[Transcript starts at 1:19]
Hello, hello, hello, my podcast people. And thank you for joining me for yet another episode of my favorite podcast. It is hot in here today. I'm going to say it. You can't tell it. You can't feel it, but it's hot in here. Cause it's still summering and I got the windows closed cause it's good, the best sound and it's hot.
I'm also recording this afternoon. So the sun is coming in from that window. Either way, it is hot. If you are listening to this, when it drops, it is Monday, September 2nd. Thank you for listening. for tuning in. Also happy Labor Day. That is. It's just perhaps somewhat apropos to release this episode on Labor Day according to Google because I didn't really know what Labor Day was so I googled it and the definition or whatever the answer or the response it gave me is Labor Day is a federal holiday in the U.
S. celebrated on the first Monday of September to honor and recognize the American labor movement and the works and contributions of laborers to the development and achievement of the United States. One day off for all your fucking hard work, so. Yeah, no, there's that. Tying into that today, I'm talking about this, what I call the slippery slope of scaling, which obviously can, and usually does require more labor.
Uh, but what I really want to focus on today and what we're going to focus on the most is namely, uh, in relation to how it affects the customers and, uh, Even more than that, the overall brand. So up first, as per always, a few life updates, a few business updates, and then we will hop on into it. Cause I'm actually very excited about this episode.
This is something I've been kind of, you know, bouncing around in my head and talking about some of my clients and talking about with Lex and I'm excited about this topic, but life updates first, like I said, when we first started the episode, it's still summering. I'm still very warm. Uh, August, September, and October are like typically the warmest months in SoCal.
So. It's warm. Uh, Justin, my brother, uh, one of my two brothers, he he and his girlfriend will arrive tomorrow, um, so I'll let you know how that goes, because as per always this is like I'm recording it in the past, releasing it in the future, so he hasn't As, as of today when I'm recording it, he hasn't arrived, but when you listen to this, he'll have already been here.
Um, he'll saying he'll still be here. So I'll let you know how that goes. Um, next up, Lex and I have started watching Breaking Bad. I've already seen Breaking Bad. I watched the whole thing. Uh, I love just watching TV at night. Uh, I, I watch, we watch a lot of like reality, um, real estate shows, but we like watched all of them, literally all of them.
So selling Sunset is coming back on like September something, sixth maybe. I dunno, something like that. Um, but until then. And even during then, we're watching Breaking Bad, and it's really cool to just relive how awesome that show is, like, it's just done so well. I contemplated watching Lost, but I'm just so unhappy with the ending.
I did watch that show when it aired, but I was like, I don't know if I can do it to myself. So, I know I loved Breaking Bad. Lex has not seen Breaking Bad, so I was like, let's watch that. And then, We can also watch the spin off, Better Call Saul, um, which I did not get through, so We got a lot of TV shows, um So yeah, there's that.
Uh, last thing, I sent an email to my list. If you're not on my email list, Why not? I'd actually like to know. If you want to share with me why you're not on it, text me, DM me. Uh, or if you didn't realize I had one, then you could join it. We'll link that in the show notes. Thank you, Courtney. Um, but I sent an email to my email list as of last Monday, last Tuesday.
I sent an email out of it Tuesday. And, uh, the email's about how I'm going to be fixing the capacitor in the ceiling fan in the guest room. So I will let you know how that goes. Um, the ceiling fan works, it just works better. I shouldn't say it works. The ceiling fan spins. It spins incredibly slowly. And after some googling, and really very little googling, it came right up.
Uh, what I believe is the issue is the capacitor. So I'm going to replace that. Uh, I got a new one on the way. So by the time this airs, it should have already been replaced. If you follow me on social media, maybe, hopefully, everything went well and I see it on social media. Um, but I will put an update in the next episode.
Okay? All right. Business updates, two things for you. And then we hop in number one round 16 of my Instagram intensive starts September 24th. That's not too long from now. And enrollment for the wait list opens next Monday, September 9th. For those of you that don't know the Instagram intensive is my six week online group coaching program that teaches health and fitness pros.
