
10:34
SPEAKER_00: So, for example, I am obsessed with Convert Kit.
10:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm not even going to tell you my affiliate link.
10:40
SPEAKER_00: I don't care if I get affiliate commission from it or not.
10:43
SPEAKER_00: But I recommend it so much because it is something that can grow with you and it has some automation tools.
10:51
SPEAKER_00: My business has been running and growing on Convert Kit for years.
10:55
SPEAKER_00: Like literally the year that they launched, I became a client of theirs.
11:00
SPEAKER_00: And it is a fraction of the cost for some of these much bigger, more sophisticated tools that my business doesn't need.
11:09
SPEAKER_00: So think about this with anything where you have a recurring monthly fee.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: This could be your email marketing.
11:15
SPEAKER_00: This could be your membership site where you're hosting all your content for your clients.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: I see this a lot for people who are running courses, and they end up spending a ton on a recurring monthly fee for a program they're not even running that often throughout the year.
11:30
SPEAKER_00: And they might be paying that fee for something they're not actively selling or that clients aren't actively using.
11:37
SPEAKER_00: So we want to be critical about how we're deploying these resources and when do we decide to invest in a next level service, SaaS software as service technology.
11:51
SPEAKER_00: I've also seen this with things like shopping carts.
11:55
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of shopping carts that you can get for your business, where what I mean by that is it hosts all the different offers you have and the checkout pages for that.
12:04
SPEAKER_00: It connects with like your Stripe or your PayPal or whatever payment provider you're using, and it manages kind of the actual transaction piece of your business.
12:14
SPEAKER_00: I just moved off to shopping cart, SAM cart that we had been using for years and years and years, paying$100 a month for.
12:22
SPEAKER_00: I think that cost has gone up, but I have the older rate that I was able to be locked into.
12:29
SPEAKER_00: And we found a solution that does essentially the same thing for a flat rate one-time fee of$500.
12:36
SPEAKER_00: What?
12:36
SPEAKER_00: I had probably spent$5,000,$6,000 or more on my shopping cart solution.
12:43
SPEAKER_00: And I could have spent a fraction of that for a one-time fee solution.
12:49
SPEAKER_00: These are things that matter because I could have taken that five or six thousand dollar difference and deployed that into an ads campaign that actually would grow my business.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: I could have used it to hire someone on my team part-time to actually help me grow my business.
13:07
SPEAKER_00: So we always have to be thinking about where we can spend the money better.
13:15
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
13:16
SPEAKER_00: And I just find the technology tends to be something that we buy and we stop thinking about it.
13:21
SPEAKER_00: And over time, like new technologies come out.
13:24
SPEAKER_00: Over time, technology in general, um, as new competitors enter the field, they're able to do it at a lower price point, usually because they start serving more niche audiences, which means it's a better fit for you ultimately.
13:38
SPEAKER_00: So I just encourage you, if you're trying to avoid the cash-eating monster, okay, do a technology audit.
13:45
SPEAKER_00: Figure out where you're spending money on a recurring basis and really ask yourself, do I truly need all the bells and whistles?
13:52
SPEAKER_00: What do I actually need this thing to do for me?
13:55
SPEAKER_00: And start simple.
13:56
SPEAKER_00: Look for the simpler, more streamlined option.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: You don't necessarily need to have all the bells and whistles.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: You can choose a simpler option.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: You can upgrade later, you can get fancier later.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: But until you get to the point where that technology is really paying for itself, it does not make sense to overspend here.
14:15
SPEAKER_00: And there's a lot of free technology we still use on my team.
14:19
SPEAKER_00: We still use Google for everything Google Drive, Google folders, Google Docs, Google Sheets.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: In fact, if you get our downloadable get paid calculator, it is a Google Sheet, a spreadsheet that I put together myself.
14:34
SPEAKER_00: And when you go to my website to download that, you join my email list, which is hosted by Convert Kit, and you get automatically prompted to make a copy of the get paid calculator, which is a Google Sheet.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: We use our Google email system.
14:48
SPEAKER_00: Like we don't overinvest in any area of technology unless we absolutely need to.
14:54
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: Next area where you may be creating a cash eating monster is hiring too many people too fast.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: This again is a balancing act, right?
15:05
SPEAKER_00: Because in general, I see in women entrepreneurs and the research backs me up, one of the reasons women don't grow as quickly as they could is because often they don't hire fast enough.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: And then they start to feel overwhelmed and exhausted and burned out because they're trying to do all the things all themselves.
15:24
SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, if you overhire, you hire too many people too quickly, you overhire, you could find yourself in a situation where you're paying everyone else but yourself.
15:36
SPEAKER_00: And that doesn't work long term.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: As you're making decisions about hiring people, one of the things that I encourage you to find out or to really think about is do I need this role, this person on my team long term?
15:54
SPEAKER_00: Or is this really just a one-off project?
15:59
SPEAKER_00: I found myself in this particular pickle years ago.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I'm trying to think, it was probably 2015, 2016, where my business was starting to grow.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, okay, I need to hire more people to help me to get all these things off my plate.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: And I ended up with a lot of people on retainer that I actually didn't need long term.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: I didn't truly need them on retainer.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: Long term, what happened was once their initial projects were done that I had hired them for, I found I was trying constantly to rack my brain.
16:34
SPEAKER_00: Like, how do I keep them busy?
16:36
SPEAKER_00: What else do I need them to do?
16:38
SPEAKER_00: And that's when the red flag started going off.
16:40
SPEAKER_00: And I realized, hold on, the retainer isn't actually what I need from this person.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: This isn't an ongoing role.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: This isn't an ongoing thing here.
16:50
SPEAKER_00: This was a one-time project, and I should not have said yes to the retainer.
16:55
SPEAKER_00: So I had to make the hard decision and part ways with a few different people because the way that I was working with them did not fit what my business was actually doing, how my business was actually structured.
17:08
SPEAKER_00: So when I sit down and I think about our team and I'm thinking about who I'm going to need to hire next, I ask myself, are they going to be a revenue generating part of the team?
17:18
SPEAKER_00: And if they are a revenue generating part of the team, are they going to be on a retainer or is it a one-time offer, a one-time package or program that they're working on?
17:30
SPEAKER_00: I also ask myself if they are not necessarily a revenue generating part of the team.
