Cindy (00:00):
The mindset that I would take around it is, how can I deliver something that solves a problem? Mm. That people will pay me a lot of money to solve that problem. Get out of the mindset of charging per hour. Yes. Right. Or like exchanging your time for money. 'cause The more that you're exchanging time for money, you are bottlenecking yourself because you're limited to the number of hours you have in a day. But if you can charge for the value of the transformation, that is how you really multiply and scale very easily.
Tim (00:27):
Welcome to the Takeover with Tim and Cindy, where we show you how to dominate every area of life and business. Let's get winning. Welcome back to the Takeover with Tim and Cindy. Today we're gonna walk you through exactly what we would do to get to six figures. If we had no money, no contacts, no employees, nothing at all. We were starting from ground zero and we wanted to get to our first six figures. So Cindy, let's go ahead and start off. What would you do if you had no contacts, no money, no employees, nothing at all, and you were starting from zero. How would you build a six figure business quickly?
Cindy (01:01):
Let's do it. I'm excited about this episode. I wanna preface by saying this is gonna be the way that I would think about doing it. And of course, with any thought or concept, there has to be execution behind it. Yep. So we're gonna share with you specifically in this episode, is the way that Tim and I think about, and the way we've done it before and the way we've trained other people to do it. So you can take this information and execute on your own. But starting off, if I had to build a six figure business from scratch, the first thing that I would think about is what am I gonna sell? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>. Okay. So I would for sure go for a service. And the mindset that I would take around it is, how can I deliver something that solves a problem? Mm. That people will pay me a lot of money to solve that problem.
Cindy (01:44):
Yeah. Because you have to remember ladies and gents, the bigger the problem, the more money somebody will pay you to solve it. Right. The more value it is for the company that you are serving, or for the person that you are serving. So I would think about what can I sell? What can I sell that somebody would pay me thousands of dollars to implement, to execute, or to consult them on? Okay. Mm-Hmm. That's the first. You need a good enough product or service. We would go the service route for sure. And another way to think about it too is you wanna charge for the value of the transformation that you are gonna deliver. Mm. And not for the value of your time. Yes. 'cause I see a lot of people get this wrong. They're trying to scale, they're trying to grow, but they're charging say $150 an hour to consult on a certain thing or $150 an hour to build out a marketing strategy. And that's not the right way to go. Because if I have to charge $150 for an hour and I may be spending two to three hours or maybe five hours per engagement, it's still gonna take me a lot of time. Yeah. To get to that six figure mark. Right.
Tim (02:43):
So you're saying transformation, which means how much problem you're solving. Correct. So the, what is the problem we're solving and how much are we changing this person's life? Not how many hours are we putting into the service. Exactly.
Cindy (03:08):
Exactly.
Tim (03:09):
So where do you think that, 'cause I, we see that all the time with newer businesses where they're charging per hour. Where do you think that mindset comes from and and kind of how do you shift that into changing to, Hey, I wanna charge for the problem I solve, the transformation I create?
Cindy (03:24):
Yeah. I mean it comes from just the way the society is, right? You generally are paid. If you're an employee, you paid a certain amount per hour. And that's how people just backtrack salaries. All of that is paid. You get paid a certain amount per hour. And then people translate that into the same thing in business, right? Mm-Hmm. You'll also see a lot of, there's different companies, for example, lawyers will charge like a retainer, right? But they're charging you x number of like billable hours. I mean, you see it a lot in different industries, but also as employees you are paid a certain amount per hour. So they translates for people like into how they do business, but just reframing to think about how can I charge for the value of the transformation I'm gonna deliver? Yes. Versus a certain amount per hour is going to put you on that track for scalability if you wanna hit that six figures. Hmm.
Tim (04:09):
What I love about that is you can become efficient at de solving the problem. The more efficient you become at solving the problem and creating the transformation, the more you get paid for less time, energy and effort. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. But the client is still really happy because you're able to solve that problem, create that.
Cindy (04:27):
Exactly. You're
Tim (04:27):
Still delivering transformation the
Cindy (04:29):
Result. Exactly.
Tim (04:30):
Yeah. I love that. Yeah. Yeah.
Cindy (04:31):
So for example, it's a lot easier to charge $2,000 to five people to get $10,000 a month. Right? Even easier to charge $5,000 to two people to get to $10,000 a month. Versus I charge $150 per hour. Like how many of those do I have to do to get to $10,000 and maybe don't even have enough hours in the day to do that, right? Yes. So thinking or changing your thinking route, how can I charge for the value of the transformation puts you on that track to charge more for your services, actually deliver a transformation and do it in a way that you're actually not having to spend that many hours like working.