Exactly. Exactly. Folks, how to use Instagram for online business, right? You want to learn how to make money on online business on Instagram with your online business. This is what I will teach you how to do. No shady bullshit. None of this MLM stuff. It's not about affiliates and, you know, having your Amazon affiliate links and things like that up there.
This is about how to use your business, promote your services, attract your people, and then present offers to them, paid offers that they, at some point in time, buy. And sustains your business. Okay. Folks on the waitlist receive, uh, they get early access to enrollment and they will also get access to Lex's Canva course if they register on the first day.
Uh, we can talk about that at some point. It's called an expiring bonus, just different kinds of sales things. Um, and they also get a hundred dollars off the full price. So the full price is 697, excuse me, 597. Uh, and the, look at me, full price, 597, the waitlist gets it for 497. So. Use the link in the show notes.
Check out the information page. It has all the things, when you learn, what the data all the stuff is in there. Okay, everything. Go check that out, add your name to the waitlist, and uh, hopefully I will see you in the intensive. Second update, do not forget that tickets for Boss Up 2024 are on sale. Boss Up is coming fast and furious.
Boss Up, for those of you who don't know, it is the live event, the in person event that Jill Fitt and I host. Uh, this year it is in Redondo Beach, and it is October 10th and 11th. We have done a few episodes about it, so we will link that. Thank you so much, Courtney. Um, and, uh, In my opinion, it is the in person event of the year, but more specifically, it is for female online business owners who are looking for actionable, tactical, and strategic advice.
It's not about rah rahs or anything like that. I read a lot of, um, threads among social media a lot. And there's a conference going on, something about investing. I'm not really sure, I don't remember what the name is of it. Um, but it's about invest, like invest con or something. Uh, and there's a lot of threads going on around it.
Going on around about it, something like that. Um, Just regarding, like, what it's like at these conferences, and a lot of conferences are just really rah rah fest, which is some, it's helpful for some people, you know, like, empowerment movements, okay, it can be helpful for some people. Jill and I are about action.
We want to see results, and the way that you get results is by taking action. And so, that is what we teach, that is what we do, that is what we use these live events for. So, for folks that are watching, Wanting to work with us, but not, maybe they don't want to work with us for the full year. Maybe they can't afford to work with us for that long of time.
Or, you know, maybe they just want more of this kind of, uh, condensed, consolidated version. Maybe they do want to be around other people that are doing the thing. Like changing your environment, environment is magical. Getting around other people that support you that are doing the same thing. Magical, which is why we put on this live event.
Live events are not moneymakers by any means. So if anyone tells you that they're lying, uh, and the only way that they make money is if you like pitch some really expensive thing at the end of it. Um, we're not here to pitch anything. We want you to get results. We want people in the room. We want to change how these things are done.
Cause quite frankly, the best way to complain is to make something. So we've made. So that as well will be in the show notes. We would love to have you there. If you have any questions, comments, concerns, anything like that. Shoot me a DM at the Movement Mash Row, shoot me a text 310 737 2345. It is actually me, the text is green because it's my sideline.
I'm not going to give out my actual number, but it is me, so text me. Okay, let's hop into this because I am excited about this topic. Today's topic, The Slippery Slope of Scaling. So this episode is inspired by all of the things that I've been reading on threads. Like I said, I'm online a lot. And every morning, my first thing I do when I wake up, I go on my phone, I'll go on threads, but I also, uh, subscribe to a few newsletters that are like kind of business, branding, tech, uh, you know, finance related, and I just read what the things are saying.
I just, I enjoy reading that stuff. And they're all saying the same thing, folks, because they're all reporting on the same things, but they're all saying the same things. That thing is that big businesses aren't doing as well as when they first started, right? It's not that big businesses are not doing well, period.
It's that they're not doing as well as when they first started. No shit. No shit. Literally though, that is what these articles are saying. I saw a breakdown on threads about, um, Nike and their sales, and that they're declining as a brand, and it's like, yeah, they've been around forever, like at some point it's gonna happen.