17:35
SPEAKER_00: So hiring somebody who's not marketing or sales, but let's say they're more on the operations or on the delivery side, working with my clients or helping me service my clients, then I have to ask myself, is this going to be a rate that increases as I gain more clients?
17:52
SPEAKER_00: Is there an increased amount that they're going to have to work on that?
17:56
SPEAKER_00: Or is this just going to be a flat rate?
17:58
SPEAKER_00: I just start to ask a lot of questions, right?
18:02
SPEAKER_00: Another thing I start to ask myself, especially as I'm growing this team, and that means I have people on my team who've been with me for a very long time, is what are the things that I need help with now that the business needs help with?
18:15
SPEAKER_00: Is there someone on the team who has shown some talent and some skill in that area?
18:21
SPEAKER_00: And we could give them that work, those tasks, those things to do, as opposed to hiring more people?
18:28
SPEAKER_00: Could we increase the hours of someone on my team because they've shown an interest in that particular thing that we need?
18:34
SPEAKER_00: These are really important questions.
18:37
SPEAKER_00: Because when we hire too many people, if you spread your resources too thin, you not only are spending more and more money on the cost of your team, but each new person that you are bringing into the team is a new person you need to manage.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: And this is where CEOs can become the bottleneck.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: Somewhere in the five to eight direct reports area, you need another person to take that over, unless all you're going to do is manage your team.
19:05
SPEAKER_00: And it's really hard to grow your business if you're spending all your time managing instead of going out there and getting more visibility for your business, getting more sales, making more deals, developing more offers, right?
19:17
SPEAKER_00: So it takes you away from the CEO role when you are stuck in meetings, trying to manage your team, trying to keep everybody on the same page, et cetera.
19:26
SPEAKER_00: So I love asking lots of questions before I hire.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: I really love the quote: hire slow, fire fast.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: I've made the mistakes of panic hiring, and that is also a very expensive mistake.
19:40
SPEAKER_00: I've made the mistake of hiring somebody without having the clarity about what the business really needs, just hiring because I'm overwhelmed.
19:47
SPEAKER_00: Not a great decision.
19:49
SPEAKER_00: Very expensive to do.
19:51
SPEAKER_00: And I've made the mistake of hiring without a true plan about how that role looks and how they need to be onboarded, what they need from me, um, what the outcomes need to be and on what timeline.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: We want to be more intentional.
20:07
SPEAKER_00: We want to be smarter about that.
20:09
SPEAKER_00: The other thing I want to bring up here is always look at your team, at the people on your team, and say, is there another thing that they could take on?
20:23
SPEAKER_00: I'm always amazed by that when I bring up to my team, like, hey, here's the projects I have and the goals that we have.
20:29
SPEAKER_00: And I asked them if there's something here you'd like to dig into or you'd like to take ownership of, I'd love to hear from you because I'd rather give you more hours.
20:38
SPEAKER_00: I'd rather give you more projects than go out and hire somebody else.
20:43
SPEAKER_00: And that's a really awesome opportunity.
20:46
SPEAKER_00: I would rather have to replace an assistant than replace somebody else on my team who knows my business really well.
20:53
SPEAKER_00: So hopefully that makes sense.
20:55
SPEAKER_00: If you're spending more than 25, 30% of your monthly revenue on your team, then we really need to make sure that either those roles are generating revenue, they're helping you generate revenue, or they are freeing up your time and energy, your time and energy as the CEO of your business so that you can stay focused on generating revenue.
21:17
SPEAKER_00: And if not, then we might need to scale back the team a little bit until we can put more people or more resources towards revenue generation.
21:25
SPEAKER_00: So more marketing and sales.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: Okay, the next area I see entrepreneurs spending too much money is when they overspend on branding, on photography, on video, on websites, on all of the things that make them feel like they're professional and that make them feel like they are projecting the image of success.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: So this is a big pet peeve of mine.
21:51
SPEAKER_00: And it's a pet pee because one, I've made this mistake myself.
21:55
SPEAKER_00: I have bought into this myself.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: And when you were earlier on in your business.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Business, you don't know what you don't know.
22:01
SPEAKER_00: So you spend money in places you think is where you need to spend money, only to realize there's not their return on investment.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: It's also a pet peeve of mine because I hear from people all the time, entrepreneurs and small business owners all the time, who are holding themselves back from doing what they want to do, from getting the visibility they need to get on their business, from doing the marketing they need to do, because they are constantly comparing themselves to the celebrity influencer entrepreneurs.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: They are looking at what the celebrity influencer entrepreneurs are putting on their Instagram feed.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: They are looking at the branded photo shoots they've done.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: They're looking at how often they're doing these photo shoots.
22:45
SPEAKER_00: They're seeing that they're doing photo shoots not just for social and not just for their website, but for every single launch or promotion.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: There's a new photo shoot, might even be a new video shoot.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: Everything is so customized and it looks gorgeous.
23:03
SPEAKER_00: Not gonna say it doesn't look gorgeous, but when you are comparing yourself to those types of people, you don't really know if there was a return on investment in that high level of design and branding and production.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: So usually I see that that high level of design and branding and production is just so incredibly expensive, and there is no guarantee that you're gonna get the ROI.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: The reason that they are doing it is because they are selling to all of us that their lifestyle, their photography, their videos, it's all selling us a version of success, right?
23:47
SPEAKER_00: If we only do what they do, if we sign up for their thing, then we will be as successful as they are.
23:52
SPEAKER_00: But we don't actually know what all went into getting their success beyond looking nice.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: And what often earlier stage entrepreneurs don't realize is it's not just the gorgeous branding and photography.
24:07
SPEAKER_00: It is the massive amount of visibility they are going out there and getting.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: It's a combination of lots of factors that help them to get the results they're looking for.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: So we have to start asking ourselves, you know, how are we going to get the ROI, the return on investment for every single thing we spend in our business?
24:28
SPEAKER_00: And we have to make sure that we are kind of pitting these things against each other to figure out where is the best place to deploy your resources so that you can get the ROI.
24:38
SPEAKER_00: Now, I do want to be very clear that I love great branding.
24:43
SPEAKER_00: I'm a little bit of a design snob.
24:45
SPEAKER_00: I love seeing beautiful design.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: I love seeing a great website.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: I do think photography is something that has only become more and more important.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: However, I also am not constantly going out there and overinvesting into something like that if I am not seeing the ROI.
25:03
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to have every single thing custom designed.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to have every single thing custom branded.
