One of the most important things to understand about any business is that, sooner or later, they all begin to self-destruct at scale.
More often than not, this happens because of the nature of the very organizations themselves. They’re bound to “human hours” – meaning that there is always a limit on what it is possible for living, breathing human employees to do in a single day. The more clients you have, the more humans you need – and that “human hours” cost rises without much, if anything, to show for it.
While this may seem like a “good problem to have” at first, it certainly doesn’t stay that way. Over the years, it almost always guarantees that the quality of the experience you’re able to offer to your clients goes down – thus bringing the quality of your client results down right along with it.
This is a problem that has only been exacerbated for many businesses due to the still ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Almost overnight, virtually every industry that you can think of suddenly changed. Consumer behaviors and preferences evolved and at that point, one of two things happened. Organizations that were not able to keep up with those changes or anticipate where they might be headed struggled and ultimately sunk.
But believe it or not, some businesses were able to prosper – even in the wake of everything going on in the world right now. More than that, they were able to thrive and profit – all because they were able to use it as an opportunity to move from business owner to expert empire.
The good news is that getting to this point isn’t necessarily as difficult as one might think. Right now, there are businesses that are making 7+ figures per month using a very particular model even though we’re still in the throes of a global pandemic. It’s just that to capitalize on this particular opportunity, you have to keep a few key things in mind.
The New “Next Level” Model: An Overview
One of the most critical things to understand about the differences between the “old school” and “new school” way of running a business ultimately comes down to the amount of money it’s possible to generate with one versus the other.
Under the “old school” way of doing things, businesses tended to grow inwards. As previously stated, they were essentially bound by “human hours” and had to continually expand in terms of employees just to meet the same level of service their clients had become accustomed to. Note that this didn’t mean that the quality of the experience they were able to offer went up – far from it. It’s just that as they obtained more clients, they naturally had to bring in more employees – thus creating a problem that only actually gets worse as time goes on.
But the new “Next Level” model speaks to something different. Using this approach, a business is able to grow “outwards” instead of “inwards” – thus allowing business owners to not only increase their sales, but their profits as a result.
The vast majority of all organizations who are still operating under the “old school” way of doing things tend to max out at between $100,000 and $500,000 per year. That’s not to say this isn’t a significant amount of money, because it is – but it’s also possible to take those results to the next level.
With the “Next Level” model, it’s very possible to scale to approximately $100,000 (or more) per month with just a single person on staff – the business owner themselves.
Of course, all of this depends on your ability to select the right model in the first place. While it’s absolutely true that no two organizations are created equally, there is still a need to create your own “Amazon Flywheel” model. The “Flywheel Effect” is something that a business either has, or it doesn’t. It’s not something that can be learned, so much as it needs to be earned. With it, you will absolutely rise to the top of your competitors. Without it, you won’t get nearly as far as you’d hoped you would.
The problem with not having a “Flywheel Effect” business model is, as stated, your services don’t scale – almost by design. They have a 1:1 ratio with human hours and effort and at that point, you’re always feeding a proverbial machine that can never truly be “full.” Those low-ticket leads likely require more customer support than you can afford to deal with. More than that, high refund rates and chargebacks (not to mention things like piracy) only take hard-earned money out of your pocket.
But the real issue is that increased complexity, coupled with more manual intervention, always leads to less automation and delegation. At that point you really have a “Jack of All Trades, Master of None” situation on your hands. You reliably perform a service, but you don’t do it particularly well – and you’re doing little to stand out in an incredibly crowded marketplace as a result.
Instead, consider the major shift you could bring to your business if you started offering something like strategy sessions. Regardless of what it is that your business does, nobody does it quite like how you do – which is the key to your competitive advantage moving forward. That special quality is exactly what your clients want to hear more about, and strategy sessions are a significant part of how you do it.
They’re perfect, low-pressure sales calls that you use to determine if a client is a good fit for your program. You can give your strategy session a cool name (like the “Double Your Revenue Strategy Session,” for example) and immediately attract attention. You (or a sales representative) can follow a sales script for consistency on each of the calls, all while generating repeatable, predictable results as well. Suddenly, you’re working with the number one key growth lever for this particular business model – which may very well be the most important benefit of all.
In the end, what you really need to do to move from business owner to expert empire involves packaging, positioning and marketing your program in exactly the right way for the right audience. If you’re able to do this with a speed you can sustain and a predictability that you need, there truly is no limit to what you’ll be able to accomplish. Savvy business owners already know this and if you don’t pivot in this direction yourself, you will find yourself surpassed by those competitors. Truly, it’s not a question of “if,” but “when.”
