1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,800 share with us a little bit about Profit Ladder. So it is a company where I help 2 00:00:05,800 --> 00:00:11,520 service-based business owners turn their sort of high ticket services that they 3 00:00:11,520 --> 00:00:17,280 have into scalable offers that attract ideal clients and help them to scale 4 00:00:17,280 --> 00:00:22,760 their business so they have more time back to serve their clients. Absolutely 5 00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:28,440 and I tell you most people want the time back. As I read a lot of information 6 00:00:28,440 --> 00:00:33,960 regarding you and your business that's one of your main focuses as you have a 7 00:00:33,960 --> 00:00:39,720 story that I would really love for you to share as how your business got to a 8 00:00:39,720 --> 00:00:46,160 level where you are now. Well it started by solving my own like really scratching 9 00:00:46,160 --> 00:00:52,360 my own itch so I ran another consulting business for 15 years and I sold high 10 00:00:52,360 --> 00:00:56,240 ticket services to large companies and the sales cycles were just really 11 00:00:56,240 --> 00:01:01,760 grueling to say the least. Very long 12 plus months trying to get in front of 12 00:01:01,760 --> 00:01:06,160 executives that are busy and so like a lot of prospecting and pitching and 13 00:01:06,160 --> 00:01:10,720 doing all the sales stuff you know like following the traditional playbook and 14 00:01:10,720 --> 00:01:16,800 being ghosted left and right and just kind of like you grow some scales to 15 00:01:16,800 --> 00:01:22,600 that and your armor goes up but it also over time for me who you know I became an 16 00:01:22,600 --> 00:01:27,680 entrepreneur and never really wanted to be in charge of sales but it became my 17 00:01:27,680 --> 00:01:32,760 job and doing a job that you don't like doing that's exceptionally hard and 18 00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:38,440 you're getting sort of rejected left and right. I just wanted a way to make that 19 00:01:38,440 --> 00:01:44,480 that that job that I had of building my own business easier. I wanted to create 20 00:01:44,480 --> 00:01:50,560 offers that people saw as valuable and easy to buy and let me focus more on 21 00:01:50,560 --> 00:01:54,120 doing the work instead of spending so much of my time selling the work. Yeah 22 00:01:54,120 --> 00:02:00,000 yeah it's interesting because as a real estate agent full-time time just sounds 23 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:04,000 really good more time right but of course we know we only have 24 hours in 24 00:02:04,000 --> 00:02:08,760 a day and majority of that is spending time with family or driving so I 25 00:02:08,760 --> 00:02:16,280 definitely get that so as you realized you were in a situation what was a what 26 00:02:16,280 --> 00:02:23,480 was the system or the turning point that got you to where you are today? Well so I 27 00:02:23,480 --> 00:02:28,960 got well to be honest I got so burned out doing the work that I tried to start 28 00:02:28,960 --> 00:02:34,720 giving away parts in my job first just trying to automate and systematize the 29 00:02:34,720 --> 00:02:39,120 marketing and sales that I did but then even the delivery of the the work that I 30 00:02:39,120 --> 00:02:43,840 was hired to do which is sort of like innovation and strategy work I said you 31 00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:48,560 know it's a three and six month project that I tend to sell and that work is 32 00:02:48,560 --> 00:02:53,200 very intense highly performative I'm helping executives and big companies 33 00:02:53,200 --> 00:02:58,320 make really critical decisions that are seven eight nine figure decisions so 34 00:02:58,320 --> 00:03:02,920 over time I was like you know maybe I can take the expertise that I built up 35 00:03:02,920 --> 00:03:07,080 doing this sort of like in this product development innovation work and I can 36 00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:13,480 package it into formats that my clients and sort of their teams could use without 37 00:03:13,480 --> 00:03:18,280 me having to be in the room because because like I mentioned before it was 38 00:03:18,280 --> 00:03:23,480 such a long complicated sales process I had to really explain a lot of how we 39 00:03:23,480 --> 00:03:27,320 would work the time I'd need from them how long things would take when they 40 00:03:27,320 --> 00:03:31,840 could expect a return on their investment and so I said like I bet that 41 00:03:31,840 --> 00:03:34,920 there's a way that I can take these things packaged up so that they don't 42 00:03:34,920 --> 00:03:40,120 need me they don't need to like spend five six figures hiring me and go 43 00:03:40,120 --> 00:03:43,720 