25:10
SPEAKER_00: So one of the things that I encourage people to do is to start simple and get fancy later.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: Once you have established that you are going in the right direction, that people want to buy your product, program, or service, you know, start as simple as you can on the design, on the branding, on the look and the feel of it.
25:28
SPEAKER_00: And then as you have proven the offer, then you can start investing more into up-leveling the branding, into up-leveling the experience, up-leveling the delivery, etc.
25:39
SPEAKER_00: So if you have seen my site and all of my different things that I have out on the internet, I love gorgeous branding.
25:47
SPEAKER_00: I really do.
25:48
SPEAKER_00: But I started simple and iterated as I went.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: So one of my favorite things that we did when I decided to shift into this direction of the CEO collective, as opposed to being under Rachel Cook.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: Now my whole business is under the CEO Collective branding.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: Is I slowly pulled together all of the different pieces of that brand.
26:12
SPEAKER_00: I started with the CEO retreat.
26:15
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to have a custom logo for the CEO retreat.
26:18
SPEAKER_00: Originally, I created my own logo in Canva using one of their templates.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: But when it was time to upgrade and elevate the experience, I hired a local designer to create the logo for the CEO retreat.
26:30
SPEAKER_00: And then she created the print workbook for the CEO retreat.
26:36
SPEAKER_00: That turned into creating the print CEO planner that we have available for sale.
26:42
SPEAKER_00: And as she was creating these things, my favorite part about working with her is she gave us brand guidelines.
26:49
SPEAKER_00: She actually pulled all of what she was doing into brand guidelines so that then we could take what she had created for us and continue making sure that our brand was consistent across the board.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: So the brand guidelines included a brand board.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: This had our logo, our specific colors for the brand, including color codes.
27:10
SPEAKER_00: So we knew exactly what colors we're using and it can be consistent throughout.
27:15
SPEAKER_00: She chose the exact fonts that worked with our logo.
27:20
SPEAKER_00: And so we had those specific fonts.
27:22
SPEAKER_00: We purchased them and uploaded them into our computer and into Canva.
27:25
SPEAKER_00: So again, it could be consistent throughout.
27:28
SPEAKER_00: She had examples of the type of photography for us to use so that again, even if we got new photos, we would have an idea of what the look and feel is to show the photographer.
27:38
SPEAKER_00: So it's very consistent and cohesive.
27:40
SPEAKER_00: Then when we decided to move everything into the CEO Collective brand, she could very easily make us a new logo that tied in with the other two logos she had.
27:52
SPEAKER_00: We already had the guidelines, so it was really easy to pull it together.
27:55
SPEAKER_00: She was able to help us see that when we moved everything under the CEO collective umbrella, what the brand feel and experience and tone and types of language, we were able to bring all that together and then be smart about how we implemented that.
28:15
SPEAKER_00: So instead of doing absolutely everything custom in my business, I'm a big believer in keeping it simple and getting fancy later.
28:23
SPEAKER_00: I'm always looking for options where I can get started with something that is easy to customize and easy to tweak for what I specifically want.
28:33
SPEAKER_00: So we went out and got specific templates for our website, for all the different types of pages on our website.
28:40
SPEAKER_00: And because they're all customizable, our designer was able to say, here's the different templates I've picked for you to use.
28:47
SPEAKER_00: And you can come in here and tweak them and change them as much as you want.
28:50
SPEAKER_00: So we made sure that every part of our website, there were templates there.
28:54
SPEAKER_00: Landing pages, templated.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: If you go to opt-in for any of my free, free CEO date checklist, free business growth checklist, free get paid calculator, like you'll see those are templated.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: If you go to one of my trainings, my free trainings, like the 90-day CEO operating system, the opt-in page for that is templated.
29:15
SPEAKER_00: It was something she created for us.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: And even the sales page, we didn't start that from scratch.
29:20
SPEAKER_00: We started with a template.
29:22
SPEAKER_00: We started with a template that was easy to tweak and adjust, make it all on brand for our guidelines, and it cut the cost dramatically from having a designer come up with it from scratch and having a developer code it all and make sure it all worked.
29:39
SPEAKER_00: So I'm a huge, huge fan of getting those brand guidelines in place.
29:43
SPEAKER_00: Yes, if you need to work with somebody to do that, cool, that's a great investment.
29:48
SPEAKER_00: But then look at how you can take those brand guidelines and build templates for yourself so that it's easier for you and your team to implement them, as opposed to customizing everything from scratch.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
30:03
SPEAKER_00: So you might spend a couple hundred dollars, even a couple thousand dollars, depending on how complicated and intensive this is, but it will make your life a lot easier.
30:13
SPEAKER_00: And I just want to say this is where you can save a lot of money, honestly.
30:18
SPEAKER_00: There are so many gorgeous templates out there now.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: You don't know how hard it was 15 years ago to create a sales page on your website.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: Because it wasn't drag and drop.
30:39
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't easy to move around or change or tweak or edit.
30:42
SPEAKER_00: So now there's amazing website templates.
30:46
SPEAKER_00: We use Divi or Elementor, are the ones that all of our templates are built on.
30:52
SPEAKER_00: There's other template sites out there.
30:55
SPEAKER_00: Um, if you're using Show It or if you're using, dang, what is it called?
30:59
SPEAKER_00: I just forgot Squarespace.
31:02
SPEAKER_00: If you're using Squarespace.
31:04
SPEAKER_00: And if you upgrade Canva for the professional edition, you can build out your brand kit in Canva.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: So we have all of our logos in Canva, all the fonts we purchased, so they're professional fonts that we paid for, but we could upload those into Canva so that we can use them on any graphics, any workbooks, any social media posts, etc.
31:22
SPEAKER_00: Like we can keep it consistent across the board.
31:24
SPEAKER_00: We could upload all of our color codes in so we have the exact colors that we wanted to use.
31:31
SPEAKER_00: This makes it so much easier when you have the templates and you have a way to create and put them out yourself instead of having to hire somebody to do from scratch every single time.
31:47
SPEAKER_00: So I share this because yes, at some point you will probably have somebody taking on all of that for you as your business truly scales.
31:58
SPEAKER_00: But it's very, very expensive to have a designer and developer on your team or to have them on retainer.
32:04
SPEAKER_00: It can be so very expensive.
