Rory Vaden: Nobody Got Rich with Multiple Income Streams.

Summary

Episode Overview

Title: Rory Vaden: Nobody Got Rich with Multiple Income Streams
Podcast: The Amy Porterfield Show
Host: Amy Porterfield
Guest: Rory Vaden, NYT bestselling author, Hall of Fame speaker, co-founder of Brand Builders Group
Date: June 18, 2026

This episode centers on the myth of “multiple streams of income” as a recipe for business success and instead makes the case for extreme clarity and focus—on a single audience, single problem, and one main revenue stream. Amy and Rory dig deep on how chronic overachievement leads to "priority dilution" and why building a focused personal brand is the long-term solution for both clarity and lasting business results.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Trap of "Priority Dilution"

• Definition: Rory explains “priority dilution” as the overachiever’s version of procrastination—being busy and productive but failing to move the business forward.
• Classic procrastination: Consciously delaying important tasks
• Creative avoidance: Unconsciously filling the day with low-impact work
• Priority dilution: "Not because of laziness or apathy, but because of interruption." (Rory, 04:23)
• Example: Small business owners, especially those working from home, tend not to be interrupted by team, but by daily life—kids, chores, emails, etc.—and by spreading themselves too thin across multiple activities.
• Insight: “When you have diluted focus, you get diluted results.” (Rory, 07:37)

Timestamp: 03:12 - 06:42

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2. Misunderstanding Branding

• Brand Clarity: Most people think of brand as visuals—logos, colors, fonts, social media.
• Rory’s Definition: “The formalization and the digitization of your reputation.” (Rory, 08:02)
• The central tenet: Brand is what you are known for; your reputation and unique contribution.

Notable Quote:
“Find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others.” – Larry Wingett, quoted by Rory (08:33)

Timestamp: 07:29 - 10:23

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3. Find Your Uniqueness to Find Your Focus

• Process: Identify what you are uniquely qualified to do and throw yourself into serving others with that.
• Who vs. What: Instead of starting with what you do or why, start with who you're serving.
  “The moment you are clear on who you are talking to, every single other downstream decision becomes clear.” (Rory, 12:18)
• Downstream Impact: Knowing your "who" determines everything: platform choice, content, offerings, pricing, etc.

Timestamp: 10:23 - 13:34

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4. The Dangers of Multiple Avatars & Problems

• Multiple Avatars: Trying to serve two completely different “ideal customers?” “You’re screwed.” (Rory, 13:50)
  • Exception: Same topic, different experience levels.
• One Problem, One Word: The core question every personal brand must answer is: “What problem do you solve? (in one word)”
• Examples: Brene Brown owns “shame,” Dave Ramsey owns “debt,” Rory’s company owns “obscurity.”
• Clarity Benefits: Knowing your unique problem and audience brings content, hiring, and decision-making clarity.

Timestamp: 13:34 - 19:02

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5. Why You Must Lead With the Problem, Not the Solution

• Marketing Misstep: Most people promote solutions (what they teach/create), but buyers are only tuned into their immediate problems.
• “You don’t market the solution. You market the problem and the payoff, not the vehicle.” (Rory, 24:50)
• Specificity is what cuts through the noise—broadcast a clear, narrow problem that your audience can recognize immediately.

Analogy:
“It’s not the intensity or volume, it’s the specificity of the signal.” (Rory, 20:20)

Timestamp: 19:10 - 25:21

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6. The Biggest Brand & Business Mistake: Chasing Multiple Streams of Income

• Myth Busting: "Having multiple streams of income is the stupidest advice on the Internet today." (Rory, 28:54)
• Real Wealth Creation: Every billionaire and successful entrepreneur got rich from one amazing stream, then diversified.
• Amy's Example: $60 million from a single course (DCA). Focusing on one thing brings mastery, reputation, and opportunities.
• Reality: Every new revenue stream comes with 8 new jobs (marketing, sales, delivery, customer service, HR, IT/Operations, administration, finance).
  • Solopreneurs usually end up putting their name in all boxes (32:58)

Memorable Exchange:
"Amy? Yeah. A lot of my listeners... they're putting their name in everything." (Amy, 33:03)

Timestamp: 28:43 - 36:28

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7. Discipline, Enjoyment, & Doing What It Takes

• Story: Rory’s mom: “Enjoying it isn’t a requirement of doing it.” (35:43)
• Not about building a business you hate, but accepting that mastery and wealth means doing lots of things you don’t enjoy—at least until you can afford help/hire out.