We know that Peloton stays struggling. I have like a gripe with Peloton. We have a Peloton, I don't fucking use it, like out of sheer principle at this point. I think they're a terrible, terrible company when it comes to treating their customers well and maintaining loyalty and being smart. I just don't think it's a smart company.
Like they thought they were going to continue to go up despite the fact that COVID was done. I'm like, of course, everyone fucking bought your bike. They were stuck inside. Like, and then you lay off all these people. I, I, I take issue. My work's Labor Day. I take issue when a bunch of people are getting laid off.
Like do better companies do better. CEOs are hopping from company to company. This CEO goes to that company. He goes to that one to try and save it. And what they do first, they slash the labor. And I'm just like, you know, this is, you've hit the cap. We're going to get into that, right? The long and the short of this is that nothing scales infinitely.
Scaling, my definition, making more money without a proportional increase in effort or more revenue without a proportional increase in expenses. Right. Cause if you have a million dollar launch, but it costs you 999, 000 to. Have that. It's only a thousand dollars of profit. It's not what we want. We want you to have a million dollar launch and the expenses are $500,000, and this way you have a 500, you know, $500, $500,000 profit.
We can see people that are like, you know, they went from having a $10,000 launch and they spent $9,000 to having a million do. We don't see this, but here's an example. If you have a $10,000 launch and you spend $9,000, right, those are your expenses, your profit a thousand dollars. If you go and have a million dollar launch, but you spend 900, 000, same, same, right?
Same, same. This is not, this is not what we want, right? We'd love to see you go to a million dollar launch, but then have only spent 50 percent of that on expenses, right? So more revenue without a proportional increase in expenses. So businesses ultimately, they should be focused on if you're, as it relates to the numbers, right?
You want to be focused on profit, not just revenue, right? Because if you're just focused on revenue, which is how much money comes in, but you're not focused on as well as how much money is going out, then you can say the same. Which one thing's wrong with saying the same, but if we're going to be looking at the numbers, most of these folks are actually concerned with profit.
So what can they do to increase profit? Well, we can look to decrease expenses. How can we do that? What is typically done first? Firing people, mass layoffs. And then people that are left still gotta do the same amount of work, right? And they get paid the same as if they had all these other people helping them, but they don't.
And so suddenly it's like your expenses have gone down, your revenue can stay the same, but if your expenses go down, then suddenly you have more profit. That's terrible. Terrible. Another thing that companies or businesses will look to do is increase the revenue. Great. Let's bring, look to bring more money in.
Two ways that we can do that. Sell the same thing. To more people, let's get more people to buy this fucking bike. Or we can sell new things to the same people. Oh, let's start selling treadmills. All right. Sometimes, and this is where I also take having, I'll have an issue. Sometimes new, like selling new things to the same people simply means a new price.
And we are seeing that left and right. And it just fucking grinds my gears. I chaps my ass. Stu Brower says that. And I love it. I think it's hilarious. Right. But. We see all of these subscriptions. They just keep fucking going up, right? We're not getting anything new It's literally just like oh we need to make more money or we I think it's actually that we want to make more money So we're just going to charge you more for the same thing you've always gotten.
And I'm like, wait, what, what? That to me, I don't like it. There are times when it makes sense to increase the, you know, the amount that people are paying, uh, that the people that have been with you for a long time, but when it comes to subscriptions, that's typically not. It's just, it's a bad taste in my mouth.
So here's where the slippery slope begins, right? That slip, the slippery slope that slips into businesses failing. What we see is that they want to increase their revenue. And so what many will try to do is grow beyond what their niche, their niche will sustain. Right. They are trying to now broaden their niche.
They're trying to expand their niche. They're trying to sell the same thing oftentimes to different people, a different audience, not a new audience, meaning not new people that are the same, but the same demographic they're going like, well, let's just broaden it. We're gonna solve a different problem here, different type of people.