through that whole vendor approval process I could just almost immediately 44 00:03:43,720 --> 00:03:48,200 give them access to what I know about the frameworks that I use and then they 45 00:03:48,200 --> 00:03:52,160 can get their own wins and sort of like significantly minimize their time to 46 00:03:52,160 --> 00:03:55,480 value and the problems that they were trying to solve to begin with when they 47 00:03:55,480 --> 00:04:00,960 sought out my help nice nice so you built a system where they can work it on 48 00:04:00,960 --> 00:04:07,060 their own and are you pretty much the support team if they have questions or 49 00:04:07,060 --> 00:04:12,800 things like that yeah so I called them tool kits so I took I took all those 50 00:04:12,800 --> 00:04:17,000 resources my knowledge I created training videos of how to use my tools 51 00:04:17,000 --> 00:04:20,920 how to go through the process and so I packaged them into these things called 52 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:26,080 tool kits and I sold them so like to hire me to do what I did was often like 53 00:04:26,080 --> 00:04:30,080 fifty to a hundred thousand dollars for a six month long project and now I'm 54 00:04:30,080 --> 00:04:36,680 selling these tool kits for two three hundred bucks so that at first was a bit 55 00:04:36,680 --> 00:04:41,120 of a mindset shift for me to take ten years worth of expertise and and be 56 00:04:41,120 --> 00:04:46,880 willing to sell it for a really small nominal fee but what I notice is the 57 00:04:46,880 --> 00:04:52,440 people that bought them often then went on to come back and hire me anyway so 58 00:04:52,440 --> 00:04:56,800 it was an unexpected benefit that I had instead of just being this new revenue 59 00:04:56,800 --> 00:05:01,360 source from these tool kits it wound up almost being a marketing vehicle that 60 00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:05,440 people would drop back into my inbox and say hey Jay you know I used your toolkit 61 00:05:05,440 --> 00:05:10,200 we loved it we have another project coming up we'd rather you just do it this 62 00:05:10,200 --> 00:05:13,520 time around we were pretty good at it but we imagine that you're so much better 63 00:05:13,520 --> 00:05:17,920 at it since you created this toolkit and that made my job of selling I mean 64 00:05:17,920 --> 00:05:23,280 exceptionally easier so I did have to support them people would reach out with 65 00:05:23,280 --> 00:05:27,480 questions about certain specifics about how the tool kits worked but mostly 66 00:05:27,480 --> 00:05:30,400 people were just like you know I want to pick your brain on like how these things 67 00:05:30,400 --> 00:05:34,080 work and maybe we can talk about a project that we have coming up so my 68 00:05:34,080 --> 00:05:38,480 support role almost blended into my ability to sell without even really 69 00:05:38,480 --> 00:05:43,080 having to sell absolutely and then by them watching your videos they pretty 70 00:05:43,080 --> 00:05:47,400 much knew the person behind the business so why not just go ahead and have him do 71 00:05:47,400 --> 00:05:51,960 it I think that's interesting about entrepreneurship is they first got to 72 00:05:51,960 --> 00:05:56,640 get to know you so they can utilize the services right so that was definitely 73 00:05:56,640 --> 00:06:00,960 very smart as you mentioned you had no clue is going to be a marketing vehicle 74 00:06:00,960 --> 00:06:06,280 for them to hire you anyway so when it comes to profit ladder of course we 75 00:06:06,280 --> 00:06:10,200 wouldn't be on vision pros live if I didn't ask you to tell me about your 76 00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:16,600 vision so I have this system that I use today when I work with clients it's 77 00:06:16,600 --> 00:06:20,720 called a reverse flywheel and what I think it is what I think makes for a 78 00:06:20,720 --> 00:06:26,960 really strong service business is to put at sort of like the gateway to working 79 00:06:26,960 --> 00:06:31,480 with you which is exactly what you're just saying create offers that are easy 80 00:06:31,480 --> 00:06:36,320 to understand easy to buy easy to use minimize your time to value and remove 81 00:06:36,320 --> 00:06:39,760 you from all the sort of acting consulting coaching work that you're 82 00:06:39,760 --> 00:06:44,440 doing so I build I help my clients build this sort of reverse flywheel where the 83 00:06:44,440 --> 00:06:49,920 goal is to sell as much as you can of your one-on-one work so I'm pretty I'm 84 00:06:49,920 --> 00:06:55,000 dog-fooding my own process for the next year I'm going to be working with up to 85 00:06:55,000 --> 00:06:58,080 a hundred entrepreneurs that are trying to scale their service-based business 86 00:06:58,080 --> 00:07:03,200 then I'll create one too many