Quote:
"90% of ‘do what it takes’ is not necessarily going to be the stuff you love..." (Amy, 37:03)

Timestamp: 36:28 - 38:26

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8. The Future: AI & the Importance of Humanness in Brands

• Brand Implications: As the world gets more artificial, humanness and personality will become your uniqueness and advantage.
• Real stories, in-person experiences, visible personality—these cannot be replicated by AI.
• “People can build an AI avatar in about 10 seconds… but you can never meet it in real life.” (Rory, 39:49)
• Business Implications:
  • The central challenge: “How do I help my customers succeed faster?” (Rory, 41:37)
  • Shift from charging for “the how” to charging for results.
  • People pay for application, not information.

Timestamp: 38:26 - 44:56

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9. Practical Brand Building Next Steps

• Rory’s company, Brand Builders Group, offers a free first call to help listeners get clear on their brand problem and path forward:
  freebrandcall.com/amyporterfield

Timestamp: 44:56 - 46:45

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Most Memorable Quotes

• "Nobody got rich from multiple streams of income. Everybody who got rich got rich from one amazing stream of income." (Rory, 28:59)
• "When you have diluted focus, you get diluted results." (Rory, 07:37)
• "Find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others." (Larry Wingett via Rory, 08:33)
• "If you are serving two completely different type of people, you're screwed." (Rory, 13:50)
• "People don’t pay for information. They pay for organization and application." (Rory, 43:51)
• "As the world becomes increasingly artificial, more and more our humanness is going to become our uniqueness." (Rory, 39:36)
• "Do what it takes to get what you want, and 90%... is not necessarily going to be the stuff you love..." (Amy, 37:03)
• "The best marketing in the world is a transformed life." (Rory, 46:45)

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Key Actionable Frameworks & Exercises

• Brand Focus Matrix: List your revenue streams as columns and 8 core business functions as rows (Marketing, Sales, Delivery, Customer Service, HR, IT/Operations, Admin, Finance). Who owns each box? If it’s all you, too many streams!
• One Word Problem: Can your whole team agree on the one problem you solve—in a single word? Try this exercise for clarity (Amy, 22:35 - 22:52)
• Lead with Problem: Audit your social content for two weeks. Are you leading with solutions or problems? Shift accordingly.

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Closing Thoughts

Amy’s summary echoes the episode’s main lesson:

“When you’re unclear on what you’re known for, you end up trying to do everything... Diluted focus gives you diluted results. The fix is clarity. One word problem, one audience, one message. When you get that, everything else gets easier.” (47:18)

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Useful Links

• Brand Clarity Free Call: freebrandcall.com/amyporterfield

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Transcript

[A]

Before we jump in, I want to share something exciting. In the next few weeks, I'm going to be curating a small group of women who are already making 500k or more annually to help them grow toward their first million and beyond. It's called the Millie Club. Here's what I know. What gets you to high six figures stops there. If this is you, you know that because you've already tried it all. And you need someone inside your business showing you the way forward. So over six months, you, you'll work with me personally, plus my team and each other to refine your business model, prepare for hiring, simplify your operations, and build a business that grows more sustainably, profitably and independently of you. Applications and details are waiting for [e-mail] forward slash club. But I have to warn you, spots will go fast.

[B]

It feels like I'm constantly fighting fire. The harder I work, the more I feel like I fall behind. Because this is the stupidest advice on the Internet. Today is having multiple streams of income. Everybody who got rich got rich from one amazing stream of income. More and more our humanness is going to become our uniqueness.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And the question is simply, how do I help my customers succeed faster? The best marketing in the world is a transformed life.

[A]

My guest today is a dear friend of mine.

[B]

One of them goes, that one over there, she's big money.

[A]

And it was my guest today. Her name is Amy Porterfield.

[B]

Amy Porterfield, the ever amazing best selling

[A]

author of two weeks notice.

[B]

Ms. Amy Porterfield.

