#128: A company that helps you automate your profits, isn’t making profit.

Summary

Next Level Pros Episode #128: A Company That Helps You Automate Your Profits Isn’t Making Profit

Release Date: October 23, 2024
Host: Chris Lee
Guest: Andrew Schultz, Founder of Profit Automation

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Introduction

In Episode #128 of Next Level Pros, host Chris Lee welcomes Andrew Schultz, the founder of Profit Automation, a marketing agency focused on automating profits for SaaS companies. Despite offering a specialized service aimed at enhancing mid-funnel marketing strategies, Andrew's business is currently unprofitable. This episode delves deep into the challenges Andrew faces, analyzing his financials, marketing strategies, and personal hurdles that hinder his company's success.

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Business Overview

Profit Automation positions itself as a “growth firm”, striving to offer more than commoditized marketing services. Andrew describes the company’s niche focus:

“We take the free users that they've generated, which are basically for a company like that, they're just leads, and we're converting them into paid users.”
(Andrew Schultz, 04:21)

The target clients are product-led growth (PLG) SaaS companies with strong founder or corporate brands that drive significant free user traffic. Despite a well-crafted website and marketing materials, Andrew acknowledges confusion around effectively communicating his value proposition.

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Current Challenges

Financial Instability

Andrew's financials reveal an unprofitable business after 20 months of operation:

“When you looked at the financials, it shows an unprofitable business so far.”
(Chris Lee, 00:07)(Andrew Schultz, 00:09)*

He relies heavily on a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC) to sustain the business after losing his previous sales job, with inconsistent monthly payments ranging from $4,000 to $10,000.

Marketing and Lead Generation Deficiencies

Despite having a background in marketing, Andrew confesses a significant gap in lead generation:

“I don't do lead gen in my business. I don't get leads for other companies and my efforts in my own business have yet to produce something that's repeatable and consistent to generate leads.”
(Andrew Schultz, 42:39)

His client acquisition has been predominantly through word of mouth and referrals, with minimal proactive marketing efforts. The struggle to define and package his offer has hindered the ability to scale and attract a broader client base.

---

Financials Analysis

Andrew provides a cash-in, cash-out overview, indicating total business income offset by business expenses and his own payouts. The inconsistency in income reflects the sporadic nature of client acquisition:

“I pay myself out of the business for family expenses. Those aren't, but those don't go in business accounting.”
(Andrew Schultz, 03:27)

The financial instability underscores the urgent need for a sustainable and scalable revenue model.

---

Marketing and Sales Strategy

Current Approaches

Andrew's marketing efforts include LinkedIn, YouTube, and a podcast, all aimed at building content and establishing authority:

“I have about 31 episodes all launched except for the last couple. Not a lot of listeners.”
(Andrew Schultz, 11:39)

However, these channels have not effectively translated into consistent lead generation or client acquisition.

Proposed Solutions by Hosts

Chris Lee and Daryl offer strategic advice focusing on:

1. Standardizing and Simplifying the Offer: Making the value proposition clear and straightforward to eliminate confusion among potential clients.

2. Diversifying Marketing Efforts:

   • Paid Advertising: Allocating a small budget to test and scale effective marketing channels.
   • Cold Outreach: Re-engaging in activities like cold DMing on LinkedIn to increase lead flow.
   • Affiliate Partnerships: Establishing relationships with complementary businesses to drive referrals.

3. Shifting Mindset from Scarcity to Abundance: Encouraging Andrew to broaden his client base beyond reliance on a few referrals, thus reducing financial vulnerability.

4. Hiring and Delegation: Outsourcing fulfillment tasks to free up time for revenue-generating activities, enabling scalability.

“You have to get out of that mentality. It’s a very scarce mindset.”
(Chris Lee, 31:40)

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Mindset and Personal Challenges

A recurring theme in the discussion is Andrew's scarcity mindset and need for certainty:

“I have a strong need for certainty.”
(Andrew Schultz, 60:38)

This mindset has led to hesitancy in taking risks essential for business growth, such as investing in paid marketing without a perfected offer. The hosts emphasize the importance of adopting an abundance mindset to focus on scaling and diversifying revenue streams.

“You have to have a vision and direction... you need to be certain in this thing I can do whatever it takes to make sure this thing is successful.”
(Chris Lee, 67:41)

---

Advice and Insights from Chris and Daryl

Chris Lee and Daryl provide actionable strategies for Andrew to overcome his business challenges:

1. Increase Revenue-Generating Activities (RGAs):

   • Allocate at least 50% of daily efforts to activities that directly generate revenue, such as lead generation and sales.
   • Focus on massive action instead of waiting for opportunities to come.

2. Test and Iterate Marketing Strategies:

   • Start with small investments in various marketing channels.
   • Continuously test, measure, and refine offers based on performance data.

3. Leverage Partnerships and Affiliates:

   • Form strategic partnerships with businesses offering complementary services.
   • Create affiliate programs to incentivize referrals and broaden client acquisition channels.

4. Develop a Scalable Sales Process:

   • Hire commission-based or affiliate-driven sales personnel to minimize financial risk.
   • Implement standardized operating procedures to ensure consistent service delivery as the client base grows.

“You're putting too much of your destiny on a very scarce resource.”
(Chris Lee, 32:03)

5. Adopt a Scientific Approach to Business Growth:
   • Embrace experimentation and resilience, viewing failures as opportunities to learn and iterate.
   • Maintain a steady focus on building a robust pipeline to ensure sustained growth.

“Success is crawling, falling, crawling, falling, take a step, fall, take a step...”
(Chris Lee, 73:06)

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Conclusions and Action Plan

By the end of the episode, Andrew acknowledges the need to overhaul his approach:

• Commitment to RGAs: Dedicate significant daily time to revenue-generating activities, moving beyond passive marketing efforts.
• Standardizing Offers: Continuously refine and simplify his service offerings to make them more attractive and understandable to potential clients.
• Expanding Client Acquisition Channels: Invest in diverse marketing strategies, including paid ads and strategic partnerships, to stabilize and grow his client base.
• Mindset Shift: Transition from a scarcity mindset to one of abundance, focusing on scaling and reducing reliance on a limited number of clients.

“I'm committed to creating that space of time for doing revenue generating activities.”
(Andrew Schultz, 77:08)

Andrew’s Takeaways:

• Intensify Focus on Growth: Prioritize lead generation and client conversion strategies.
• Simplify and Refine Offerings: Make the value proposition clear and compelling.
• Embrace Accountability: Consider partnering with others to maintain discipline and drive consistent action.

Final Remarks: Chris and Daryl encourage Andrew to persevere, emphasizing that business success mirrors personal discipline and resilience. They highlight the importance of being proactive, embracing change, and maintaining unwavering commitment to business growth.

“You've got to just go and get in front of 10 new people a day and offer your services.”
(Chris Lee, 34:13)

---

Key Quotes

• Andrew Schultz (04:21):
  “We take the free users that they've generated, which are basically for a company like that, they're just leads, and we're converting them into paid users.”

• Chris Lee (31:40):
  “You have to get out of that mentality. It’s a very scarce mindset.”

• Chris Lee (32:03):
  “You're putting too much of your destiny on a very scarce resource.”

• Chris Lee (73:06):
  “Success is crawling, falling, crawling, falling, take a step, fall, take a step...”

• Andrew Schultz (77:08):
  “I'm committed to creating that space of time for doing revenue generating activities.”

---

Final Thoughts

Episode #128 of Next Level Pros serves as a candid exploration of the hurdles faced by entrepreneurs in scaling their businesses. Through Andrew Schultz’s journey with Profit Automation, listeners gain valuable insights into the critical balance between mindset, strategic action, and effective marketing. The hosts’ practical advice underscores the importance of relentless pursuit of revenue opportunities, strategic offer development, and the transformative power of adopting an abundance mindset. For entrepreneurs navigating similar challenges, this episode offers both reflection and actionable strategies to propel their businesses to the next level.

Transcript

[Chris]

So the name of your company is Profit Automation. And what I'm looking at here on financials is an unprofitable business. Is that right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chris]

So far, I'll be honest, like looking at your site and listening to your videos, it's a little confusing. So would you say the reason why you haven't spent money on paid or done affiliate marketing is because you just don't know what you're offering?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, I have spent.

[Daryl]

You don't know what you're offering or you don't know how to package it?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, it's. I don't know how to package it yet. I mean, when you asked me what my biggest challenge was, I don't know what I'm selling.

[Chris]

And I'm just going to shoot you.

[Andrew Schultz]

Straight if you're good with that.