formats from that work and then as I answer 87 00:07:03,200 --> 00:07:07,200 questions create templates create assets I'll package those into do-it-yourself 88 00:07:07,200 --> 00:07:12,040 versions of the work that I do and eventually I'll have my own flywheel 89 00:07:12,040 --> 00:07:16,560 which is very much inception of exactly what I'm teaching my clients to do 90 00:07:16,560 --> 00:07:19,840 because it works and I really believe in it so I want to do the same for my own 91 00:07:19,840 --> 00:07:24,840 business absolutely so I was looking as I mentioned me looking on your site and 92 00:07:24,840 --> 00:07:28,400 everything and you have the you know still getting the leads still getting 93 00:07:28,400 --> 00:07:34,160 people in you know it's it's almost like an ever-giving system that allows you to 94 00:07:34,160 --> 00:07:38,720 have continuous growth in the business what was the biggest struggles you faced 95 00:07:38,720 --> 00:07:48,680 when you decided to grow profit ladder at first jumping to sort of like chasing 96 00:07:48,680 --> 00:07:52,800 money it's always been a thing for me is like chasing the revenue and forgetting 97 00:07:52,800 --> 00:07:58,360 that again dog-fooding the process I have to demonstrate my expertise and my 98 00:07:58,360 --> 00:08:03,800 value earn trust from my market and so people won't be willing to just drop 99 00:08:03,800 --> 00:08:07,840 five ten thousand bucks to work with me one-on-one and they probably also won't 100 00:08:07,840 --> 00:08:12,760 just buy a toolkit or a template that they don't they haven't yet gotten to 101 00:08:12,760 --> 00:08:18,360 know me so after six months or so of research I realized that if I could run 102 00:08:18,360 --> 00:08:22,360 master classes and be in front of my audience and show them sort of like 103 00:08:22,360 --> 00:08:27,480 teach them the process and get them down the funnel then it'll be much easier for 104 00:08:27,480 --> 00:08:32,600 them to just hire me or kind of use one of my do-it-yourself offers yes yes yes 105 00:08:32,600 --> 00:08:38,320 makes a lot of sense so you're now doing masterminds as well yeah these master 106 00:08:38,320 --> 00:08:43,560 class like two-day workshops I probably should be charging for them but I I 107 00:08:43,560 --> 00:08:48,280 really have a good feeling that if I can bring the right people together and 108 00:08:48,280 --> 00:08:52,440 inspire them educate them on like productizing and finding their own 109 00:08:52,440 --> 00:08:57,520 packaged offers that the right people lean forward and want to work with me so 110 00:08:57,520 --> 00:09:01,320 I'm keeping them free at least for now it's invite only I have an application 111 00:09:01,320 --> 00:09:06,160 process and so far the first one I'm doing next week is almost already sold 112 00:09:06,160 --> 00:09:10,920 out or not sold out but filled because it's very I'm really excited about it 113 00:09:10,920 --> 00:09:15,120 how many you have participating if you don't mind my asking there's 18 right 114 00:09:15,120 --> 00:09:20,800 now and I said I said like at max I want 20 but I plan to do the monthly so I'll 115 00:09:20,800 --> 00:09:24,840 take it like one one master class at a time and if it goes really well and I 116 00:09:24,840 --> 00:09:28,640 get really confident in it maybe I can expand it okay and you said the max 117 00:09:28,640 --> 00:09:34,720 you're taking this time would be 20 yeah so I've got two spots left applications 118 00:09:34,720 --> 00:09:39,480 close this Friday so it should be filled out by them got it got it so y'all hear 119 00:09:39,480 --> 00:09:44,400 that there's two spots left to being educated and sitting with Jay Malone to 120 00:09:44,400 --> 00:09:48,760 figure out how to profit get on the profit ladder I love the name of that 121 00:09:48,760 --> 00:09:54,240 because I tell you interesting enough is the goal is always to to rise right to 122 00:09:54,240 --> 00:09:59,480 increase and and like you said a lot of people are often chasing money but 123 00:09:59,480 --> 00:10:03,600 there's a better way of doing that right letting and what I see you have done is 124 00:10:03,600 --> 00:10:08,240 by having those toolkits and allowing people to do it on their own is giving 125 00:10:08,240 --> 00:10:13,280 them an ability to learn and know you first which is what everyone is talking 126 00:10:13,280 --> 00:10:17,080 about now is just building a relationship so that people can contact 127 00:10:17,080 --> 00:10:22,440 you and trust you to contact you and to make their business move forward and 128 00:10:22,440 --> 00:10:28,760 climb the ladder so not to give away much or a lot you do have a website 129 00:10:28,760 --> 00:10:34,280 which we will announce later but what tips do you have for entrepreneurs 130 00:10:34,280 --> 00:10:39,800 business