32:06
SPEAKER_00: And if you can think about a template as a way to not just save money, but to give your business back the resources it needs to get in front of more potential clients, you will grow faster and you'll still look great.
32:22
SPEAKER_00: Your business will still look professional and pulled together.
32:26
SPEAKER_00: So I really, really, really want you to be thinking about this.
32:29
SPEAKER_00: I want you to be looking critically at where you're spending money, what expenses you're taking on in your business.
32:35
SPEAKER_00: If it is not going to make a difference in sales, then don't spend any money there.
32:40
SPEAKER_00: Because if you're just going after it because some celebrity, influencer, entrepreneur made it feel like you have to use these things, or this is how you should look, this is what you should do.
32:53
SPEAKER_00: Chances are, one, they're probably getting paid on the back end to send you to those places.
32:58
SPEAKER_00: Like they're probably an affiliate or something like that.
33:00
SPEAKER_00: And two, it's likely not going to make a major difference.
33:04
SPEAKER_00: It really isn't.
33:06
SPEAKER_00: We need to audit those expenses.
33:08
SPEAKER_00: You need to know what your burn rate is, what your break-even rate is in your business.
33:14
SPEAKER_00: If you're just getting started, you need to know how fast you're going through your cash reserves, how fast you'll go through your startup fund.
33:20
SPEAKER_00: That startup fund might be a credit card, it might be your savings account.
33:24
SPEAKER_00: But especially if you're in startup mode, if you aren't making enough revenue yet, you need to keep an eye on it because often I see people who spend their money too fast, not realizing it could take a lot longer than they think to recoup their investment.
33:40
SPEAKER_00: And there's honestly no reason to overinvest in this area when there are so many gorgeous templates and so many amazing tools that'll help you get it going faster.
33:49
SPEAKER_00: As your business grows, you need to know your monthly overhead expenses.
33:54
SPEAKER_00: And if you're not tracking your numbers, now is the time.
33:58
SPEAKER_00: Now is the time to start tracking your numbers and get crystal clear about it.
34:02
SPEAKER_00: I've mentioned the book Profit First before, a lot on the podcast, but one of the things that Mike Mikalowitz talks about in going through the book is getting a hold of your expenses, doing an audit, and ruthlessly cutting out anything you don't need.
34:16
SPEAKER_00: You might find there are tools that you're using that have a free or a lower price point.
34:21
SPEAKER_00: You could downgrade your price point.
34:23
SPEAKER_00: Um, you could even pause some tools if you're only using them once in a while, which can be so helpful to know if you're really trying to keep your expenses lower.
34:34
SPEAKER_00: There might be an equivalent tool that's a lot less expensive, like the sales cart that we just switched to.
34:41
SPEAKER_00: We went from a$99 a month sales cart to a$500 one-time fee sales cart.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: And that's huge because I've spent probably$6,000 with that other one.
34:52
SPEAKER_00: I could have spent$5,500 on ads or on getting more visibility for my business.
34:59
SPEAKER_00: And that's how you have to start thinking is is there any way I can deploy my resources in a smarter way that is gonna get us the ROI?
35:09
SPEAKER_00: You might find that if it's not a tool or technology, there's a template, something else less expensive.
35:15
SPEAKER_00: These are smart decisions for a lot of people, especially if you are under 250, 500K in your business because it frees up the cash flow you need to put into something that's actually gonna generate growth in your business.
35:29
SPEAKER_00: It's actually gonna get you in front of more potential clients and help you to acquire them.
35:34
SPEAKER_00: So I hope uh that talking through this, one didn't scare you.
35:38
SPEAKER_00: And two, is gonna help you wrangle and avoid creating that cash-eating monster.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: Now, once you've gone through your expenses and you've audited those, you're making sure you're not overspending in areas that don't make sense where you won't get an ROI.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: Where should you spend it?
35:53
SPEAKER_00: Should you just dump it all into marketing?
35:56
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
35:57
SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
35:58
SPEAKER_00: Mistake number two: thinking more marketing is the answer.
36:02
SPEAKER_00: More marketing could be the answer.
36:05
SPEAKER_00: But I want to say that marketing is not an ATM.
36:11
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: Running Facebook ads is not an ATM.
36:14
SPEAKER_00: Posting more on social media is not an ATM.
36:18
SPEAKER_00: I hear from a lot of people who are posting on social media, they're getting on calls with me, and they're saying, so-and-so said all I need to do is spend money on Facebook ads, or all I need to do is do social media like stories on Instagram each and every day.
36:31
SPEAKER_00: And they buy into this mindset that just doing more marketing is going to fix everything in their business.
36:37
SPEAKER_00: If you're setting up a sales system, so this could be a funnel, this could be an opt-in that leads to a product, program, or service, and then you're just trying to brute force, just push it in front of many people as you possibly can, and you're not seeing results, you're not seeing conversions, you're not seeing people sign up for your free thing, much less your paid thing, more marketing will not fix a bad product market fit.
37:03
SPEAKER_00: This is where I see a lot of problems start, and we need to actually look at what's going on.
37:07
SPEAKER_00: First, if you're sending people to something free, where they're opting in to your email list for a free resource, this is a strategy everyone hears that they should do.
37:19
SPEAKER_00: If you are sending traffic there and it is not converting to people actually taking that action to opt into your email list, if you send a hundred people to that page on your website to get your free checklist or your free training or your free resource, and 50% or more are not signing up, yes, I said 50%, then it means it's not about doing more marketing.
37:44
SPEAKER_00: It's about fixing the messaging.
37:47
SPEAKER_00: So I know 50% is high compared to industry average, but I actually want you to do good marketing.
37:54
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: I don't want you to do average because most business owners get this wrong.
38:00
SPEAKER_00: I want you to have marketing that actually works and gets results.
38:05
SPEAKER_00: And that means if 50% or more people aren't signing up to your free resources, then your messaging is off.
38:11
SPEAKER_00: There's something going on here.
38:13
SPEAKER_00: The same thing applies if you're trying to make sales for something.
38:15
SPEAKER_00: So if you're sending a hundred people to a sales page and you're not getting one to five people buying that thing, and these were people who were actually ideal potential clients, then it is not a marketing numbers problem.
38:31
SPEAKER_00: It is a messaging problem.
38:32
SPEAKER_00: It is a product market fit problem.
38:36
SPEAKER_00: When I'm going through and analyzing things with my clients, I want to know these types of numbers because it helps me.