[Chris]

Hey everyone. Today we have a special episode with Andrew Schultz. Andrew is a budding entrepreneur that has an offer that helps increase marketing for SaaS companies. In today's episode, we dive deep into what is holding him back. We look at his financials, we look at his marketing and sales strategy along with few different personal things that are limiting him. On this episode of Next Level Pros. All right, Andrew, thanks for making the trip. Excited to have you.

[Andrew Schultz]

Excited to be here.

[Chris]

Yeah, man. So, you know, we've, we've got a bunch of information here about your business. We got. Appreciate you putting this all together.

[Andrew Schultz]

Excited.

[Chris]

So you're, you're the founder of Profit Automation.

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct.

[Chris]

Awesome, awesome. Can I, can I point out the, the funny aspect about that?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So the name of your company is Profit Automation and what I'm looking at here on financials is an unprofitable business. Is that right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, yeah. So far.

[Chris]

So far. Good, good. I just, I thought when I was reading it over, I thought it was kind of funny. I'm like, cool. Hey, this is, this is, this is funny a little bit. But we're gonna, we're gonna help you get this thing profitable. So you've been running this business how long?

[Andrew Schultz]

About 20 months? 2023.

[Chris]

Cool. Is this a full time side gig? What is it? Full time, full time gig. And are you the only income winner in the house or does your wife work as well?

[Andrew Schultz]

She works very part time.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

So it's mostly me.

[Chris]

So my question first and foremost would be like, how are you pulling that off?

[Andrew Schultz]

Like we have. So we. I got fired from my job in January 2023.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

We had gotten a HELOC just before that happened, which allowed me to kind of run in this Direction without quite as much stress as we would have had. Yeah, so.

[Chris]

Yeah, so because I mean what we're, what we're looking at here, you have kind of a basic cash in, cash out type statement, right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And it looks like when you're, when you're referring to cash out here. So this isn't like your typical financials. What is that expenses or is that personal expenses like, or are those all businesses expenses?

[Andrew Schultz]

That's everything. So that's income for the family and any business expenses.

[Chris]

Is it income for the family? But is it business expenses or family expenses as well?

[Andrew Schultz]

Not family expenses, just business. I pay. Right. I pay myself in the, out of the business for family expenses. Those aren't, but those don't go in business accounting.

[Chris]

Okay, so does the cash out include what you get, what you pay yourself?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yes.

[Chris]

Okay. How much are you paying yourself right now?

[Andrew Schultz]

It's different every month.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

As you might be able to see from these. But I try to do a $5,000 payment.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

And then at the end of the month to look at, you know, what the financials are and if I can do another one.

[Daryl]

What, what's your, how much were you making your previous job?

[Andrew Schultz]

I was a salesperson. I was there for eight months. The, the base was 105,000.

[Chris]

Got it.

[Andrew Schultz]

For eight months I didn't have any sales. So it was just that.

[Chris]

Okay, so tell, tell the listeners a little bit more like what exactly you do.

[Andrew Schultz]

So Profit Automation is a middle of the funnel focused marketing agency.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

I do, I call it a growth firm because we're more focused on not just a commoditized marketing service, but bringing specialized marketing and platforms to SaaS companies to help them grow. The niche focus right now is product led growth companies who have a founder brand or a strong corporate brand that drives a lot of traffic for them. And we take the free users that they've generated, which are basically for a company like that, they're just leads and we're converting them into paid users.

[Chris]

Got it.

[Andrew Schultz]

Which is generally a pretty low metric for those businesses.

[Chris]

So I'm gonna pull up, I got right now. So the name of your website is what.

[Andrew Schultz]

Get Profit automation.

[Chris]

Com. We're screen sharing it here. So I looked at this earlier. It's got, you know, there, there's definitely, it's well put together. So when your target audience like do they know what you're talking about when you say mid Funnel?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay. So like who, who are you? Who your main.

[Andrew Schultz]

Like it would be a CMO or a marketing leader. Or a demand gen leader. So they could be, they could have different titles. Sometimes there's not a cmo, depending on the size of the business, but it's somebody who's in charge of marketing at a SaaS company.

[Chris]

Got it, Got it. So somebody in charge of marketing at a SaaS company. And how are you getting your clients right now?

[Andrew Schultz]

Every client that I have signed up so far in my business has been through word of mouth.

[Chris]

Okay, so let me, let me get this straight. So you teach people how to turn leads that they already have into clients, Is that right? That's just kind of the basic of it, yeah. Okay, so I'll be honest, like looking at your site and listening to your videos, it's a little confusing. Right? Like, and it may speak perfectly to your target audience, but potentially your target audience is broader and there's like more people that you could go and serve, you know?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And I think any of the broader audience would probably be a little bit confused. Like, I, I understand most marketing lingo. I consider myself a pretty well educated CMO type person.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And even there was like, I think this is what he's trying to say, but it seemed, seemed a little complex.

[Daryl]

Okay, what, can you explain your sales process? So you're talking to CMO or one of these guys. What does that conversation look like? How long does that take to land a client?

[Andrew Schultz]

So I just pivoted to this market this year and I've really only signed up one client in this market. It's a really good one. We had one conversation and he was interested. We connected on LinkedIn. I commented on something. I've been following him for a while, made a comment on one of his posts. He said, hey, yeah, we should talk. And we had a conversation and he was interested, introduced me to his team and we started working together right away.

[Chris]

So right now, I mean, you're based on your monthly numbers. The numbers have kind of been all over the board.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Right. I mean you've got 2,000 month, 1,9000 month 2, 10,000, then down to 6, then 8, 10, 4, 6. Right. It's kind of like just boom, boom, boom, boom. And I think you kind of shared a little bit of this. Like you don't necessarily have like a package or an offer really dialed in. Would you say that? Is that correct?

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. I think that's my biggest challenge is not having, I mean, when you asked me what my biggest challenge was, number one was, I don't know what I'm selling.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

Being a little hard on Myself there, like, I understand the value that I bring, but as you mentioned, I mean, this, this website is kind of a new iteration. There are clients. Like the guy that I just mentioned, he just got it already and he had some of the background that you had. He knew, you know, some of the marketing styles that I do, whereas a lot of the people that are in my market don't. And so that's why it's like a lot of it's coming through referrals. Like if they get it, they get it. And then we talk and we work together. But I'm looking for something a little bit more repeatable.

[Daryl]

Let me ask some questions on, on, I think clients, and then let's go to unit economics. But with. So how many clients do you currently have?

[Andrew Schultz]

2.

[Daryl]

How many have you had this year total?

[Andrew Schultz]

5.

[Daryl]

5?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

How many have you reached out to?

[Chris]

How many have tried selling?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, so reached out to would be the wrong term. I haven't reached out to a lot of people. I've had inbound, probably five more.

[Daryl]

So you're saying five people reached out to you.

[Chris]

You haven't reached out just because they know that you're offering something or how did they. Like, why would they reach out to you?

[Andrew Schultz]

They came through my funnel.

[Chris]

And how are they getting to your funnel? Are you running ads?

[Andrew Schultz]

Three of those. No, I don't run ads. Three of those came when one of my clients who has a lot of. He has a lot of followers on LinkedIn, he posted that he was working with me and I got three meetings on my calendar right away.

[Chris]

Got it. So, so, so essentially, you know, you got, you have word of mouth has been pretty much. Pretty much it.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay. So I mean, really, it comes down to two major issues in the business. One, having to standardize what you're selling.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Like an offer.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And then if a way to market it. Right. Like, you know, if you, if you break down marketing, like just jumping over here to the tv. Right. Like, you have, you have paid, you have referral, you have organic, and then you have affiliate. Right. Do you understand the difference between the four?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yes.

[Chris]

Okay, cool. So it really sounds like the only business that you've had is come through referral, is that right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct.

[Chris]

Yeah. Because not because you weren't paying an affiliate commission to the guy that shout shouted you out.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Chris]

You're not running any paid ads.

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct.

[Chris]

Okay. And you're, you're not really posting or, or doing.

[Andrew Schultz]

I do quite a bit of that.

[Chris]

You do some. Your organic. Where does that organic stuff lays it Instagram, LinkedIn. Where are you doing it?

[Andrew Schultz]

LinkedIn and YouTube. LinkedIn and YouTube and a podcast.

[Chris]

Okay, so you run a podcast?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

That's good.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay, sweet. How's it, how's that gone for you?

[Andrew Schultz]

I started it in January. Mostly just to start talking.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

To solve some of these problems we're talking about. Like what? You know, if I can talk and I'm going in public, you know, it will help me find my voice and talk about what I'm doing better. And so it's, that's what I do. I have about 31 episodes all launched except for the last couple. Not a lot of listeners.