owners or leaders that you can give them I think I build on top of what 131 00:10:39,800 --> 00:10:45,800 you're saying is I think especially service-based business owners you are 132 00:10:45,800 --> 00:10:51,080 sort of led to believe that you got to chase revenue at first and that the only 133 00:10:51,080 --> 00:10:55,400 way to do that is to show up and do what you do day in and day out you you know 134 00:10:55,400 --> 00:10:59,160 you're burning the candle at both ends and there's no room left for you to 135 00:10:59,160 --> 00:11:03,120 scale your business let alone enjoy your life and spend time with family there 136 00:11:03,120 --> 00:11:08,040 are ways if you're willing to I think like the biggest pitfall is too many 137 00:11:08,040 --> 00:11:11,520 business owners including myself for many years are willing to put in a little 138 00:11:11,520 --> 00:11:16,520 bit of elbow grease up front to create those offers that do attract people and 139 00:11:16,520 --> 00:11:20,360 make things offer and bring in more predictable revenue they just want to 140 00:11:20,360 --> 00:11:25,680 like chase the clock and sign clients and move on to the next deal and that 141 00:11:25,680 --> 00:11:29,640 just keeps you on that hamster wheel so take a minute think about that there are 142 00:11:29,640 --> 00:11:33,520 wedge or gateway offers that you can create that bring your next client to 143 00:11:33,520 --> 00:11:38,640 you instead of always having to chase that's the way you want it to is just 144 00:11:38,640 --> 00:11:43,400 not you know one person one client that's done now where's the rest of them 145 00:11:43,400 --> 00:11:48,640 coming from yes feast or famine cycles that you get caught up in and it really 146 00:11:48,640 --> 00:11:54,680 drives you crazy after a while yes and an interesting is now that me being on 147 00:11:54,680 --> 00:12:00,320 the podcast interviewing a lot of guests and social media a lot of people are 148 00:12:00,320 --> 00:12:06,880 trying to be entrepreneurs based off of other people's visions considering you 149 00:12:06,880 --> 00:12:11,400 had gone through another business and now you're here and now you're realizing 150 00:12:11,400 --> 00:12:18,920 and have realized so much to help other people how often do you believe that 151 00:12:18,920 --> 00:12:25,960 these business owners and entrepreneurs can reach a level immediately because of 152 00:12:25,960 --> 00:12:31,320 what they're seeing everybody else do you know it looks real good but yeah it's 153 00:12:31,320 --> 00:12:36,040 it social media is really a trap like that that you I mean it's good to be 154 00:12:36,040 --> 00:12:40,280 inspired so the good part of social media is that you can very much more 155 00:12:40,280 --> 00:12:44,640 easily these days you just have to go to seminars and hire coaches and get 156 00:12:44,640 --> 00:12:48,200 mentored from these high-power executives today you can open up YouTube 157 00:12:48,200 --> 00:12:52,520 or LinkedIn or another social platform and you can follow along the stories of 158 00:12:52,520 --> 00:12:58,640 people that build in public which I'm a huge fan of the trap is that you then 159 00:12:58,640 --> 00:13:03,080 put a timeline and unrealistic expectations in terms of time and money 160 00:13:03,080 --> 00:13:06,840 that you'll be able to replicate what they did and it's always an iceberg you 161 00:13:06,840 --> 00:13:13,160 never very few share the 10-year saga behind I mean my business my first 162 00:13:13,160 --> 00:13:17,480 business is my prototype of me being an entrepreneur and that was 15 years 163 00:13:17,480 --> 00:13:24,360 most many people would give up or just assume that I started profit ladder and 164 00:13:24,360 --> 00:13:28,920 I made six figures in my first year and I like a few months of struggle and pain 165 00:13:28,920 --> 00:13:34,320 and I figured it out but there's so much more behind that so you got to just you 166 00:13:34,320 --> 00:13:39,480 really have to be inspired but then be realistic about what you can do with 167 00:13:39,480 --> 00:13:45,680 that inspiration absolutely and I love how you I say twisted that because it it 168 00:13:45,680 --> 00:13:50,840 is being inspired and there's nothing wrong with being inspired and and I 169 00:13:50,840 --> 00:13:55,880 truly truly love the way you said that because it can be an inspiration as long 170 00:13:55,880 --> 00:14:01,200 as you're not looking for a quick fix what are the common mistakes business 171 00:14:01,200 --> 00:14:10,080 owners are making when trying to scale I think it's a direct correlation between 172 00:14:10,080 --> 00:14:17,280 scale equals more of my time or or hiring more people and that can totally 173 00:14:17,280 --> 00:14:20,840 be true I'm not knocking companies that want like business there's some plenty 174 