Tim (05:07):
Right? So you're saying if I go out and I wanna make $10,000 a month, if I can go out and sell to clients every month that are willing to pay me $5,000 that's $10,000 and it, I don't have to spend full time delivering for those clients. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, if I can find a way to solve the problem, deliver the transformation in 10 hours Yeah. Then I making $10,000 a month for 10 hours or 10 hours a week or however, they're probably gonna take you more time upfront, but over time you get more and more efficient. Yeah.
Cindy (05:36):
I think the big takeaway is get out of the mindset of charging per hour. Yes. Right? Or like exchanging your time for money. 'cause The more that you're exchanging time for money, you are bottlenecking yourself because you're limited to the number of hours you have in a day. But if you can charge for the value of the transformation, that is how you really multiply and scale very easily.
Tim (05:54):
If say you're leaving a job to be an entrepreneur, you're actually leaving a job. If you're not switching or thinking and you're still going hourly, you're leaving one job for another job. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Mm-Hmm. Except for this new job, not only do you have to deliver the product, you have to go be the sales, the marketing, all of it for that. And so, yeah. You know, to go get clients, I think too, that's something that people don't realize. There's a lot of time and energy that go into that. And so if you're just charging by the hour, somebody might think, oh, I'm making $50 an hour at my job. And well, if I could do the same thing and charge 150 mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, well, I'm making three times for my money, but they're not realizing there's a lot more that goes into running a business.
Cindy (06:27):
More expenses, more cost more time. Absolutely. Then again, so the first thing I would do is determine what service I'm gonna offer. Hmm. Making sure that I'm charging for the value of the transformation. Yeah. And not on how much time I'm gonna spend doing it. And then second, I'm gonna think about how can I solve a problem that's big enough that a company will pay me really good money for? Yeah.
Tim (06:46):
And sometimes when you charge more, you end up actually getting better clients. <Laugh>. Yes.
Cindy (06:51):
Yes, yes, yes. That's so true. Yeah. That's
Tim (06:53):
So true. Awesome. So how do we kind of now think about growing the business? Like how, what, what are the components that are needed to actually run, grow, and sustain a business?
Cindy (07:03):
Yes. So there's three things that are essential to growing and sustaining a business. One, it's flow, second it's conversion. And the third is retention flow, conversion, retention. Three things that are essential to not only sustain a business, but to scale. Yeah. So if I'm thinking about getting to my first six figures, I have to have those three things in place. So flow is having consistent leads or prospects that are interested in my service coming to my door. Right? So how can I get consistently week over week, month over month people that are interested in my service? Hmm. So this is leads, right? Interested prospects. And with flow, you can get this from many different places, right? This is like lead sources. Maybe I'm running ads for some people this is referrals. So you have to think about how can you have people that are interested in your product come to your door every month? Yeah. Because without flow, you cannot sustain a business. Yes. Without needs, without interested prospects. Not only can you not get to six figures, you can't scale beyond that at all.
Tim (08:06):
A hundred percent. So
Cindy (08:07):
You need
Tim (08:08):
Leads. Yeah. And one thing I love about the language there is, is flow. It's not one every now and then hit or miss feast or famine flow. You think of just the visual of what a flow is, is there's a flow, a steady flow. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, there's some kind of flow of consistent prospects or people for, for those of us who use simple language, people that are interested or need help with, you know, the service you offer Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative> consistently coming in. So there's a flow of that. You have a source, a place, a channel. Yes. A strategy that's keeping those things coming in consistently. And I think a lot of times when I see somebody starting off new, that old movie with Kevin Costner, if you build it, they will come. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, you know? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. We actually saw him. We were, we were at an event and we saw him and everybody was, you know, talking to him about that movie.
Tim (08:58):
And it's like, the one thing you're not allowed to talk to Kevin Costner about is, is that movie in his new movie <laugh>. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And it's, but it's filled the dreams and it's, it was this movie where if you build it, they will come and he built this baseball field out, out in this cornfield. And then all these, you know, baseball players of ancient times or you know, not ancient times, whatever came and they played on the field. And too many people, they go right to re retention, which is the product. How do I build a product and they think, Ooh, I've got this product. If I build it, they will come. If I launch this business, Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, they will come. And the reality is, smart business people, they actually get flow and first and then delivery.