[Daryl]

But previously you said that the, it's. It's good value in the marketplace. You said something along those lines. Why do you say that? What do you mean by that?

[Chris]

Yeah, how do you know that?

[Andrew Schultz]

Most SaaS companies right now are. They're in pipeline crisis and it's, it's been a really tough couple of years for SaaS.

[Daryl]

What is.

[Chris]

So yeah, when you say pipeline crisis like that doesn't that, that may mean something to me, But I'd say 90% of the listeners, like, what is he talking about? Okay, what does that mean?

[Andrew Schultz]

They. Their pipeline. That's, that's what they talk about when they have leads in the sales process moving towards close.

[Chris]

Okay. And so what's the definition of a pipeline crisis?

[Andrew Schultz]

It's the ways that they used to generate pipeline using their, they, they did a lot of outbound calling, cold calling and cold emailing. In the past they had a person named a bdr, a business development representative.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

Who would do that work. And that model just stopped working in 2023.

[Daryl]

You're talking about lead gen, bringing leads in.

[Chris]

So your initial lead generation. So. But how does your model solve that? Because you're saying you're not lead generation. You're mid your middle of the funnel, which is like retargeting old leads. Is that correct?

[Andrew Schultz]

Not necessarily old leads, but leads that they have right now that aren't moving forward. Right? Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay. So yeah, just, I mean, retargeting, rehashing. What?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, so, well, converting. Right. So the focus I have right now, the thing that my hypothesis is that this is going to be the area where I can make the biggest impact is in these product led growth companies. So their leads are the people that they've signed up as free users.

[Chris]

And so when you sell somebody something, right, Say I'm, I'm a software business that has this pipeline issue, right. And I have a bunch of leads that aren't converting, what are you presenting to me?

[Andrew Schultz]

You have free users. You're probably converting somewhere between 1 and 3% of those into paid users. And now, and let me just preface this like this is, this is new. So this webpage that you just saw and this focus, I've narrowed it down very recently.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

Like just over the last couple of weeks.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

So just so you know that. Okay, but so you have all these free users, you're converting maybe 1 to 3% of them. If you're like most SaaS, companies who are running this, we want to increase that and we put a, we put a conversion program together in your welcome sequence and in the interactions that you have over the period of time when you have a free user who either converts or doesn't convert into a paid user, you probably have a specific amount of time where you know what that is.

[Chris]

So are you just working as like, do you have software solution? Do you have a process? Or are you just consulting me, coming in and building out something custom?

[Andrew Schultz]

So with the components we would put together and I can put this on software for you if you don't already have the tools to do this. We've got email programs, sms, and then other communication methods like a webinar, like the perfect webinar you may be familiar with, or video sales letters.

[Daryl]

So.

[Andrew Schultz]

Or challenges.

[Daryl]

What's. What are you finding? What's different from what companies are currently doing versus what you're.

[Chris]

I mean, there's, there's a lot of people that do sms, email build webinars. Right. There's a lot of solopreneurs out there that I can go and hire. Why you?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, the. I don't. Those companies that are doing this, they're all doing a lot of the same playbook. You get a couple of emails as you sign up for their products. They generally assume that you're here because you want the product, that you want to buy the product and that you're seriously considering it. I don't really think that's the case, which is why, you know, only 1 to 3% are converting. A lot of the time they come with a problem that they're trying to solve. And the approach that most companies are using today, you know, just kind of presumes like, hey, you're here to buy our products. So they tell you about the product, they tell you where to click first and second and third. They tell you where to get help and support. You know, they welcome you to the family. It's all the same. It's all the same kind of messaging. I tell companies that when you're. When you have a new user sign up, you should understand that they're there to solve a problem. And the more that the burden of placing. The more that you place the burden of finding out, does this solve my problem? On their shoulders, the more friction you're gonna have and the harder it's going to be for you to convert them to the next step. You need to meet them where they're at and say, I know why you're here. You have this problem. I understand you. And immediately, like as Jay Abraham said, if you can describe somebody's problem better than they can, then they immediately assume that you have the solution. That's a much better starting point. And then you talk, and then, you know, you talk to them about how they can solve that problem. Your software is part of it.

[Daryl]

So if I understanding you, you're saying that you're able to create more clarity around the customer's problem.

[Andrew Schultz]

I will help the. I'll help the company get more clarity around that. Yeah. Communicate in a way that centers on that problem and converts more people.

[Daryl]

So your secret sauce is identifying what the problem is around their customers in their pipeline so you can pull them into action.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And why should someone trust that you know how to do that?

[Andrew Schultz]

I have a. I have a good track record of working with businesses and doing this. So we've had some pretty remarkable successes with an adjacent industry of sales influencers who work in the tech space, selling their training to salespeople in times of. It was a crisis in this industry. In 2023, I got fired from my job and so did so many other salespeople. The market was just really poor. And the people I worked with, their buyers were not buying for that reason. They'd either lost their jobs or they were afraid they were going to. And just using some of these tools, like a seven email sequence, we had a client that did $50,000, 60,000 plus dollars in sales in three weeks from that or another one did 200,000 in a month just from seven emails.

[Chris]

You're saying these are clients since you've launched your business.

[Andrew Schultz]

Mm.

[Chris]

So my question is, if these guys have had this success, why aren't they currently with you?

[Andrew Schultz]

One of them is okay, and the other one, he had cash flow problems.

[Daryl]

So what I'm. What I'm hearing is you've got a solution, you've identified or you've already. You've already been able to implement it and see the results.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, no, that's a little bit of a different. Like those are. That's a different business that I was serving. I pivoted to SaaS in January because I've spent my whole career there. And I was starting to think that sales influencer space just wasn't going to be a market that was big enough for me to grow like I wanted to. And I spent my whole career in software. So I, My plan was to switch to SaaS and that's where a lot of the slowdown has come from.

[Daryl]

So you're trying to niche.

[Andrew Schultz]

Mm.

[Daryl]

And you're also trying to figure out what's your package and then how do you offer. Yeah, what's.

[Chris]

So would you say the reason why you haven't spent money on paid or done affiliate marketing is because you just don't know what you're offering?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, yeah, I have spent.

[Daryl]

You don't know what you're offering? You don't know how to package it?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, it's. I don't know how to package it yet. I think I'm closest as close as I've ever been with this new package.

[Chris]

Okay, so what's your package? Right. Once again, if I'm this person, what are you offering me?

[Andrew Schultz]

So on this page, my main offer for PLG SaaS right now is a free. The free. Free to paid conversion accelerator. So they book a call, we have a kickoff call. They answer some questions ahead of time. I do research.

[Chris]

What do you mean a free paid.

[Andrew Schultz]

So the, yeah, the, that's the metric that we're focused on is the free to paid conversion. That's the, that's what they're looking at in this PLG business. Like how many of our free users actually convert to paid users? So this is an accelerator for that metric and I'm doing it for free.

[Daryl]

What is, what does PLG stand for?

[Andrew Schultz]

Product LED growth.

[Daryl]

Sorry, Product LED growth.

[Chris]

Okay, so I mean you're using a lot of words that are really like too sophisticated. Like I don't even care how sophisticated is your user is. Right. Like marketing and sales has to be like very low level sophistication.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Chris]

Like accelerator. Right. Like, like if you're telling me that you're going to increase my conversion rate. Right, because that's what you're, what you're telling me. Right? Yes, my. Okay, so I will help increase your conversion or I will add another 2% to your conversion or you don't pay anything. Right. Like that to me is like very basic, very needed, very. Right. And because what you're trying to do with this funnel, if you will, is create interest in your services. Right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. The goal is to have a really great offer for people to come in, have conversations with me, provide some value and then upsell after. And this is a pretty like I put a lot into this offer.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

So it's, I mean there's a lot of value here if I'm communicating it in a way that you know, my prospect understands.

[Chris]

Right. So I mean I'll just tell you like if I'm going to be buying something no matter what. Like the, like even though I know what KPI is. Right. Key performance indicator. Right. Like usually that's not what somebody's going to market something as. Right. Like so we'll give you a program to smash your free to paid conversion KPI in 30 days for free.

[Andrew Schultz]

Like what?

[Chris]

Okay, so instead of like increase your conversion rate in 30 days for free. Right. Like that's, that's like something that I'm like oh, okay. What does that mean? Like, or like have, have leads that aren't progressing, will increase your conversion in 30 days for free.

[Daryl]

Or it's like if you're convert. If you know conversion rates are like you were saying 1 to 3%.

[Chris]

Double it.

[Daryl]

Yeah. If you double your conversion rate, you will forex your profits.

[Chris]

Right.

[Daryl]

Let me show you how. Or something, something that kind of pulls.