[A]

The harder you work, the more behind you feel. You're showing up every day. You're putting in the hours, you're doing more than most people would ever be willing to do. And somehow the work that would actually move your business forward still isn't getting done. If you've ever ended your day exhausted and thought I did so much. So why does it feel like nothing really changed? This episode is going to hit home because the problem isn't that you're not working hard enough. It's that your focus is scattered. My guest today, Rory Vaden, has a name for this. He calls it priority dilution. It's the overachiever's form of procrastination. It doesn't look like procrastination, it looks like productivity. But the result is the same. Your most important work keeps getting pushed to the side. Rory is a New York Times bestselling author, hall of fame speaker, and co founder of Brand builders group. His TEDx talk on multiplying time has been viewed over 5 million times, and this is his third time on the show. But this conversation is different. Today we're talking about why so many high achievers feel stuck even when they're doing everything right. And how getting clear on your personal brand can completely change the way your business grows. Before we dive in, if you're watching on YouTube, hit subscribe, so you do not miss episodes like this. And if you're listening on your favorite podcast app, follow the show so new episodes show up automatically. Let's get to it. Well, hello, Rory. Welcome to the show.

[B]

Hi, buddy. Good to be here. So great to be here.

[A]

I'm so excited to jump in. Okay, so here's where I want to start. Why do you think the most hardworking entrepreneurs feel the most stuck, even when they feel like they're doing all the things?

[B]

Yeah, so in my. In my first book, take the Stairs, I talked about three different types of procrastination. And I think entrepreneurs today are dealing with the third one, and they don't even realize it's happening. Okay, so classic procrastination is consciously delaying what you know you should be doing. Okay, we know what that is.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Creative avoidance is unconsciously filling your day with menial work or trivia work. But what chronic overachievers struggle with is something called priority dilution. Okay, and priority dilution can be conscious or unconscious, but it's. It's the same net result as classic procrastination that at the end of the day, you leave the office with your most significant priorities left incomplete, not because of laziness or apathy, but because of interruption. Entrepreneurs and small business owners specifically, they run the risk of falling victim to whatever is latest and loudest. The term that they always say is, it feels like I'm constantly fighting fires, right? I'm putting out fires. And the harder I work, the more I feel like I fall behind because I'm responding to everybody else and I'm not getting any of my own things done. And so it's the. It's the new procrastination. It's the chronic overachievers procrastination. It's the small business owners procrastination. And it is. It is a constant state of interruption. Priority dilution. And I think that's what we're facing today more than ever before in history.

[A]

I think you're absolutely right. But I want to put it into context for who's listening. A lot of the women that are listening, they don't have big teams. They're working with some contractors they're doing all the things, but they're not necessarily being interrupted by team members saying, hey, can you review this or can you look at that?

[B]

Sure.

[A]

So what do you think is interrupting them the most?

[B]

Well, I mean, a lot of times it's the house stuff. Right. It's like the, the, the, the, maybe the cleaners are here or I have to, the cleaning, it's the laundry, it's the meal prep, it's the kids, you know, come running in. It's husband needs something. It's somebody's here to work on the tv. It's, it's, it's all of those things. And the interruptions are still virtual. Right. Think about this way. Most small business owners probably organize their inbox in a way where the most recent email is at the top.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But if you ask any successful business owner, they will tell you that very rarely is the most recent request the most important item to deal with.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And yet we literally organize and structure our lives and the center of our attention is where the most recent thing gets our attention first. That's the opposite of how scaling really successful business owners work. They protect their attention, they protect their time, they protect their energy and focus first on the things that matter most. But if you don't do that deliberately, there's just this barrage and it's all sorts of stuff. It's the kids homework, it's where are we going on our vacation. It's, it, it's just a barrage, a never ending barrage. And some of its team, some of its clients, some of it is software updates. Some of it is your favorite email newsletter. You know, when, when Amy has a new podcast. Okay, of course, of course you want that, the list, we want that at the top of the list.

[A]

But I also think, you know, yes, it's the personal stuff, especially when you're working from home, everything comes at you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But also a lot of my listeners, they're doing so, so many things. So they have their hands in this program and that product and doing this and doing that. And so all of that's coming at them and they really struggle with what should I focus on now? And tell me if I'm wrong, but I think one of your solutions, one of your fixes to this priority dilution is brand. Okay, so go there. Because first of all, we need to set up brand. A lot of people think, and I thought this for years, a brand is what you do on Instagram and your visibility, like what is brand? And then let's talk about how that could be A fix for priority dilution.

[B]

Yes, absolutely. Okay, so I think this is relevant because if you think about branding the wrong way, it's going to cause you to be more distracted.

[A]

Yes. Yeah. Yes.