Cindy (09:34):
Hey there, I've gotta stop here for one quick second to ask you this question. Have you been enjoying the podcast? If so, make sure that you are subscribed and take that one extra step to please leave us a rating and a review. Wherever you are listening to the show, not only does it help us continue to grow and impact more people, we'll make sure that we show up wherever you are listening as well.
Tim (10:01):
So smart business people, they get flow, then they sell it, and then they tweak the product with the client. Yes. A lot of times if we try to build that perfect product right off the bat, we're, it's gonna be the perfect product in our brain, but not the perfect product for the client. So I love that we start with a flow of consistent prospects.
Cindy (10:18):
Yes. Yes. Because I mean, it doesn't matter how great your product or service is. Even step one, I built an amazing service that I know people are gonna want. If I don't have flow, I can't sell it. So what's the point of even having an amazing service if you don't have interested prospects coming to your door actually wanting what you offer? So it's one thing to have an amazing service. It's another thing to have consistent flow of leads, which is why that's such a critical part in scaling. So think about ladies and gents, how can you get flow? How can you get interested prospects consistently as to mentioned week over week and month over month interested in your service, right? 'cause That's a really, really important part to scaling. So that takes us from flow into the second part, which is conversion. So it's all great if you have leads coming in, but you need a proven process to convert those leads that come from the flow Yes.
Cindy (11:06):
Into paying clients. Yes. So here's where the sales process comes into place. And it's such a critical part. If you wanna get to six figures, you have to have a proven way to convert leads into paying clients. You have to be obsessed with sales. Yeah. And I feel like not too many people mention this on the journey to building and growing a business, people get very comfortable with referrals and how easily, like easy those are to sell. Yep. But you have to get used to selling to people that are not referrals. Right. And if you can get over that hump, that is how you scale to that consistency of six figures.
Tim (11:43):
What's crazy is that when you have a good sales process that can convert, say you're doing some email outreach, you're doing some LinkedIn outreach, you're doing, you're doing some kind of way where you're going out into the marketplace, what we would call outbound, which we have a lot of trainings on if you want for some, some free trainings on how to do this stuff. You go out in the marketplace, you get people that are interested, that need your service, they need help. If you can now create a process of very predictable proven, step 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, that can turn them from a interested prospect into somebody who actually gives you their credit card. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative> and pays you thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars for your service. That's a process. And I think a lot of people think, well, hey, maybe that's not my thing.
Tim (12:27):
I'm not good at sales. I didn't have the gift of gab. The reality is it doesn't matter. Some of the best salespeople are actually introverts because they're very process driven. They're very observant. And so this is a process. And if you use the language, I hate selling so is not my thing that you're literally saying that you hate half of your business because a real business, not a job. Not where you get feast or famine in up and down cycles. But a real business that grows, that has healthy, consistent, reliable revenue is two parts. It is one part selling the product, like telling people, yes, I can help you and getting them to give you money. And the second part is actually fulfilling on that promise that you made them. And if you say, I hate sales, I'm not good at sales, you are literally saying, I hate half of my business and the first half of my business without which this part of the business, you will not have a business period. Right? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, you can't, you couldn't just sell something and not have a product. You'd go to jail. Yeah,
Cindy (13:23):
Absolutely. But
Tim (13:23):
Oftentimes, but the problem is, so that's illegal. You'll, you'll go to jail if you do that part. But the problem is the other side, you won't go to jail if you can't sell. And all you have is a good product, right? Yeah. You
Cindy (13:33):
Just, you just stays stuck. <Laugh> stays, you don't grow your revenue.
Tim (13:36):
Yeah. You go to your own life gel where you don't get to move forward in life. But the beautiful thing is knowing that it is a skill, it is a process. It is literally a step 1, 2, 3 that can be created. It can be replicated. And you can even long term get salespeople to do this for you. I would not start with salespeople. I would start with you being the salesperson, you getting good at this process. And once you have that, if you have a flow source and a process that can predictably turn this flow source into customers, you now, congratulations my friends. You now have that first half of your business without which you will never have a business. And those two things, once you get good at flow and conversion, you will forever be able to create revenue for yourself in any economy. Good, bad, up, down, whatever.