38:43
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes people think that they're having a volume issue, that they just need to do more, more, more posting, more sharing, more social, more blogging, more whatever.
38:53
SPEAKER_00: But what they actually need to do is dig into their actual offers and test out a few more things.
38:57
SPEAKER_00: So this is something I feel no one really talks about.
39:00
SPEAKER_00: That the expectation seems to be that you create something and once you've created it, boom, you're done.
39:06
SPEAKER_00: And that's just not how it works.
39:09
SPEAKER_00: I feel like a lot of time we need to remember that there's a lot of things you will put out to the world in your business, whether they're specific products, programs, or services or free resources or whatever.
39:21
SPEAKER_00: Even if you think it's the best thing on the planet, it doesn't matter if your potential clients don't care about it, right?
39:28
SPEAKER_00: So there has to be an overlap between what you're trying to create and what they actually will pay for, what they actually will get.
39:35
SPEAKER_00: So you have to test your messaging.
39:37
SPEAKER_00: You have to find product market fit, and you need to test a lot and know that this is just part of the process.
39:45
SPEAKER_00: Over the course of my business, I can't tell you how many free things that I've put out just to see if they work, just to see what resonates.
39:53
SPEAKER_00: So currently we have just a few main free offers on my website.
40:00
SPEAKER_00: You can get the CEO date checklist, the business growth checklist, the get paid calculator, the 12-month profit plan, and then we have fired up in focus challenge, best year ever challenge.
40:10
SPEAKER_00: So there's like a lot of free stuff I've created over the years, but you don't see the dozens that I have retired, that I have taken down because they just weren't converting well.
40:22
SPEAKER_00: They weren't performing as well.
40:24
SPEAKER_00: So I have created things over 15 years, and the things that performed the best, the things that resonated the best, were the things I continue to lean into.
40:33
SPEAKER_00: Anything that didn't perform as well as those, gone, out of here.
40:37
SPEAKER_00: So I think this is just really, really important.
40:39
SPEAKER_00: If you're not seeing results and you're sending enough traffic to it, because we don't know if it's a traffic problem or a messaging problem until we look at the numbers.
40:49
SPEAKER_00: But if a hundred people are landing on that page and you're not getting any signups, it's a messaging problem.
40:54
SPEAKER_00: It's likely the wrong thing for the people you're targeting.
40:57
SPEAKER_00: They don't understand it.
40:58
SPEAKER_00: It's not relevant enough.
41:00
SPEAKER_00: There's too big of a disconnect between where they are and what you're trying to offer to them.
41:08
SPEAKER_00: They don't understand why they should get this, right?
41:12
SPEAKER_00: And there's no amount of marketing that's gonna fix that disconnect.
41:15
SPEAKER_00: You actually have to get to the root cause with a message.
41:18
SPEAKER_00: And this is the same thing with paid offers.
41:20
SPEAKER_00: If you're sending a ton of traffic to a paid offer, a product, program, or service, and no one is buying it, then sending more traffic is not going to fix that.
41:30
SPEAKER_00: No amount of Facebook ads is going to fix something that people don't want to buy.
41:34
SPEAKER_00: So we have to make sure your people actually want what you have to offer and that there's enough people out there to buy that specific thing.
41:42
SPEAKER_00: So this is where we need to get really honest before scaling our business, and we need to test things first.
41:49
SPEAKER_00: This is one reason with my clients, when I talk about testing with your hot market first, your warm market, and then your cold market, it's so crucially important.
41:58
SPEAKER_00: So, what does that mean?
41:59
SPEAKER_00: Your hot market is people who already know, like, and trust you.
42:02
SPEAKER_00: They've already engaged with you on a more high-level way.
42:06
SPEAKER_00: These could be former clients, people who've already purchased something from you, referrals coming in, people you actually know and they actually know you like in real life.
42:16
SPEAKER_00: So these are the potential clients who are really, really hot.
42:21
SPEAKER_00: They already believe you're credible and they are the most likely to buy your offer.
42:27
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
42:28
SPEAKER_00: So we want to get your offer in front of those people first because they're the most likely to buy it.
42:32
SPEAKER_00: If those people aren't going to buy it, then we need to go back to the drawing board.
42:35
SPEAKER_00: So if you're getting it in front of people who already know like and trust you, they already believe you're a credible expert, they already have that higher level connection to you and they're not buying, then it's time to go back and rework.
42:46
SPEAKER_00: How are we presenting this product, program, or service?
42:49
SPEAKER_00: So if they do buy it, if your hot market says, yes, I want more of this, and then you move into your warm market, your warm market is your email list, your social media following.
42:59
SPEAKER_00: People who are engaging with you in some way, they're listening to your podcast, they're following you on YouTube, they're reading all your content.
43:08
SPEAKER_00: This could also be people who you're kind of in the same circles.
43:12
SPEAKER_00: So they kind of know who you are.
43:14
SPEAKER_00: They have familiarity with you and your brand.
43:16
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you haven't had a real conversation yet, but they know who you are, right?
43:22
SPEAKER_00: If you promote your offer to that warmer market and you've done all the things, right?
43:27
SPEAKER_00: You're emailing them multiple times, you've emailed them like a full promotion, you've shared on social media, you've DM'd people who were interested, you personally follow up with anybody who was actively looking at your sales page or reaching out with questions.
43:44
SPEAKER_00: If you go through all of that and people aren't resonating and they're like, oh, this isn't really what I'm looking for, then again, we got to get to the root of the problem.
43:52
SPEAKER_00: And so what can we do here?
43:54
SPEAKER_00: Keep in mind if these people aren't buying, do not go to a cold pool of people.
44:00
SPEAKER_00: The cold market is where Facebook ads lives.
44:02
SPEAKER_00: Facebook ads is getting in front of people who do not know who you are.
44:05
SPEAKER_00: So don't go there because then you're throwing money at a problem that is not fixable with just throwing money at it.
44:11
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to convert to a cold audience if it won't convert to a hot audience.
44:16
SPEAKER_00: So we got to fix the problem.
44:18
SPEAKER_00: We got to get back into market research mode.
44:20
SPEAKER_00: We got to get on the phone.
44:21
SPEAKER_00: We got to talk to people.
44:22
SPEAKER_00: We got to do a hundred conversations with potential clients.
44:25
SPEAKER_00: We need to survey our audience and get to know what it is they actually want and they're looking for.