[Chris]

So with this particular scenario, you're. You're planning on working for them for free for 30 days. And what does working for them for free for 30 days mean?

[Andrew Schultz]

There are three calls, kickoff call. They answer some questions before the call.

[Chris]

Yep.

[Andrew Schultz]

Do some research. Yep. Come and have a deeper conversation on the call, go away. We give them three, the top three recommendations that we would have right there on the call. Then we go away and we build a custom program for them. It's recommendations and samples of emails, text messages. Whatever we think is best for their market and the user that they're converting. We put that together for them, have an implementation call, let them go and implement it and have a follow up call for results.

[Chris]

What would you imagine your target audience is doing in sales on. Do you have like a profile bill of what your customer is like your target customer?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, it's a. I'm, I'm not exactly certain where I fit best on the company size scale. A lot of these companies I think that I could work with are going to be smaller.

[Chris]

What like hold on, let me, let me keep going here. Like how, how small?

[Andrew Schultz]

There are a lot of companies I could work with that are sub 1 million array I don't think that's where I want to be. I think that. Well, I think they're probably at least 500k to 10 million ARR.

[Chris]

Okay. So I think first and foremost, it's important to identify, like, who you're targeting. Right? Like, and giving away something for free. Like, it's very gimmicky. Like, business owners, like, to a consumer, free trials and those type of things work. Right. Free. 30 days of, like, doing work in my business makes me think, what the freak.

[Daryl]

Like, typically, if I see that, I'm thinking, I don't have the time.

[Chris]

Yeah. Because this is gonna just. Cause, yeah, this is gonna cost me time, and I'm probably not gonna get results. Like, that's literally what I see when I. When I look at what your offer is.

[Daryl]

And truthfully, if someone's coming with a higher price tag, I'm actually gonna pay more attention of why are they charging me so much? So there's this perception of, like, free equals cheap. And if I'm paying for something, I want to see the value in it, so I'm more interested in what they're offering. Does that make sense?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Like, if.

[Chris]

I mean, the. The number you're trying to impact, the number one thing that drives any business sales. Right. You're wanting to increase conversion rate on sales. And I know it's expensive to do that as a business owner. Right. Like, training is expensive. Top salespeople are expensive. Good marketing is expensive. And you're offering it to me for free. Just like this guy probably has nothing that's worth. And just being completely frank like this, that's what I hear as a business owner. So. So with that, I think a better offer that eliminate. Because what you're trying to do with free is eliminate risk, right? To the. To the business owner.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. I mean, I just want it to be easy for them to come in and get what I'm offering and see the value and then move forward.

[Chris]

So a better option than eliminating risk with free is eliminating downside. Okay. And what I mean by eliminating downside would be something like this. I will increase your conversion rate and only take a percentage of the increase. Right. Like if, for example, If I'm at 2% and you can come in and give me 4%. Right. And I pay you a percentage of that increase in 2%. That's a win for me as a business owner. And it doesn't seem gimmicky. It just. What it seems to me is like, this guy's confident in his. In his product and Service. So it eliminate the downside of this guy being a complete bust for me. But he actually has something of value. Right. He would not be tying what he has to some to the upside unless he was confident he was going to be able to do it. Right. Like that's. Even though it's a similar type thing what you're trying to offer, like free or whatever, it's just complete. It's completely different. And there's money for you to be made right up front.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

What are your thoughts on that?

[Andrew Schultz]

To be honest with you, I have not found a large appetite for performance based payment. Why my market, I don't know. When I negotiate it, they always don't want to do it.

[Chris]

Have, have you tried. Is that been part of your offer?

[Andrew Schultz]

It was a standard part of my offer. Even back in like the sales influencer market, you know, I'd say to make it, you know, so I don't have a huge retainer. It'd be like it's, you know, the retainer is this and then you pay me x percent of sales or profits and they would generally not like that idea.

[Chris]

What about, what about if it was offered up to a certain amount of dollars? Hey look, you pay me performance up to 10,000 bucks.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, I've had one, one person bite on that.

[Chris]

Have you offered that? A bunch of times, yeah. Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

That's how it always was. I always had a cap. But other challenges.

[Chris]

Hold on though. This is, this is the thing you're telling me that you haven't had a lot of people bite on this yet. You started this conversation with. I haven't done a whole lot of marketing or talked to a lot of people about it. So I find it hard to believe that you have enough data to say that this doesn't work.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, it's not. I mean it's not a whole lot of people, but it, you know, it's probably. I probably offered that five, six times in the business and I've had one person want to do it. The others wanted to work with me, but they didn't want to pay the hold up the percentage fee.

[Chris]

Let's, let's just use what you claim.

[Andrew Schultz]

Okay.

[Chris]

So you claim that most SaaS companies are converting at 2%. Right. And if you can get them to 4%, that's a win. Right. And then you just explain to me that you've made an offer to five to six people and had one convert. What percentage is that?

[Andrew Schultz]

20%.

[Chris]

20%. You see where I'm going here?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So, but so to Say, to say that doesn't work when you're getting a 20% conversion, yet these companies that you're offering solutions to are only getting a 2% conversion. That seems pretty like a pretty bold claim.

[Andrew Schultz]

Well, here's the. I mean, this is the concern I have is those other people still wanted to work with me. They just didn't want to pay me that way.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

And so if I'm, if I'm making that my offer, I mean, I could still make that my offer and then walk it back. If they don't want to do it that way, I think too, like, I just don't want to. I just don't want to cut out 80% of my market because they don't want to work that way. The other. And just real quick, before you go, Gerald, the other thing is, at a SaaS company, the larger, the larger it gets, the harder it's going to be to negotiate for that. Like, it wouldn't even be in that.

[Chris]

Okay, so this, this is what I'm hearing, Andrew, and I'm just going to shoot you straight. If you're good with that, you're. You're operating very much on a scarcity mindset, right? Because you're saying. And the reason why you're operating on a scarcity mindset is because you're not taking enough action to get people in front of you to able to offer products to.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, right.

[Chris]

And so I get it. Like, if you think that you're only going to have five or six total opportunities to be able to offer a product, you want to be able to capture as many of those people as possible. Because, I mean, from, from the looks on your financials, right? Like, you have two clients right now. Right. Losing one client is a big deal. And gaining one client is a big deal.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

You have to overcome the mentality that one client is a big deal. Right. Like, you have to get out of that. It's a very scarce mindset. Right. Like, what is your total target market? Like, how many potential people could you pitch this product to in the world?

[Daryl]

And I think to kind of emphasize that, like, the whole concept of 10x is easier than 2x. Like, trying to double your business is a lot harder than 10x in your business.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Because once you think, okay, I just need to tax my business, period, what does that take? I need 10 times the leads coming in. I need to 10 times the effort here and there, and that's the same thing. The conclusion I'm getting is like, you're trying to swing a Home run every time you're up to bat. Think of how it happens in baseball.

[Chris]

And it's not even that you're trying to swing a home run for every time at bat. You're just unwilling to go up and take at bats. And the very few times that you are at bat that they have to be a home run, right? Like, it's not even that you're trying. Like, it has to, or else I don't feed my family is what is what I'm hearing. And so, like, you've got a. Like, this is a sales and marketing issue, right? Like, you gotta ignore. Like, you don't even have to have the perfect freaking product. Like, you've got to just go and get in front of 10 new people a day and offer your services. And if nobody's biting on your service, then you have the wrong offer. And then you need to make a little tweak and then you need to go and get in front of 10 more people, and if they don't take it, then you need to make a tweak. And like, that is the foundational issue that we're talking about here. It really has nothing to do whether or not your product is perfect, your offer is perfect. You're like, like you're not marketing. Like, in marketing, you can do this in such a very simple way. Like, like when we're talking about, like the organic marketing here, right? We're talking about like cold DMing a bunch of people on LinkedIn. Are you doing that?

[Andrew Schultz]

I have done that. I'm not doing it right now.

[Chris]

How, how many times have you done that?

[Andrew Schultz]

Hundreds. Back several months ago, I was doing it pretty frequently.

[Daryl]

I'd say another thing too is like, what services can tie into your service that people use before needing your service, and what services do people use after.

[Chris]

What you offer from an affiliate standpoint?

[Daryl]

Because the thing is, you can start tying in and saying, hey, I got this one solution that takes care of this, this and this. You fulfilling this. You've got a company that does that. You got a company does that. You're making a commission off of those, you're making your money off of this. All of a sudden you're able to offer something way bigger, right? That's one of the ways, I think, one, you can piggyback off these guys because you create a relationship with them, you're getting business from them, you're giving business to them. Two, your offer can be a lot better. You can say, hey, this is what I offer. You have pricing in for both those Guys as well as yours. Or maybe it's just before you or after you, whatever you want.