Cindy (14:23):
Yes. Absolutely. It doesn't even matter where the flow comes from. Right. Maybe you have an email list, maybe you're running ads, maybe you're doing outbound. You need conversion as that second piece. Because without it, yes. You cannot fulfill, which is the retention side. You cannot fulfill on the promise or even have a predictable running, growing business. So they go hand in hand. For sure. So if we were gonna rebuild from zero one, I would make sure that we have a source of leads. And then second, I would make sure that we're really, really good on the sales process, that we can convert those people that are coming in into paying clients. 'cause We see a lot of people get stuck on this conversion piece. Yeah, for
Tim (15:01):
Sure. Here's a cycle that I'm gonna warn everybody about. We've done this for over 700 clients. I mean, probably the time this recording will be thousands. We're growing so fast right now we're helping so many people. And that's directly indirectly. We've, we've talked to, we've managed, we've, or you know, we've, we've consulted so many other kind of businesses. And here is the most common problem that people run into when they're small. And they, and they're, they're just starting out is they have number one, their lead flow problem, their flow problem. A lot of times they get that fixed and they have flow coming in. Then they run into the conversion problem, which is, ooh, these leads aren't converting. Like there's some, some struggle. Instead of taking ownership and saying, what can I do to improve the process? What most businesses that all will stay stuck forever due.
Tim (15:48):
They stay in the cycle four years. They fix lead flow, they have trouble with conversion, they blame lead flow. Oh, the leads are not good, they're cold, they didn't work. So then they maybe fire the lead company they hired, they changed their strategy, they struggle for another 12 months. They finally get the guts to go out and hire another lead service, try another lead service. They get excited, they get leads coming in. They run into the problem of conversion systems. They don't take the ownership to get good at converting those leads. And then they stay inside. And we've seen people that have been stuck for years blaming everybody else, I tried this lead thing, I tried this lead thing, nothing worked. And so I'm just warning you right now. You are going to face, you're gonna have to look at the man or woman in the mirror and say, wow, this is gonna take some work.
Tim (16:30):
Like you gotta realize it's not gonna be perfect at first. Yeah. But if you can be like the small few that stick with it, that get the lead and go, what am I doing wrong? How can I do better? And you improve your conversion systems, you can get to the point where you could put any lead flow in front of yourself and convert them into clients. You now are doing what most or not willing to do, able to do, period. And that is truly what creates a bulletproof. I can get to six figures at any economy at any time no matter what, no matter where my income's at, no matter what my connections are. If you have those two skills as a human being, you will forever have income certainty in
Cindy (17:08):
Any economy. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. So good. So good. That takes us really nicely into the third one, which is retention. So we have flow. We are able to convert those leads into paying clients. Now it's about how do we retain these people and get them to spend more money with us on the backend. So again, if we were building this from scratch, I would figure out, okay, if my initial say consulting fee is like $5,000 and I'm doing it for say two months, for example, I wanna figure out what can I sell this person next? What is the next problem that I can solve for this client? Yes. 'cause that then opens me up to sell them the next thing. It is a lot easier to sell somebody that's already a client into the next program or into another engagement with me. Yes. Than it is to pitch somebody on the flow side or on the conversion side.
Cindy (17:58):
It is a lot easier to upsell or retain a client that's already paying you money. So I would figure out how can I best retain these clients? What can I sell them next? And more specifically, what is the next problem that my solution is gonna open up? So yes, if I'm doing say consulting on lead generation and we finally figured out how to get them leads and they're getting leads consistently in the door, well I know that's kind of flow. The second issue or problem that might open up is conversion. So maybe I consult on the conversion side of it and I teach people how to solve. So always think about ladies and gens. So what is that initial problem that your service is gonna solve? Yes. And then what is the next problem that's gonna open up for your prospect? And you may not know this upfront, it may take you going through that cycle with a few clients first and then realizing, okay, this is actually opening up another problem that then I can solve.
Cindy (18:53):
So now I have not only lifetime value, right. Where one client comes in and they're able to purchase two or three or four products with me. But I also have retention. So I'm keeping clients staying with me for a lot longer as well. Yes. And that can really, really boost my revenue because we have people come into our programs and a lot of people that we coach and consult and they only have one product or service that they're selling. And then once the client is done with that, they let them go. But it's like, oh wow. How much money are you leaving on the table by not selling them that next thing? So I'd definitely make sure I have the next thing to sell my client. Wow.
Tim (19:32):
I love that. The exciting thing is, is when you do get flow and conversion down and you're like, oh my gosh, I can generate revenue. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, wow, I sold three clients at 5K. Holy cow, I've never made this kind of money in my life before. And then you get excited like let's do that again. Let's sell four, let's sell five, let's sell six. And then people kind of miss that. That $5,000 client, if you deliver for them and they love you and it's awesome and they have the means to do it, they might spend $10,000 with you. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. A lot of times when you sell them something new or something else, if you've solved the first problem and that's helped them get more revenue, more results, a lot of times they're willing to pay you more. Yeah. For that next thing. And sometimes you have to downsell them something smaller, but a lot of times they're willing to pay you more. So you could take what is initially a $5,000 client and you might turn some of those into 30, $40,000. Yep. Over the lifetime of that customer. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So it is like, oh, when we think of retention, I think when we talk retention, we're talking about not just delivering for the client. Like that's bare minimum, right?