00:14:20,840 --> 00:14:24,320 of business owners that want to grow a big team and that's how they will scale 175 00:14:24,320 --> 00:14:29,800 I've been down that path and I think that it's especially the more we get into 176 00:14:29,800 --> 00:14:34,280 the better the technology gets the better you're able to leverage AI as a 177 00:14:34,280 --> 00:14:39,760 partner in the work that you do and manage sort of contractors and virtual 178 00:14:39,760 --> 00:14:45,000 assistants I think you can build a very healthy and profitable six seven eight 179 00:14:45,000 --> 00:14:50,960 figure business with a tiny tiny team so I think like think about what scale 180 00:14:50,960 --> 00:14:54,960 means to you it doesn't need to be always increasing your prices till you 181 00:14:54,960 --> 00:15:00,160 price yourself out of the market hiring bring on all that risk or working 182 00:15:00,160 --> 00:15:05,080 yourself to like really grinding out until you're unable to do the work 183 00:15:05,080 --> 00:15:10,720 anymore yeah yeah Jay are you also a consultant is that a part of your 184 00:15:10,720 --> 00:15:17,040 business as well sort of I do more well I guess no I do I'm trying to be more on 185 00:15:17,040 --> 00:15:21,280 the strategy side and maybe a little bit of coaching my first business was in 186 00:15:21,280 --> 00:15:25,920 consulting and I also grew up in Accenture and had other consulting roles 187 00:15:25,920 --> 00:15:31,120 and I'm trying my best not to build that business which requires me to always 188 00:15:31,120 --> 00:15:35,520 have to show up and do what I do in order to get paid so it's more strategy 189 00:15:35,520 --> 00:15:39,320 work I give people out of the tools and the frameworks I point out their blind 190 00:15:39,320 --> 00:15:43,320 spots that I always use that expression and it's hard to read the label from 191 00:15:43,320 --> 00:15:47,620 inside the jar so that's kind of the I provide them with a second brain and I'm 192 00:15:47,620 --> 00:15:51,120 like here are two or three offers that are right under your nose that I think 193 00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:54,960 would really scale your business here's how to build them so I give them a plan 194 00:15:54,960 --> 00:15:59,520 and a blueprint and off they go yes well I had to ask because I'm sure everyone 195 00:15:59,520 --> 00:16:05,320 is thinking it I'm like hey I mean that the tips that you're given it's like oh 196 00:16:05,320 --> 00:16:08,040 I could just give him a quick call he could tell me how to scale my business 197 00:16:08,040 --> 00:16:12,000 real quick and give me some great advice so I'm sure I wasn't the only one trying 198 00:16:12,000 --> 00:16:17,240 to figure that out yeah advice advice and help is totally up I just don't want 199 00:16:17,240 --> 00:16:21,840 to build the offers for people I think I have partners that do that work I'm very 200 00:16:21,840 --> 00:16:25,480 leery of building another start-to-finish service business like that 201 00:16:25,480 --> 00:16:30,200 yeah yeah it makes all the sense in the world and before we go this is one of my 202 00:16:30,200 --> 00:16:37,320 favorite questions what are the greatest joys of what you do so in my last job I 203 00:16:37,320 --> 00:16:42,200 helped big companies move big boulders of big mountains which is great and 204 00:16:42,200 --> 00:16:45,760 there's a lot of pride that comes with that in helping a Ford and a Rosetta 205 00:16:45,760 --> 00:16:51,960 Stone and a Home Depot today I'm working with people like you and I individual 206 00:16:51,960 --> 00:16:57,000 business owners that have gone all in on building their dream and I know how hard 207 00:16:57,000 --> 00:17:01,960 that is and I now have like a system it's not just like I do coaching and I 208 00:17:01,960 --> 00:17:06,000 can help the next entrepreneur I have systems that I know work that I use that 209 00:17:06,000 --> 00:17:10,640 I give back to people and it's really it's talk about inspiration it's like 210 00:17:10,640 --> 00:17:14,200 inspiring and an honor to be able to help those people in ways that will 211 00:17:14,200 --> 00:17:17,360 really kind of move the needle for them thank you for being here today I'm 212 00:17:17,360 --> 00:17:21,120 really happy that you tuned in to vision pros live I'm looking forward to seeing 213 00:17:21,120 --> 00:17:25,040 your reactions as these episodes continue to move forward is going to 214 00:17:25,040 --> 00:17:28,640 get more and more fun we'll have more and more engagement as well we'll invite 215 00:17:28,640 --> 00:17:32,160 people to participate in the show and thank you for giving us your time and 216 00:17:32,160 --> 00:17:35,920 attention have an excellent time building out your vision and becoming a 217 00:17:35,920 --> 00:17:51,560 vision for yourself