[Chris]

I, I think, I think it's a pretty like, I know you probably fret it a lot. I mean it sounds like you don't really know what you're, you're selling or whatnot. Like you sell conversion, right? Like that's, that's what you sell. You increase people's mid funnel conversion. It's got to be that basic, that. And, and now you just have to have an offer on what that is. Look, you pay me performance based up until 10,000 or just performance based altogether, I will increase your conversion. And now you need to get in front of people where that's actually going to move the needle and because like once again going back to just what we've talked about, five to six people, like you can't like so when we were, when we were selling at 20, 26 million a month. Okay, guess how many leads we generated a day?

[Andrew Schultz]

Hundreds.

[Chris]

Thousand. A thousand. That means there was a thousand people that expressed interest in our product that we spent money on. Okay. To express that interest. And then from them expressing our interest, we reached out to and took a swing. Not all those converted into a phone call actually picking up, but when the phone call picking up, we had to convert those into an interested buyer that was going to take a proposal and then from an interested buyer and proposal, certain amount of those were going to close. And at every level there was a metric similar to like what you're helping these other businesses do. Right. And you've got to do that for your business. You have nothing measurable from, from a marketing standpoint that is input and output. Right. Like you want to go and solve this output. Like I mean I would too. Right now you've lost five grand over the last 14 months. That's no position anybody wants to be in. The way that you solve this is you have to start marketing what you do and marketing like start spending like a small. First of all, where are you at financially to be able to spend money on marketing? Do you have any money?

[Andrew Schultz]

No.

[Chris]

So you've been living off of a line of credit or a heloc?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, like when, yeah, when we needed it. Over this period of time, do you.

[Chris]

Have any money there in your HELOC that you could access?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

I mean, and so this is, this is the reality, right? It's like how much do you believe in what you do?

[Andrew Schultz]

100%. But like as you've seen today, like I haven't figured out how to Communicate it in a way that's just like a no brainer for people yet. Okay, that's, that's where I like, that's where I'm trying to get.

[Daryl]

Yeah, I don't think it's how to communicate it, it's how often you're communicating it. Yes, because in any sales process, the more repetitions you get, the better you get. You start to fine tune things. You see what works, what doesn't work. Your closing percentage is actually phenomenal. Right.

[Chris]

If you're closing 1, 1 out 5, 1 out of 6.

[Daryl]

It's phenomenal.

[Andrew Schultz]

Like that's, it's, it's higher than that. But they're referrals.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

You know, like facts.

[Chris]

Okay, so then why, then why aren't you asking for more referrals? Why aren't you going and creating more affiliate relationships? Right. Like most of these things are action oriented. You have, you're going to pay with everything with either time, energy or money. Right. Paid ads is going to be money. Right. The other things are going to be time and energy.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, right.

[Chris]

I guess. What are you spending your day doing? Every single day?

[Andrew Schultz]

Right now I'm doing the organic content.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

I'm delivering for customers and I'm like working on stuff like this.

[Chris]

How long does it take to deliver for customers?

[Andrew Schultz]

It's up and down because as I mentioned in these documents, without a standardized offer, it's, you know, it's, it's kind of ad hoc or bespoke.

[Chris]

Are you, are you selling contracts to these people or is it just month to month?

[Andrew Schultz]

It's month to month with a minimum number of months to start.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

So usually three to six.

[Chris]

Okay. So you have six months, six month agreement. It's month to month. But people, people, why would somebody leave you if they're getting results?

[Andrew Schultz]

The only time that's happened is because they had cash flow issues in the business.

[Chris]

Okay. And so, I mean, so how much time is being spent every day to fulfill for customers?

[Andrew Schultz]

If I were to average it out, I'd say probably half the day.

[Chris]

So half the day is being spent on that. So you're working for ten grand a month. 20 hours a week is fulfilling on that. Is that something that could be hired out?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, with some training. With some training.

[Chris]

Okay. I mean, so let's, let's talk about, let's talk about what you love doing. So we have, we have this thing called the energy matrix. We have quadrant one, two, three and four. And quadrant one is stuff that's low energy, low value. Okay. And energy Is defined by do you love doing it? And value is how much value it brings to the business by you doing it. Right. Or how much it would cost to replace what you do. Okay. What do you love doing in your business?

[Andrew Schultz]

I love creating the content. I love doing the marketing for my own business or for somebody else's. So I love that delivery piece. There are parts of it that I love more than others.

[Chris]

Do you love the sales?

[Andrew Schultz]

I don't love the sales.

[Chris]

You don't love doing sales?

[Andrew Schultz]

No.

[Chris]

So selling two clients, you don't like doing that?

[Andrew Schultz]

I like it. It's. You don't love it as much as the other stuff.

[Chris]

Okay. Okay. So what I would put that in. If you look here. So it's sales, I would put in quadrant three, which would be low energy, high value. Okay. Low energy means you don't love it, but it brings a lot of value. Right. Okay. So sales is going to hang out here. What do you hate doing? And would require not a lot to hire it out.

[Andrew Schultz]

Specifically for growing the business in sales and marketing. Just anything like accounting would go there.

[Chris]

Accounting.

[Andrew Schultz]

I don't really do a whole lot of it. I look at it every once in a while. I need to.

[Chris]

What about anything on the fulfillment side?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, there's. There's some automation work, technical work, building the building websites or you know, just setting stuff up.

[Daryl]

Let's. You said marketing is one of the things you love to do. What aspects of marketing? Because I don't. What we're getting to is like there's not a lot of marketing happening. So when you say you love marketing, like I feel like there's a disconnect there.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. So when you say marketing, I mean, I'll split it into two things. The marketing that's not happening is lead generation right now in my business. And admittedly like that's a. That's a weak spot for me that I've always had. I don't do lead gen in my business. I don't get leads for other companies and my efforts in my own business have yet to produce something that's repeatable and consistent to generate leads. I'm much better when I have leads. The marketing I love to do is copywriting, email marketing.

[Daryl]

Basically the services that you're offering.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Have you. Have you ever tried to like team up with somebody else that offers a similar service and just do those fulfillment. The stuff that you love to do.

[Andrew Schultz]

Is that somebody that does some. The same stuff as me?

[Chris]

No, just.

[Andrew Schultz]

Or somebody who does.

[Chris]

They could use your services of. Of Copywriting. Right. Like that, that type of thing. Right. Have you ever tried teaming up with anybody?

[Andrew Schultz]

There was one guy who had a very similar business that I talked partnership with a couple times at the beginning of this year. It didn't, it didn't pan out, but.

[Chris]

Right.

[Daryl]

You guys had similar businesses.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, we had similar businesses. Which I think is what you're asking, right?

[Daryl]

Yeah, but I think, I think too it's, it's complimentary business.

[Chris]

Right.

[Daryl]

So for example, someone who's good at the lead. Nurturing generation. Sorry, lead generation, not the nurturing. So you have someone on the front end, you're right behind them. So now together you guys are bringing in leads, nurturing leads, converting those leads, but then you're also able to offer that service to others.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So, and I guess I'm confused. So are you trying to do like a done for you business or is it like a consultancy of this is how to do it?

[Andrew Schultz]

I want to get to it done for you. When I started last year, I mean, I, I started this business without a whole lot of Runway ahead of time. I got fired from my job, thought what am I going to do next?

[Chris]

Right.

[Andrew Schultz]

I know I'm really good at this stuff. I can do this for a business. And I spent the first year figuring it, like kind of bouncing around between who do I serve, what do I want this to look like. Do I want to be a consultant or do I want this to be an agency? I'm trying to avoid commodity areas that are just going to get replaced by AI in the next one to two years anyway. Yep. And so those are, those are the things I've been navigating. So the answer, I know the answer now, but I haven't always known the answer. And the answer is I want it to be a done for you service that I can sell repeatedly at a higher scale.

[Chris]

Yep. So I mean really, you have a sales and marketing issue, right. Like getting clients in the door. Because at the end of the day, like if you have, if you have increased, if you have sales coming in at the top of the funnel here, right. So you got sales and then you have to do fulfillment, which is what you like doing. You like doing the fulfillment side of the business, right. Like doing, doing the legwork or whatnot. But that is also for you to be able to scale because like half your day is being spent to be able to do $10,000 worth of. Worth of work a month. And so that really puts your max capacity at like $20,000 under your current, under your current Offer.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Chris]

So what I would be doing is I would be contracting with a, with a sales company, somebody that has leads, some affiliate, some something, because they're going to be able to drive you business that you currently. And you give them a commission and you. And you figure out, okay, what am I willing to. What am I willing to do this? And you got to be able to know what you can hire out the fulfillment for, right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Because right now your, your max amount of money that you're working for is $100 an hour. Because if you're making 200 grand a year, that's 100 bucks an hour. Right. And yeah, like that. You got to figure out how somebody else can do the fulfillment for less than like 25 bucks. Right. Have you built out processes and systems to be able to do this, to be able to teach somebody else to do what you do?