44:30
SPEAKER_00: We have to drill down and figure out the disconnect.
44:34
SPEAKER_00: Chances are, if you take the time to do this work, to do the market research, then you will see such a massive difference in your business.
44:47
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
44:48
SPEAKER_00: No one is talking about this.
44:50
SPEAKER_00: They just tell you to go post more on Instagram stories, but none of that is actually converting to anything.
44:54
SPEAKER_00: Then we need to drill deeper and we need to know the difference between just trying brute force, throwing everything at our business, and being more strategic and be willing to ask the deeper questions.
45:08
SPEAKER_00: When you do the work of talking to your audience, talking to your clients, really understanding where they're coming from, what they need, meet them where they are, and then you can walk them through the problem and the solution that you have.
45:24
SPEAKER_00: But we can't scale anything if people aren't converted converting into your paid offers because that's a bad product market fit.
45:32
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
45:33
SPEAKER_00: And in a conversation about scale, you might not think that is, you know, something we have to talk about, but it is because I see so many people who are jumping to try to scale and they don't understand this.
45:46
SPEAKER_00: And they're wondering why they're doing all the things and not getting any of the results.
45:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
45:53
SPEAKER_00: Off my soapbox for just a second.
45:56
SPEAKER_00: I might get back on it.
45:57
SPEAKER_00: We'll see.
45:58
SPEAKER_00: Let's get into the third big mistake when it comes to scaling that I'm seeing from entrepreneurs.
46:03
SPEAKER_00: And this is a mistake that feeds into both of these other things, which is overcomplicating their business.
46:12
SPEAKER_00: Overcomplicating their business.
46:14
SPEAKER_00: Business should not be complicated.
46:15
SPEAKER_00: And in fact, the more complicated you make your business, the more likelihood that it's going to be really hard to stay on top of and to feel in control of.
46:24
SPEAKER_00: And the more likely that things are going to go wrong and break, you'll always be putting out fires.
46:28
SPEAKER_00: You'll always be fixing things.
46:30
SPEAKER_00: So do you really need the 37-step funnel?
46:33
SPEAKER_00: Do you need that?
46:34
SPEAKER_00: I would have to say no, you probably don't.
46:36
SPEAKER_00: When it comes down to it, business is way simpler than everyone is making it out to be.
46:42
SPEAKER_00: It is not this mystical thing that only a few people can understand.
46:47
SPEAKER_00: Like the majority of our economy is built on small business ownership.
46:52
SPEAKER_00: It's not that complicated.
46:54
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
46:55
SPEAKER_00: When it comes down to it, you do not want super complicated systems.
47:02
SPEAKER_00: So one thing I want you to know is the more things you have going on, the more steps, the more technology that has to talk to each other.
47:11
SPEAKER_00: This is a big one because that leads to potential for things breaking.
47:16
SPEAKER_00: The more expenses.
47:18
SPEAKER_00: These things get expensive, like I mentioned in the first mistake.
47:22
SPEAKER_00: I've seen so many people who feel like they need 20 different types of technology just to sell something.
47:27
SPEAKER_00: And I am like, no, we do not need that.
47:31
SPEAKER_00: All of these different tools that a lot of people are saying you need, you can strip that down and keep it so much simpler because the expense adds up and it adds more opportunity for things to break and to go wrong.
47:45
SPEAKER_00: So the simplest answer, the simplest system is probably the best one and the more scalable one because it's less likely to break, to get outdated, to fall apart as you're going after rapid growth.
47:58
SPEAKER_00: The more steps, the more technology, the more things going on, the more likely you will be in that putting out fires mode.
48:08
SPEAKER_00: So I've seen a lot of people who, you know, they do all the funnels and everything, and they come to us and they're like, I set this funnel up and should be working perfectly.
48:16
SPEAKER_00: But then we look at it and we go, Oh, the link is broken.
48:19
SPEAKER_00: The tool's not set up properly.
48:22
SPEAKER_00: And that's why people aren't getting through this whole sales process.
48:25
SPEAKER_00: So the more steps, the more opportunities for things to break.
48:29
SPEAKER_00: And when things start breaking, then the more experts you need to keep going to.
48:34
SPEAKER_00: Most of the entrepreneurs I work with did not go into business to become a technology expert, to become a marketing automation expert.
48:42
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't have that expertise, then it means we got to hire someone to go figure out what we did or why it's not working.
48:50
SPEAKER_00: And we don't want to put ourselves in a situation where we have constantly got to hire people to come fix things that were broken.
48:58
SPEAKER_00: So it gets complicated, it doesn't need to be.
49:01
SPEAKER_00: The other thing I think about a lot, because I've seen this happen over and over again, the more complicated your business, the more opportunities for a change in the market to mess up your business.
49:12
SPEAKER_00: And I've seen this happen a lot when people have built a whole marketing and sales process around just one specific tactic.
49:22
SPEAKER_00: And when that tactic breaks or stops working, their whole business kind of falls off a cliff.
49:31
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
49:32
SPEAKER_00: So the most recent example a lot of people could probably think about is Facebook ads.
49:37
SPEAKER_00: In the early days of Facebook ads, it was drastically different than Facebook ads now.
49:44
SPEAKER_00: So sorry, I'm talking a lot about Facebook ads in this episode because it's just a great example of where things can go wrong.
49:51
SPEAKER_00: And it's not the only one, right?
49:52
SPEAKER_00: It's not the only place where things could go wrong.
49:55
SPEAKER_00: Facebook is a love it or leave it type of situation right now.
49:59
SPEAKER_00: And they can be great.
50:01
SPEAKER_00: Early on when Facebook ads rolled out, it was amazing because it was the first time small business owners had access to that level of sophistication with their advertising.
50:11
SPEAKER_00: However, it has changed dramatically.
50:16
SPEAKER_00: And there have been so many times where Facebook has pushed out an upgrade and it messed up somebody's entire sales process.
50:23
SPEAKER_00: They had no other attract marketing system in place to bring new potential clients into their business.
50:29
SPEAKER_00: And so their business just kind of stopped when Facebook ads stopped working for them.
50:34
SPEAKER_00: I've seen people who got kicked off of Facebook ads, like their accounts were shut down and their entire sales process stopped working.
50:43
SPEAKER_00: As things have gotten more and more expensive, which is something that happens, Facebook ad costs used to be nothing.