That's problem, problematic. That's problem. That's problematic, right? Loyalty to your core customers, your core demographic, that underpins success. And as soon as the solution for continued growth becomes expanding the audience, you know, translation broadening the audience, it's a very, very slippery slope, right?
We have to understand nothing scales infinitely. At some point, Alright, and this typically depends on the niche, the product, um, the life cycle of the customer. You're going to hit a ceiling. You're going to hit a cap. Churn, right, people leaving this thing, stop using this thing, people leaving the membership, whatever.
It means that new people, yes, new people are coming, but old people are leaving, right? And so the total number of people ideally just stays the same when you reach that limit. I would contend that if you shit on loyalty and you shit on your original customers and you're just like, I'm raising the price for everyone, fuck these old people, right?
And you're just solely focused on revenue, people will leave faster than new people come in, right? The OGs, they're going to be out of there. And we know that Last in, first out. It's very real. So you have twice the amount of people leaving. So you have the old people that are leaving, cause you're not loyal to them, and you have the new people that really aren't sticking around that long cause last in, first out.
There's not that much loyalty there. And then the business declines precipitously. I, we see this. I think a good example of this is something like CrossFit, right, and I've been talking about CrossFit, and I'm thinking about bringing on my guy Paul. Um, he's a client of mine, and we've been talking a bunch, and he has a very unique, um, perspective as it relates to, and very qualified perspective as it relates to CrossFit.
Um, I don't know if you folks are aware, um, there was a death at the CrossFit Games, um, a man, Lazar was his name, um, he, Passed away during the swim event. And so there's just been a lot of talk around this and, and Paul and I have been speaking about this and Paul has a military background, um, but that's what really got my wheels spinning as it relates to CrossFit and I've, I've been really interested in, in CrossFit as a brand, like you all know, I did CrossFit for many years, but just.
I'm interested in most businesses as a brand and CrossFit. I just, we've been thinking about it a lot recently and that is why. Um, but CrossFit is perfect example that, you know, I was around for its golden days and CrossFit has a ceiling just like everything else, right? It has a ceiling. Everyone in the world is not going to do, want to do CrossFit.
Right. And even if everyone in the world did want to do CrossFit, you'd have a ceiling because like, then you'd have everyone, it'd just be done. You can't have more people than that. Right. But everyone in the world isn't going to want to do CrossFit. Right. And the success of CrossFit is based on the fact that not everyone in the world wants to do is for a specific type of person.
It allows us to niche down and be like, this is for you. And people can be like, yes, this is for me. They can see themselves in it. Right. It's typically this type A person, competitive. They are an achiever. That is not everyone. It's fine. That's, that's good. Additionally, the product itself, right. CrossFit in and of itself does create a limit just in terms of churn, because folks can only physically do it for, but so many years, like you just, I'm still not doing it because it just, it breaks your body down as it relates to this niche kind of, and people self selecting in CrossFit is also very right leaning right as it relates to the political spectrum, heavy military influence.
That is not for everyone. What we saw kind of like. Combat this, and I'll use that very much pun intended there, is that it's an affiliate model. So the individual boxes could succeed, kind of have their own culture. But that ultimately dilutes the product and, and leads to its, its, you know, downfall, right?
We know that there's a strength in unity, right? Strength in numbers here. We saw CrossFit start to falter in 2020. We had all this social unrest, things like that. Greg Glassman went to, on Twitter, I guess, said some stuff. And then people wanting to disdain. Do they want to de affiliate left and right?
Others didn't see any issue with it. We just see a fractioning of that customer base. That's not good for business. CrossFit would be very wise to just draw a line in the sand and say who they are, who they're for, who they're not for, and accept the loss of some folks and reward the loyalty of others.
And the reason this is coming up is because CrossFit has the opportunity right now to do that. I'm not saying that I'm going to agree with what that line is, but it would be wise to draw it, right? So after, uh, Lazar's death, right now they're, you know, the, the, not the player, we'll call them the players, but the, um, The main CrossFitters, right, the, the, the competitors have, they have the, uh, formed their own affiliation and they're calling for, um, Dave Castro to step down and basically they're calling for an overhaul of CrossFit.