[Andrew Schultz]

In some areas, yeah.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So first of all, you need to solve the sales issue. And the easiest way to solve the sales issue is to hire somebody to do sales that gets paid commission only. Right. Because then there's no risk. Yeah, there's no risk affiliated with the commission, only if they're doing cold calling. Right. And just going directly to the source or with affiliate type, type offer. Now, if you're generating leads through paid advertising, there's gonna be a little bit of risk, but then you just start doing, you know, figuring out what you can convert at. Frankly, if I was you, I'd be spending a little bit of dollars, 100 bucks a month, couple hundred bucks a month, nothing crazy, on generating leads. And see, can you start converting those, and if you can prove that you can convert those, then you put a salesperson on those that they're going to get paid a commission. They have, then they start building up. Because once again, going back to what I talked about is like, you're putting too much of your destiny on a very scarce resource. Yeah, right. Like you're, you're just hoping and praying that when you lose this one client, you can replace it with the client. And from what I read, you've done that for the most part. When you've lost a client, you, you've replaced with a client.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, it was, I mean, serendipitously, it was like this just happened on the same day. The last two times one client left, I signed another client. I had been planning to sign the client. The client leaving was a little bit less of a. Something I saw ahead of time. And so I was like, I'm growing. And then.

[Chris]

And I I would say it's probably not serendipitous. I think it is just that scarcity mentality of, like, you know, you have to always be here and you're there. Right. And I would say most people operate that way. It's not unique to you. Right. Like, don't think they're like, oh, I have this unique problem that nobody else has. Like, most people do just enough to. To survive. Right. And to be able to get to like. But you've got to get past the survival mode, past this scarcity. And you got to think in abundance, like, what if. What would it look like to be able to have 20 clients? Right. Like, and you need to start designing your whole strategy on what it's going to take to get 20 clients, what it's going to take to service 20 clients, and that has got to be your goal. It's back to Darrell's point of, like, 10x is better than 2x. Instead of thinking, how can I get from 2 to 3 to 4, think, how can I get from 2to20?

[Daryl]

So an example would be, like, let's say in two months, if I could promise you you're going to have 20 clients, what would you do today? So you're ready for that. What would you do?

[Andrew Schultz]

I would need to hire some people.

[Daryl]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

I need to have those standard operating procedures built out completely in ClickUp. I would need to.

[Daryl]

So the reality is, if you're not taking those actions that you know you have to take in order to be at that size, you never. You'll never get there. And what's interesting, and we've learned this is, like, once you understand taking those big actions, like, having a big, massive goal will change you and make you think differently than if you're just waiting for something to knock on the door and be like, oh, there's my big opportunity.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Because they usually. It is a knock on your door.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Like, you've got to go find it. But putting yourself in a mindset to find it is thinking in the future, what's the vision? How are you getting there? If it comes to you, are you ready to go?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And if you're not, you're just gonna let it pass by you.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Daryl]

And that's what most people do.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. So the hard part is hiring with this. Right. Like, how would you. How would you approach that?

[Chris]

So, so again, the least risk that you can take right now is going in, hiring salespeople that are commission only or going and hiring affiliate partners that are essentially going to bring you business For a percentage, right? Like that's gonna be the most exp. It's actually the most expensive. You think that the other way is the most expensive, but the most expensive is giving up a percentage of commission or a large percentage to an affiliate partner.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Chris]

But it's a way to be able to get money in the door, right?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And then the other thing is like, you gotta be willing to take some risk, right? Like, and if that means diving into your, your HELOC or selling some assets or, you know, being able to like get it down, like most people are unwilling to sacrifice their lifestyle for what they want, right? And we, we just think that we. And this isn't necessarily you, but most people think that they deserve the watch, the house, the, the cars, the everything else where in reality is like, they've got to match the action to be able to get there. And so like, hiring is a slow process, but it has to be done right. Like, you've got to make the moves, have got to be okay, I got to generate revenue. And if I'm not willing to generate revenue, I got to bring somebody in that will generate revenue. So up here I have the disc analysis which we had you take.

[Daryl]

Hold on, just really quick. So one of the things you just said is we call RGAs, revenue generating activities. If you're not spending 80% of your time on RGAS right now, like that's all you need. You need more revenue. And what happens is as you're stuffing revenue, as you're stuffing clients in your business, you're gonna have a bottleneck to fulfill. Right. That's a lot easier to solve than building out all this stuff, perfect processes, all the hires or whatnot. So you need to stuff business into your. Yes, you need to stuff revenue into your business. And then the pipeline, you'll figure it out. It's like packing on a, on a big trip. Usually don't pack till the day before. Right? But you always get what you need. And you might miss a few things, but it's never a big issue. Yeah, stuff the revenue in your business. Don't worry about how you're going to fulfill because you'll figure out. You'll figure it out.

[Chris]

And it's way easier to hire and figure it out once you have the revenue than the opposite.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right?

[Chris]

Because you're, you're trying to solve this like, oh, how am I going to be able to grow and hire all these people when I have no revenue? Go get the revenue. Right? Even though you hate sales, go do it. I don't care. Like, like, go figure out how to get in front of people. Ask for referrals, do affiliate relationships, spend a few hundred bucks a month on ads. Like, start getting in front and perfecting exactly what, what that offer is. Like, we don't know exactly what the perfect offer is going to be for your business because we're not in your business. But just understanding, like, like, just simplify it. Make it very simple. Solve a problem. Identify the problem that you're solving, Provide a solution and charge appropriately for it. And be the most expensive. Right. Like, do not, do not cheapen yourself. You could probably be charging these people 20 grand a month instead of 10 grand a month or whatever, whatever you're doing. And. But yeah, the worst thing you can do is have all your eggs in one basket, counting on one, one client to be there forever. Right. Like, like, you've got to get out of that mentality. Yeah. So the other thing, just when hiring people looking, going over here to the disc analysis, we had you do a disc and you're a D, which dominant personality? And this will tell you about dominant personalities. They're not very personable from, from a. Like they get crap done. Right. Like, they, they are drivers. They can get things across the finish line. They're very goal oriented. Everything like that.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

But there's no like, flowery anything. Right. The I is the influence side, which you're lacking, which is fine. Guess what? The biggest thing that you need to understand about a disc is that the I, the S and the C, you have to hire out. You have to find people that are going to bring the balance. There's no such thing as perfect people. There's only perfect couples, perfect teams, and perfect, like groups. And the way you do it is by balancing the disc. Like, if I'm hiring a salesperson, what I would be looking for is somebody that's a high D high I. They have both that influence and drive. Like those are. You're gonna be your top, your top salespeople in an organization. Deep personalities can do it. They don't necessarily love it because they don't necessarily love people. Right.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And then just so you know, like, you can, you can fulfill all those roles, the I, the S to C. But naturally you're going to reserve back to id. That's like going to be your default.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And so eventually you get tired of being the. The I and the S and the C and you want to go back to that D. That's where you just want to keep going. And so back to what he's saying, you can fulfill all those roles, but eventually, like you have to have a.

[Chris]

Team that balances you out. And so I would be focusing on going and finding a di that can go and do some sales, going to push, generate or push revenue. And until then, to Daryl's point, like, you've got to be at least 50%, 80% should be the target. At least 50% of your day has to be an activity that is potentially generating revenue.

[Andrew Schultz]

Not fulfillment.

[Chris]

Not fulfillment.

[Andrew Schultz]

Okay.

[Chris]

Not fulfill.

[Andrew Schultz]

New revenue.

[Chris]

Yeah, new revenue. Because like you're going to get done the fulfillment. The problem is you're probably allowing that fulfillment to take a good portion of your day because you're putting, putting off the actual revenue generating things or other things that you know you need to get done. And it's easy to do this.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Would you agree with that?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And the other thing you could think of is you're like, man, I can get more revenue if I treat these clients really, really good and deliver top of the line product. The problem with that is it's not how the world works. Like, you've got to do the activity that's bringing in more and more clients. If you, unless you want to barely survive, keep doing what you're doing. Right. But you got to shift your mindset to like, I've got to bring in 10x revenue generating activities. I've got to be able to stuff my business with revenue where I have a problem on fulfillment.

[Chris]

How many hours are you working a week right now?

[Andrew Schultz]

60.