Cindy (20:39):
Yeah. That's a given. You, you have to deliver and do a good job.
Tim (20:42):
You gotta do a good job. But you should always be solving that's what's next. Now you'd wanna make sure you don't overthink like, well hey, I do email marketing and well they also need SEO and they also need web. You don't wanna think a million different ways. You wanna make sure you do still stay focused. Yes. That's good. You do wanna make sure you do stay in a, some kind of lane that you're not venturing too far out. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So you gotta think what problem, when I solve problem one, what's the second problem that I create that is something that I'm already good at solving. Yeah. Or something like, you know, internally the operations we do, the recruiting, the training, the sales training, all that stuff we do really lends well to the next problems that a client creates when they start making more money, when they start scaling, when they start growing, that we have things that we're already really good at.
Tim (21:33):
We're already really efficient at that we can go, hey, we can help you with these two things next. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> versus having to go out and try to create a brand new product from scratch and basically running two businesses at once. And you wanna make sure whatever that next thing is is something close to what you're already offering or something you already do internally maybe. Yes. that's, that's similar and you're comfortable with and that you know, will deliver excellent results so that they buy a third and a fourth and a fifth and a sixth thing from
Cindy (22:00):
You. Yes. Yes. So good. I don't know if you mentioned this upfront and I just thought about it as we're thinking about what to sell them. Like what service, if I'm gonna build something that's six figures and that I can consistently scale over time, I wanna think about a service that I can replicate. Hmm. Right. 'cause I think too often people wanna customize like every single little thing that they're delivering to the client. And yes, there is for sure room for customization, but I also wanna think about how can I productize my service? Yeah. Meaning how can I make it in such a way that if I put people through this exact same say it's five step process, they're gonna get to the outcome that they want. Because if I can repeat the same cycle with enough people, I know that I'm gonna get to my goal and surpass my goal versus trying to customize, like maybe working one-on-one with somebody. And I have to customize every single service and every single thing that I do with a client. It makes it a lot easier for me to scale. So that's just a bonus tip for you all to think about is how can I create a service that I can systematize that if people go through these exact same, say it's five step processes, they're gonna get the exact same outcome. And of course there's areas that you can customize as well, but that is how you scale. So I would try productize as much as possible.
Tim (23:16):
Yes. And there's a saying that is complexity fails, simplicity scales. Yes. So if you can keep it simple there, there's a couple keys here. 'cause It has to solve the problem. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And it has to deliver the transformation. I think too often some people want a product ties their course, they wanna create a course and productize so much that it doesn't solve the problem and it doesn't create the transformation. So you do have to be doing both. You do have to truly be solving the problem. Creating the transformation. Yeah. But also going, how do I do this at scale? How do I keep this simple? How do I, what are the core components that I can just replicate every time? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, what are the minimal amount of moving pieces that I need to
Cindy (23:56):
Customize? Customize
Tim (23:57):
Absolutely. For, for each person. Yes. Oh, this has been absolutely incredible. And what's so powerful about this is if you're listening to this and you're just wanting to get to your first six figures or multiple seven figures, this will get you there. You know, there's gonna be some learnings along the way. We have a lot of resources on the lead flow and on the conversion stuff. So definitely check out some of our other resources for sure. But this same process, if you get there and you go, Hey, I want to keep going, same
Cindy (24:23):
Thing. This
Tim (24:23):
Is the same foundation that Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative> that we're using for se, you know, 7, 8, 9 figure businesses. Yep. Like this is the same, the same product, the same understanding, the same foundations, the same philosophies. So what you're building here could get you to and keep you outta healthy fund. Don't want to grow past, you know, six figures, multiple six figures. But if you do decide you wanna scale past that and you do decide you want to keep going, you're building a foundation that you could do a 7, 8, 9 figure business on.
Cindy (24:53):
Absolutely. For sure. Awesome. Okay. There you have it. Ladies and gents, that was our secret strategy to scale to six figures and beyond. We do hope that you found it helpful. Make sure to follow the show wherever you are listening. And remember, domination is not a destination, it's a way of life. Stay winning.