And so CrossFit is at a point, if it can, I don't know if it can withstand the lawsuit, but it adds, it's at a crossroads where it can decide what, what does it want its identity to be and draw that line in the sand. All right. And you're going to lose some people, but you're going to gain others. And then we have to just focus on those people.
For those of you that are in the kind of movement space, HIROX, if you've heard of it, uh, HIROX is going to be the next big thing and not related to CrossFit, but in the next kind of like big movement thing we see is it's, you know, Very akin to OCR obstacle course racing, things like that. Um, but High Rocks would be very wise to stay exactly as they are marketing to endurance athletes that want a physical challenge, right?
It would not be smart for High Rocks to try and scoop up CrossFitters because they see CrossFit stumbling, like, Oh, they could get some of them, right? That is a perfect example of a business looking to broaden its niche. And that starts diluting the brand, right? When you broaden the niche, you dilute the brand.
Do not try to scoop up those CrossFitters. High Rocks is not for CrossFitters. CrossFit is not for High Rocks people. They can, you know, do this if they want, but understand who your niche is and just love on those people and then accept that there is a ceiling. It's okay.
So what is a more prudent approach to scaling? Well, first, like I just said, understand that nothing scales infinitely or indefinitely. When you hit that cap. You could also just work to stay there. I honestly say like, how long can we just stay here? We have some people leaving, we have some people coming in and just look to keep it there forever.
Right? The opposite of scarcity is not abundance. It's enough. Just be like, Oh yeah, this is my enough. Cool. We're just going to just stay here. That's great. I don't know. You could also, because I know some people think that if you're not growing, you're dying, right? If you're not growing, you're shrinking.
Okay. Well, then you could just simply allow things to shrink over time and then see what you'd like to fill in that new space. So keep this thing going as long as it feels good to you, as long as you feel, you know, you're happy with it. And then it starts to go down, starts to decline. That means time and space, the mental energy opens up.
You'll have all these experiences. You've gained through that time. And you can say, what direction do I want to go in now from an action item perspective, I believe that you should completely exhaust your niche before you even ever think about expanding it. Right. Tactically, this looks like affiliate marketing.
A lot of the big, big, big names as well as the online in the online business space, that's how they make so much of their money, affiliate marketing, meaning they are having other people sell their product. Right. B school and other shit. Right. They, they have a product and they're looking to get in front of new audiences with that same product.
Right. New audience, not a different audience, a new audience, new people, new eyes, fresh eyes, but with this same offer, right? Still looking to bring in the same type of people, right? Solving the same exact problem with the same exact offer. And the way they're doing that is by having other, you know, other business owners sell that product for them for commission, right?
So affiliate marketing. And paid traffic, right? It's the same, selling the same thing to new people, right? Those are the two ways we said you could increase revenue. Sell the same thing to new people, sell new things to the same people. All right. So as it was the other side of this, right? Selling new things to the same people.
We can, I think, initially look at increasing the life cycle of a customer. Right? So I think the step that we look at with this is can I create a product that keeps people in it longer? Right. And I don't want to say create like a brand new product, but what can I do with like my current offer, whatever it is that keeps people with me longer in an ethical way, of course.
All right. But as the example I gave with CrossFit is maybe that methodology gets changed a little bit so that people aren't just like literally broken. In like one to five years, right? You just, or you accept it and you just accept the churn there. But first I would be thinking, how can I keep people here longer in an ethical way, in a way that they actually need me.
So new customers obviously would benefit the most or be the ones that be put into that kind of longer sales cycle. But we could also think about it from your current customers. It's more kind of what we call it, what I call pocket launches or backend launches. I told you I like real estate shows, right?
So these are offers that are not necessarily front facing, but. The top of funnel avatar where people start the problem you solve for them, the offer you put in front of them, that stays the same. But then as they move along, they get through that, they solve that problem. They may have a new problem that they want you to solve, and then you can sell that to them.