[Chris]

So what was the day look like? Is it Monday through Saturday?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And it's how many hours you're saying? Four hours a day towards fulfillment.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. Not on Saturday. That's generally like special projects day, doing stuff like building that new funnel or creating content for the podcast or LinkedIn, that kind of stuff.

[Chris]

So from what I'm hearing, you're doing a lot of marketing that isn't marketing. Right. Like podcast and videos and funnel, like these are all cool things but ain't driving traffic.

[Andrew Schultz]

No, it's not, it's not lead gen. No.

[Chris]

And you've, you've got to do lead gen activities if that means you go in and knocking on these software's doors like physically, or if that means cold calling them or DMing them or whatever else. Like that is the work that you're avoiding and has to be done. Like, I don't care how beautiful your funnel is, I don't care how great your podcast is if nobody's listening to that dang thing or landing on that dang thing, you ain't gonna get a dang new client. Right. And as proven like your only traffic has actually come and come through somebody saying something about you. Right. Which is, which is awesome. And let's get more of those, that's a traffic driver. Like let's get more people shouting you out on their, on their LinkedIn. Like how do we, how do we do that? How do get more affiliates? How do we get like that is. Those are the true revenue. Revenue generating activities. Not you're. You're doing revenue capturing activities. Do revenue generating activities. Right. And so that's, that's gonna be, that's gonna be the big, big changer. And because dude, I don't care what your offer is, if you have 20 people, 20 clients, it's gonna be way, way better than what you got going on right now. Because if you lose one client at 20, no big deal. Right now you lose a client, you're struggling, you're sweating.

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct? Yeah.

[Chris]

And yeah, we've got to get away from that.

[Daryl]

So let me ask you, what are your takeaways? What are your actions and where do you feel like you, why haven't you taken some of these steps?

[Andrew Schultz]

So takeaways are just have to have a much more intense focus on growing the business with new leads and then converting them through sales and marketing. I've got this marketing piece down, but I'm not putting anything into the funnel to test it and iterate to get to the right offer and then closing more people. That's a mindset thing. And.

[Daryl]

I think what you got to realize is like you've got a product that has been built off of referrals.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

So you've got a good product.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

So now it's how do I take this product? How do I get in front of more people? And truthfully, the way that I look at entrepreneurship and business is like if you've got a good product and you're not getting it in front of people, like you're missing your calling in life. Your calling in life is to help other people. You can only help people if you're getting in front of them. And if you're not doing that, like you're missing out on what you're supposed to offer the world.

[Chris]

So it's like what Robert Kiyosaki says in Rich Dad, Poor dad when he's referring to books. Right. Like best written. There's best written books all the time. They don't sell.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, right.

[Chris]

Like who cares how good your product is if it's not a best selling book. Right. You need to be a best selling project. And so going back here with the, the four, the four quadrants, if you want to just look over your shoulder here. So marketing and sales like, and specifically lead gen clearly exist in your, in your third quadrant, which is low energy, high value. Right. Like these things are what are going to drive the most value to the business. Yeah. You may hate doing them, but quadrant three, you cannot hire out before quadrant one. Okay. When you're building a business, quadrant one has to be your first hires. These are the things that you hate doing and do not bring a lot of value. Right. And you. Meaning that you can hire them out for cheap. Right. I can go and hire somebody in the Philippines for three bucks an hour or whatnot.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And so, so instead of, instead of putting off quadrant three or trying to hire that out, say this is the short term sacrifice that I need to make until I get all the quadrant one things off my plate.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And then I can focus on getting the quadrant three. So then eventually you're going to hang out here in quadrant four and quadrant two. So quadrant four, this is the things that you love doing and bring a ton of value to the business. And then quadrant two would be low value or so they'd be high energy and low value. This would be things like with your family. Right. Like you could hire them out like a nanny or whatnot, but you love doing it. Right. And so this is, this is where you want to hang out for the rest of your life is in quadrant two and four. The things that bring the most value when and, and you love doing and the things you love doing that you could hire out but you're not going to because you absolutely love doing it. Right. And so focus in this quadrant three. Like I'm going to bite the bullet in the meantime, I'm going to do the sales, even though I don't love doing them. And then eventually I can bring in a sales guy like that is what's going to push this thing forward. And sales, I promise you, will solve all the issues. It solves all the heartache.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah. Well, do you, I mean, you want to go a level deeper or are we out of time?

[Chris]

Yeah, we got it.

[Andrew Schultz]

So it's not that I hate those things. There's, I've done a lot of, of work this last 20 months on me and a lot of that went through the world of Tony Robbins and the challenge with those activities, I think. And I've worked a lot on this, and it still keeps showing up, is that I have a strong need for certainty. And so my desire to. And I'm aware of this, you know, up here, my desire to go into areas with that are uncertain. In doing things like lead gen, like dropping a thousand bucks on ads, which I did. I dropped several thousand dollars on ads in January and it didn't pay off because I didn't have the right offer, you know, but waiting out into January.

[Chris]

So January dropped several thousand, you said.

[Andrew Schultz]

Okay.

[Chris]

So first of all, never go and just drop several thousand. Okay. Always start and test. Always, always be really low.

[Andrew Schultz]

That's what I did. But it was, it was December and January over the course.

[Chris]

So you let it test too long.

[Daryl]

Yeah, Let me jump in here, because when you start talking about this, I have all kinds of thoughts. So when you say certainty, you've got to realize where you're wanting certainty.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Right. Now your certainty, you know, the results you get, they're not the results you want.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

But you know how to get the results you're getting.

[Andrew Schultz]

Correct.

[Daryl]

So you're certain in getting below par results Right now, if you truly think of what you want, what is that? What's. What do you want certainty in?

[Andrew Schultz]

I would like to be. I don't, I don't think the certainty is the thing at that point. Like, I, I would be uncertain. But what I want to do is go get results. Any result that I want.

[Daryl]

Yeah. Be more specific.

[Andrew Schultz]

What result for my business growth?

[Daryl]

Personal.

[Andrew Schultz]

Personal.

[Daryl]

Personal. It'll come from your business. Right. But what's your personal goal?

[Andrew Schultz]

I want to be a highly successful business owner.

[Daryl]

Okay. So that's making 50,000 a year.

[Andrew Schultz]

No.

[Daryl]

How much is that?

[Andrew Schultz]

It's a, it's $100 million valuation business by 2029.

[Daryl]

Okay. So if you want certainty, a certainty is if you keep doing what you're doing, you'll never get there. Right, Right. So you've got to figure out how to change your focus on what you're certain in. Because I've gone through some of Tony Robbins stuff. Right. And a lot of times it's pain or pleasure. Right. So certainty gives you pain or gives you pleasure and you've got to shift it. But a lot of times the pain's not painful enough, so you keep going back to that. And so you gotta realize, like, where does this lead you if you don't make the change? Like, where does this lead you? Where does it lead your family and your kids?

[Andrew Schultz]

Not good places.

[Daryl]

And how much of that do you want to have? How Much pain do you want to continue bringing into your life?

[Andrew Schultz]

None.

[Daryl]

None. And so the question is, what can be a plan? Which I think Chris is getting to. What can be a plan that you are certain in that'll change that, but give you what you want? And going back to some of the principles that we teach is having a vision that you believe in is certainty. It's just we're not taught how to use it in that way. Doesn't mean you know every step, but you know the outcome.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So yeah, I mean it's great and grand to say, hey, I want to, I want a hundred million dollar business. But if you don't have a roadmap to be able to get there, like you've gotta, you gotta be able to get there.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And so there's, there's only one way that you can build a hundred million dollar business. It's with a team. And the only way you can afford to hire a team is you have to have a sales and marketing process that works.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, right.

[Chris]

Like that's, that's it. And the only way like you get a sales and processing a marketing and sales process that works is you've got to spend time, energy and money on those things. Right. And so like first like game plan is to be like sales and marketing. That's it. Like that's, that's gotta be your focus. There's nothing else. Like I don't care how cool you like you want your team to look or whatever else, like number one has to be a sales, in sales and marketing game plan.

[Daryl]

And I think you've got to specify RGAs. Right. What are the revenue drivers in sales and marketing? Because I think there's a lot of stuff you can do in marketing that's not going to produce any, any revenue.

[Chris]

So yeah, let's, let's break this down. So we're going to say daily. So how much time are you going to commit to revenue generating activities every day?

[Andrew Schultz]

Well, you're saying it should be 50% of the time. So it should be four hours. I have a question. But, but let's, let's keep going. It's probably better for.