50:50
SPEAKER_00: It was like you could get people opting in for your list for 50 cents, a dollar or less.
50:55
SPEAKER_00: But as it got more and more and more expensive to run Facebook ads, it pushed more and more people out of being able to use them, especially if they didn't have a, you know, high four, low five figure offer.
51:09
SPEAKER_00: So they can be great, but I have seen so many people who, when one thing got more expensive or when it got taken away, everything broke.
51:19
SPEAKER_00: They had nothing else in their arsenal to go out there and get new clients into their potential business.
51:25
SPEAKER_00: So I've seen this happen over and over again with Facebook.
51:29
SPEAKER_00: And I've also seen this happen with Google.
51:31
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there were a lot of people who were driving tons of traffic with SEO on Google, and then SEO, Google would update their SEO and their whole framework, and suddenly it would shut down the flow of traffic to these websites.
51:46
SPEAKER_00: So you have to keep this in mind.
51:48
SPEAKER_00: You can't just throw more and more money at these things and hope they're gonna answer all the problems.
51:53
SPEAKER_00: Because chances are they won't.
51:55
SPEAKER_00: And when the things get too complicated and you can't see how you're going to replace one thing with another, it's gonna set you up for not if but when that thing stops working.
52:07
SPEAKER_00: So when you sit down and think about it, like really think about it and compare it to what you might have heard about these funnels and automations and all these different things.
52:18
SPEAKER_00: We have simplified this so much because I don't want this stuff to break down.
52:23
SPEAKER_00: And if something breaks, I want it to be much easier for us to be able to troubleshoot why something isn't working correctly.
52:30
SPEAKER_00: And also, I want more control over my business.
52:33
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be at the whim of a platform that I do not own and have any control over.
52:40
SPEAKER_00: I want to make sure I have diversified my marketing, just like you would diversify any assets in a portfolio, right?
52:47
SPEAKER_00: I want to make sure if Facebook stops working, I still have TikTok or still have my email list or I still have my podcast.
52:52
SPEAKER_00: Like I want to make sure I've diversified those things, but not overcomplicated them because I have a clear strategy for how they all work together.
53:00
SPEAKER_00: And when people have this over-complicated system, they don't know why things are broken, they don't know why it stops converting, they can't figure out why they're not getting the results that were promised by the again, celebrity influencer, entrepreneur, guru, then they just jump to something else.
53:16
SPEAKER_00: And then at the end of the day, they're wondering, you know, why can't my business work for me?
53:21
SPEAKER_00: I believe the more simple and streamlined we make our businesses, they're easier to run.
53:27
SPEAKER_00: And I think automation has gotten too far.
53:31
SPEAKER_00: That that end of the spectrum has gotten too far.
53:34
SPEAKER_00: It's removed the humanity from business.
53:37
SPEAKER_00: And we need to bring back the humanity in business.
53:40
SPEAKER_00: We need to bring back that we're doing business not with bank accounts, but with people, right?
53:46
SPEAKER_00: So one of the ways I've simplified this in my business, and we're still working about this on a regular basis, is instead of having a super complicated on-demand training funnel, I have simplified it so much.
54:04
SPEAKER_00: In the past, I tried the very complicated system.
54:08
SPEAKER_00: So I had a funnel set up for a program that's no longer available solo, but it's in the CEO collective vault.
54:15
SPEAKER_00: But I have a program called Get More Clients.
54:17
SPEAKER_00: And I had originally set it up for an on-demand webinar funnel where people went to the landing page, they opt in for the free webinar, and it wasn't just an opt-in to get it on demand.
54:28
SPEAKER_00: You had to opt-in, and there was a piece of technology there that allowed them to choose the specific times to join it.
54:35
SPEAKER_00: And then there was another piece of technology that was adding the countdown timer.
54:40
SPEAKER_00: And there was another piece of technology to make sure that they could only see certain things if they took certain actions.
54:47
SPEAKER_00: But it took like five different pieces of technology just to get that piece all working.
54:54
SPEAKER_00: And then it was breaking all the time.
54:57
SPEAKER_00: Things were not working correctly.
54:59
SPEAKER_00: So it was kind of like a Frankenstein-looking system.
55:03
SPEAKER_00: And no matter how many times we tried to ask for help or tried to say, why is this not working with this?
55:10
SPEAKER_00: We just couldn't get to the bottom of it.
55:12
SPEAKER_00: So we said, you know what?
55:13
SPEAKER_00: Let's simplify this whole thing.
55:14
SPEAKER_00: Instead of needing a countdown timer and specific times to opt-in and deadline funnel and all these different bells and whistles, we said, you know what, we're gonna make it very, very simple.
55:25
SPEAKER_00: We have an opt-in page, people sign up for it.
55:27
SPEAKER_00: As soon as they sign up for it, they can access it.
55:30
SPEAKER_00: It's like our website, our email service provider.
55:33
SPEAKER_00: That's all we needed.
55:34
SPEAKER_00: We didn't need anything more complicated than that.
55:37
SPEAKER_00: And it just made it so incredibly simple to go from, hey, come join us in 10 minutes for this next webinar we're doing, to just say, hey, it's on demand.
55:48
SPEAKER_00: And I just put the pre-recorded video out there.
55:50
SPEAKER_00: Okay, there's no fancy technology, it's just an embedded video of the training on my website page.
55:56
SPEAKER_00: So they sign up for it, get it, they get the email sequence afterwards, inviting them to take the next step.
56:02
SPEAKER_00: A very simple email sequence.
56:04
SPEAKER_00: There is no countdown timer.
56:07
SPEAKER_00: There is nothing fancy here.
56:09
SPEAKER_00: And what we do is by simplifying all of this, it's just made it so that it removes layers of friction for our potential clients and it removes layers of complexity for us to manage.
56:23
SPEAKER_00: So I love keeping it simple.
56:26
SPEAKER_00: Keep it simple and strategic as one of our core values.
56:29
SPEAKER_00: It's so much easier on everyone and less likely that it is going to be something that we are constantly having to deal with.
56:38
SPEAKER_00: So I hope this episode was helpful.
56:40
SPEAKER_00: Again, this is a very practical, like Rach's hot take, no nonsense, no bullshit series on the truth about scaling, because I want to make sure that we are talking about how to be practical and profitable.