You can offer that to them, but that offer doesn't have to be front facing. So, you know, it could be that I have my Instagram intensive and that's what stays front facing. And then when people come in, they go through it and they've been through it. And they're like, Hey, but we'd like more, we'd like more support.
I could create, you know, a small, uh, mentorship group. That's for people that are wanting to, to work on content creation. That's never front facing. That's never like publicly launched, but it exists to move people through and keep them in the ecosystem. Right. And, and ultimately, uh, extend the life, the life it's called a lifetime value of the customer.
Right. But I kind of, I've been calling it a sales cycle. Um, that's technically not the right word. It's the lifetime value, right. Of the customer. And so I just kind of hate saying that sounds so gross, but how do we serve them longer? How do we identify problems that they have that they want us to solve that we can solve and continue to solve them for that person?
Because if we put that offer front facing, then suddenly it's a different person, right? Because like I said, your niche is the problem you solve and who you solve it for. And so me creating this, Uh, content club may not be the same person because the content club is for people that say that have already been doing content, they're more advanced.
That's a different person than this person that's going into the intensive that maybe is just starting out with like, how do I use this for business? Right? Different, different people there. I, I don't know. So we see here still the importance of keeping that niche the same, right? The same person, the same problem.
None of this again, is trying to sell the same thing, the same offer to a different avatar. We are not looking to broaden the niche. I really do believe that as a slippery slope on your way down. And we're seeing it happen across the board with these bigger companies because they've hit their ceiling.
They've exhausted the market. They've run all the ads. They've captured all the people. And they're like, how do I get more? How do I keep getting more? And it's like, stop being so fucking greedy. You don't. I know that I've brought up, um, I have brought up, what is the name of it? Uh, Dyson a bunch, because I think they're doing it, doing it right.
Right, where they have the vacuums, but they also have their air wraps, they have their hair stuff, they have their air filters, and they're all, like, similar, and it's selling new things to the same people, it's the same avatar. Right, I just think that they're doing it very, very well. They're not trying to be like, oh, well, let's actually make, like, a lower end.
Vacuum. Let's make a cheaper vacuum. Let's, let's, let's like, because that's broadening the niche, the niche, all right? Niche. Problem you solve and who you solve it for. People, Dyson, what they're looking at is people that do have a little bit more money. It's more of like, you know, a higher end, if you will, vacuum.
As soon as they're like, let's like have it for super, super cheap. You've broadened the niche. You've diluted the brand. And I think it's a very, very, very, very slippery slope. And it is a money grab. We see it with airlines doing it now, and it drives me crazy. They've just unbundled everything, and now you gotta pay for it.
Just to walk on the plane, you gotta pay for it. If you want a napkin, you gotta pay. If you want the So I'm going to say hello to you like, this is too much, right? So I think that at the end of the day, this very much ties into my, what my guy says, my guy, Seth Godin, like we're on first name basis here. But he says people like us do things like this, right?
So that the heart of his marketing, um, theme. He also goes on to say that people buy for two things, status and affiliation. That affiliation part is huge. As soon as you expand the niche, you dilute the brand. And like Kendrick said, they not like us. That is. Very important to understand as it relates to maintaining the integrity of this business, maintaining the success of this business.
All right. So I'm looking at the time, I'm going to wrap it up here. I really did enjoy this one. I could talk about this more and probably will. Um, but I love just kind of get the first time I get to get it out of my head. And I'm like, yes, there it is. Uh, understand folks. Scaling is not a bad thing. I just think that it's something that should be done strategically, uh, intend very much intentionally.
And we all have to understand that nothing scales infinitely. If you want to chat about this, I would love to chat about this, but if you want to chat about this, shoot me a DM, shoot me a text 3 5. Like I said, it will be me. I promise me or Rupert and if you want two of us, uh, don't forget we got the intensive coming up.
We got bossip coming up. All that information will be in the show notes. Thank you, Courtney. As always, endlessly, endlessly appreciative for every single one of you. Until next time, friends. Maestro out.
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