[Chris]

So, and let me just point out, your numbers aren't enough. You're telling me half Your day is four hours. That means eight hours a day. That's not 60 hours a week. Oh, okay, but we'll just point that out there. Okay, so you're gonna say you're gonna do four hours a day of revenue generating activities. Okay, so four hours a day, rgas okay, once. Once you have something that's scalable, meaning that you're starting to generate, you need to hire salespeople. And then once you generate enough revenue, you need to attract other talent. And the way that you're going to do all these things is like, what Darrell's talking about. You have to have a vision and direction like you have to. And certainty is more in yourself than in what your offer is. Right. Certain that you're going to do whatever it takes to make sure this thing is successful. Right. Like, for me, I'm a very certain person. The reason I'm certain is because I don't lie to myself. Right. When I say I'm going to wake up tomorrow at 5am I'm going to wake up tomorrow at 5am and the way that you build more confidence and certainty is just not. Is those little things of not lying. Like, if I say, all right, I'm getting up every day at 5am every time I get up at 5am it reestablishes, I am what I say I am. Therefore, I will do what I say I'm going to do. And I'm going to. I'm going to be that. Right. Like, that's how you make little wins. Like, hey, I'm going to do 10 pushups. I do 10 pushups. Then, like, it's just those little things that build up the confidence over time.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, right.

[Chris]

And. And then when I say I'm going to work four hours a day on RGAs, I work four hours a day on RGAS. And the second that I don't, I have to audibly say I screwed up. Right. Because what most people do when they start screwing up is they ignore it and act like it never happened. The day I didn't wake up at 5am I don't admit it to myself that I screwed up. So I got to go and look at myself in the mirror and be like, you didn't wake up at 5am tomorrow. We're going to get this thing figured out, and we're going to get back on track.

[Daryl]

The other easy thing to do is just not tell yourself any of those things. So it doesn't matter what time you wake up. Going back to what Chris is saying, you got to be specific in your vision.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah, I'm good at that. In a lot of areas of life, it's in. It's in those things where I don't have a lot of certainty. And this is where the question. This is where the question came in. So what I have found and I wonder, I'm curious how you did this in your business. So I could say, I'm going to go do four RGAs, four hours of RGAs every day. And what I will do, just knowing myself and my habits and the way I operate, I'm going to go get. Within two weeks, I'll be in a pretty deep rut of. All right? I've got a routine. I'm doing my four hours of RGS a day. It's not working, but I'm doing it and I'm comfortable with it. Now I'm certain in this thing I can go do these four hours.

[Chris]

We're talking about revenue generating activities, not activities that I think might generate revenue.

[Andrew Schultz]

Okay.

[Chris]

Like, so if it's not working, change it. Do something different that generates revenue. Because I guarantee you, if you are doing things that actually generate revenue, you're not going to get in a rut. Right? And so we're not telling you a specific way to go do that. We're saying go and work and try and figure out until something works. Right. And there's a million different ways that you can market. Yeah, a million. So go figure out which ones. Work and fail and try again and fail and try again and fail and try again until you find something that is a vein that works and then do it again. And then, I mean, that's, that's all success is. It's crawling, falling, crawling, falling, take a step, fall, take a step, fall, start to walk, fall, take a start to walk, fall, start to run like that. That's all success is. But it won't be if you continue to try to crawl. Right? Like, you have to continue to try the next step, the next thing that's going to be able to generate that success.

[Daryl]

And I think one of the powerful tools that you might need is a partner. It sounds like you get caught up in your own head and then you go aimlessly in a different direction.

[Chris]

Absolutely.

[Andrew Schultz]

Well, in that same direction. So I'm thinking back to the time where I was doing all that dming, right? Like, I would, I would do this process and I'm. I'm on this precipice. Like, should I change it? It's not working, or have I just not done it long enough? And you know, I can feel good about doing it at the end of the day. Like, I did it. I said I was going to do it and I did.

[Chris]

It wasn't getting any results.

[Andrew Schultz]

No.

[Chris]

If it wasn't getting results, then it wasn't working.

[Andrew Schultz]

But I would expect pretty low Conversion rates on that. Right. So like, I mean, I don't know.

[Chris]

How did you have any conversions?

[Andrew Schultz]

I had several conversations, but no sales.

[Chris]

Okay.

[Daryl]

So I think two is you're trying to say, okay, I'll do this. That didn't work. I'll do this. You need 10 things at once.

[Andrew Schultz]

Okay.

[Daryl]

You need this, this, this.

[Chris]

I need to mass, like massive action. And frankly, I think you're probably not working 60 hours a week and you probably need to work more until this thing launches. So when we launched Soul Gen, eight hours a day, my day was dedicated towards working in the office, setting up, working on the business. And then I spent every evening in customers homes closing deals. Every evening I was working 12 to 14 hours a day, six days a week until that thing got off the ground. Right. Like, you're probably just not taking enough action. And the action that you're taking is just busy work to tell yourself that you're taking the action. Because there's a lot of people that do that. Right. Like, we want to lie to ourselves like, well, I'm working and it's just not working. No bull crap. You're not working. You're just, you're not even like mentally there. Right. You're just there hitting DMs and expecting different results.

[Daryl]

It's usually you're finding an activity that keeps you busy so you don't have to do the other activity. Right, right.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And so that's where, like, if you can't hold yourself accountable to that, that's where you get a partner involved. A partner that can compliment you, has at least an eye. You can have a DI isc, whatever it may be, probably someone who's more dialed in on the marketing Legion side. And this is where you say, hey, I'm going to do this. Hold me accountable to it. And there can be a lot of power in that.

[Chris]

Yeah, there's a ton of power in partners. And there's a variety of ways that you can get partners. You can either have an equity partner, you can hire a consultant, you can hire a coach. Right. Like, these are all different ways for us, we've always preferred the partner approach. So we can be able to like bounce things off of each other. And you know, even when I'm not a hundred percent certain, there's like different certainties and in different ways. But yeah, there's a big balance in, in abilities and character and everything else that's going into it. But then on top of that, it's pain to be in the right rooms. Right. And now I get that you can't afford to be in the right room right now, but like you should be doing everything you can to make additional money so that you can pay. Like there's two things that I would recommend to any person once they started generating a profit. One, you got to do all the action possible to be able to start generating a profit. And then once you start, have profits. There's two things that you invest in. One is more marketing, more paid marketing. Because all, none, none of it should be going into your pocket. It should all be going into building your business. And two is paying to be in the right rooms. And you know, you've done some of this, obviously you had some Tony Robbins and whatnot, but like, dude, like that's, that's where you've got to be. What do you think?

[Daryl]

Yeah. What are you hearing?

[Andrew Schultz]

You're right.

[Chris]

So what are you committed to doing?

[Andrew Schultz]

I'm committed to creating that space of time for doing revenue generating activities. The way you talk about that to me, like the words are being more resourceful. I've got to find the ways that are going to work in my business, in my market. And it's not doing it for a month and then looking at results, it's every single day, you know, where's the money today? Where could I get money today?

[Daryl]

It's a science, scientific approach. You test, you measure. Test, you measure. You test, you measure. You're not getting a result. You need to do a new test, a new structure, a new program, a new opportunity.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

So you committed to doing those RGAs. What else?

[Andrew Schultz]

I'm committed to doing the RGAs. I'm committed to. What else do we talk about?

[Daryl]

We talked about partners, we talked about lead gen, talked about standardizing your offer, hiring salespeople.

[Chris]

Standardizing your offer, which is.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Simplifying your offer.

[Andrew Schultz]

That's already. Yeah, that's already a work in progress. I will continue to do that. Salespeople, I think will. I think I'll try to go the.

[Daryl]

How do you know you'll have the right offer?

[Andrew Schultz]

When it's a no brainer for my market?

[Daryl]

I think one thing I do is I'd reach out to people that are potential clients. Say, hey, can I run something by you? I'm trying to set this up. Structure the right way. Are you, Would you be interested in something like this?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Like.

[Chris]

Or if you're in my position, how would you structure this offer?

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

Get market feedback. People will give it to you if you reach out to the right people in the right way. Like there's so much information, so much value in what people are experiencing and most people assure that pretty freely.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Daryl]

And if they won't, they're usually the type of person you don't want to hear from anyway, so.

[Chris]

All right. All right. Well Andrew, we appreciate you coming in, making the trip up from, from Utah, coming to the studio. Hopefully what we've been able to provide has been of value and that you have a, a strong game plan forward. And you know the biggest thing is just realize you know you talked about things that work like in your fitness and everything else like these same principles apply in business. You've just got to do it like you know it works in fitness. You just got to work until you know it works in business. Right. And so like that's really the key in allowing the same principles to impact the side of the business. So appreciate your time. Thanks for joining us on the show.

[Daryl]

Yep.

[Andrew Schultz]

Thank you.