56:57
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to talk about acting like or presenting success when a lot of the people who are presenting success aren't telling you what is happening behind the scenes.
57:08
SPEAKER_00: And instead, you know, you're buying into their BS and then wondering why it's not working the way they promised.
57:15
SPEAKER_00: It's because they didn't really share the whole story with you.
57:19
SPEAKER_00: So let's keep on with the practical conversation.
57:23
SPEAKER_00: The chance of being an overnight success story, even though that's what a lot of people market to small business owners, that is few and far between.
57:31
SPEAKER_00: That is not the norm.
57:33
SPEAKER_00: Practically, it takes time to grow a business.
57:36
SPEAKER_00: It takes time to get it to the point where you have the right offer at the right price point for the right people.
57:44
SPEAKER_00: So that product market fit.
57:45
SPEAKER_00: It takes time for you to hone in on the right messaging.
57:49
SPEAKER_00: It takes time for you to hone in on the right positioning.
57:52
SPEAKER_00: All that takes time and it takes trial and error.
57:55
SPEAKER_00: There's no way you will know.
57:56
SPEAKER_00: Like none of us have a magic ball to tell you whether or not that offer is going to be what works.
58:02
SPEAKER_00: And then you have to build the infrastructure.
58:04
SPEAKER_00: You have to have the marketing, the sales, and the delivery and the operations and the team, all of those pieces, not just marketing and sales.
58:13
SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, we're building kind of a lopsided business that will collapse in on itself when you can't keep up with the level of service that really needs to happen and your team doesn't know how to keep things running because everything is breaking all the time.
58:26
SPEAKER_00: So, again, to recap, here are my mistakes to avoid.
58:32
SPEAKER_00: Don't create a cash-eating monster.
58:34
SPEAKER_00: Audit your expenses.
58:36
SPEAKER_00: If your expenses are getting out of control, then you might need to bring it back and simplify.
58:42
SPEAKER_00: Go with the less expensive technology.
58:45
SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself: can we streamline this somehow?
58:48
SPEAKER_00: Can we collapse together a couple tools that we are paying for, especially if some of them have added an additional feature and now they've replaced something you were paying for?
58:59
SPEAKER_00: So audit your expenses.
59:02
SPEAKER_00: Don't overly invest in your branding and your website.
59:06
SPEAKER_00: Is there a template that will help give you that branded look, that polished professional look that we're all going after?
59:15
SPEAKER_00: But without having to invest in custom design, custom branding, custom development every single time we're trying to go out there and promote something.
59:24
SPEAKER_00: Is there an easier, simpler way for you to achieve that result?
59:28
SPEAKER_00: And then don't get stuck in more marketing is the answer.
59:31
SPEAKER_00: Showing up more on Instagram stories is not gonna change a bad product market fit.
59:35
SPEAKER_00: If the thing is not selling to people who already know, like and trust you, time to go back, do the market research, and fix the actual underlying problem.
59:44
SPEAKER_00: More marketing is not gonna do that.
59:47
SPEAKER_00: Facebook ads is not an ATM.
59:49
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to magically fix that.
59:50
SPEAKER_00: Just sending more people to something that's not converting is not gonna help you.
59:54
SPEAKER_00: It's just gonna be a really expensive way to try to scale.
59:57
SPEAKER_00: So go back to basics before you try to scale it up.
1:00:01
SPEAKER_00: And finally, don't overcomplicate everything.
1:00:03
SPEAKER_00: The noise out there about how complicated business needs to be, it is just completely unnecessary.
1:00:09
SPEAKER_00: Unnecessary.
1:00:10
SPEAKER_00: And honestly, a lot of it is built to target aspiring entrepreneurs, the people who want to be entrepreneurs, they don't know what they don't know.
1:00:18
SPEAKER_00: And so they are investing all over the place because they believe in the celebrity influencer gurus.
1:00:26
SPEAKER_00: And so they keep doing what they're telling them to get in a cycle of consumption, of buying education, and then they still don't get the results.
1:00:35
SPEAKER_00: You don't need to have the 37-step funnel, you don't need to have all these complicated ascension models with an opt-in with a tripwire with a low-ticket offer and then scale up to your high-ticket offer, like simplify it.
1:00:50
SPEAKER_00: Like, let's take all the complexity out.
1:00:53
SPEAKER_00: Overall, my whole point in this series is to talk about hey, how do we serve more people?
1:00:58
SPEAKER_00: How do we grow more sustainably?
1:01:01
SPEAKER_00: How do we keep up with delivering and taking care of the clients at the level of sales that we want?
1:01:09
SPEAKER_00: And how do we do it without breaking our business, without making it harder than it needs to be, without setting our team up for feeling like everything is an emergency because everything's breaking, where everybody's getting burned out and working 24-7.
1:01:24
SPEAKER_00: We just need to think smarter about these things and have a more nuanced conversation than what I feel is generally happening in the entrepreneurship space.
1:01:32
SPEAKER_00: So I'd love to hear your insights.
1:01:34
SPEAKER_00: The series is a little bit of a different one for me.
1:01:37
SPEAKER_00: I kind of feel like I'm a little ranty here.
1:01:40
SPEAKER_00: Like this is this is me being a little spicy, a little on my soapbox.
1:01:45
SPEAKER_00: And it's really coming from a place of just being frustrated with how people get stuck, how I keep seeing businesses get stuck for installed for a long time, because they don't have somebody just telling them and cutting through all the bullshit.
1:02:00
SPEAKER_00: So that's what I'm here doing.
1:02:02
SPEAKER_00: So let me know what you think.
1:02:03
SPEAKER_00: Tag me at rachel.cook on Instagram.
1:02:06
SPEAKER_00: I want to hear from you.
1:02:07
SPEAKER_00: I want to have a conversation, and I really want to hear your thoughts on this episode, especially.
1:02:12
SPEAKER_00: For full show notes, and of course the first two episodes, if you didn't hear it, head over to the CEO Collective.com slash podcast.
1:02:21
SPEAKER_00: You can get the full series on Promote Yourself to CEO Podcast on iTunes or Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, anywhere you listen to podcasts.
1:02:32
SPEAKER_00: Okay, I cannot wait to share with you the final series.
1:02:35
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna bring this all home and talk about some of those practical, profitable strategies.
1:02:40
SPEAKER_00: So thank you so much for listening to this week's episode.
1:02:42
SPEAKER_00: I'll talk to you soon.