[B]

If you think about branding as a lot of people do, as, like, your colors, your logos, your fonts, your website, your TikTok, your short form, your podcast, like your. Your various products that you sell, you're literally going to be distracted. And when you have diluted focus, you get diluted results. Okay, the way that we think about branding, right, the way that we actually define it, is simply the formalization and the digitization of your reputation.

[A]

Okay, one more time.

[B]

Formalization and the digitization of your reputation. So we want you to think about your reputation. What is reputation? It is what you are known for. It is, what do people say about you? And the best piece of personal branding advice that I've ever received, and we've talked about this before, came from a gentleman named Larry Wingett. And he said, the goal is to find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others.

[A]

Okay. I've heard you say this before, and it kind of takes me a moment to take it in, so that word exploit really throws me off.

[B]

Oh, really?

[A]

Yeah. So say it one more time.

[B]

Sure. Find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Right. So it basically means to go, let me figure out, how can I be most helpful and how can I be most useful to the world? And then I'm going to throw myself relentlessly in the direction of that one thing. It's realizing that my highest value as a person is to be the highest value to other people that I can be. And that creates focus when I ask myself questions. And this, of course, is like, the work that we do with people is we take them through all of these introspective questions, like, what have you earned the right to talk about? What are you the best in the world at? What can you do that nobody else can do quite like you? Those types of things, it forces you to hone in and figure out, like, what audience can I serve in the deepest way? And so you become more focused on being who you already are, leaning into your strengths, and you are able to ignore and pay less attention to what the world is throwing at you of, like, you should be doing AI and you have to be doing this and that and this and then 5,000 things and chasing 5,000 income streams and talking to all these different types of audiences on all these platforms, trying to monetize in all of these different ways where you just feel overwhelmed and you feel exhausted and you don't even feel all that clear on what is the. What is your uniqueness? So we know when we can help someone find their uniqueness. It. Focus is the byproduct. Like, clarity is the byproduct. And that is a big part of what breaks you free of priority dilution.

[A]

So you're saying that when you get really clear on your uniqueness. Well, would you agree with this? That your focus is like. And you can really hone in on what you do, right? Meaning all that other stuff kind of gets more quiet in your head.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And that's huge because people are listening right now, and it is really noisy in their head. And also, Rory, they're being told they should do this and that by experts like us. You should do this and you should do that. And they're like, where should I even focus?

[B]

Right? Or what should I do next?

[A]

Or what should I do next? Should I do first?

[B]

What are the. What are the things that matter the most?

[A]

And you're saying if you can get really clear on your uniqueness, you know where to focus. Give me an example of someone you've worked with that finally got clear and they were able to then get more focus. Can you think of something?

[B]

Well, there's a. There's a. There's a bunch of people that I can think of. But let me, let me talk about it like this too. I'll give you an example, okay? A tactical example that will apply to everybody. If you go on social media and you think about what should I say? Right? It's like, immediately the whole world of topics is open.

[A]

Like, yes.

[B]

Should I be personal? Should I be professional? Should I talk about my kids? Should I talk about what I'm doing this weekend? Should I talk about my business? Should I talk about my customers? Right? Like all. There's an infinite world of possibilities when you ask, what should I do? And if you look at the world around you, you see other creators who are all being successful doing all of these different things. Someone's are doing cat videos. Some are doing like random rants to the camera. Some are teaching very formal and like, you know, proper. And what we figured out is that you shouldn't start with what you shouldn't start with, why, you should start with who. You start with who you are talking to. The moment you are clear on who you are talking to, every single other downstream decision becomes clear.

[A]

Amen. Totally agree.

[B]

So I go, once I know who I'm talking to, I know exactly where I should post. I know what questions I should address. I know what fears they have. I know what my lead magnet should be. I know what products I should sell. I know how much I should price them. I know what needs to be included in them. I know how long it needs to take. I know if it needs to be virtual or in person. Why? Because it all revolves around that who. So from a tactical, pragmatic perspective, being super clear on your brand messaging and your brand positioning of who am I serving, everything else becomes clear. Contrast that with somebody who says, I want to help everybody. Yeah, right. And you're like, well, then you're talking about all the topics on all the platforms, on all the. All the days and all the different things, trying to sell all these different products, trying to monetize in too many different ways, and you're going to bounce off the wall and you're going to be exhausted because you're. You're literally throwing stuff everywhere and there's not focus. So you start with who. That will give you a tremendous amount of focus. Doesn't. Doesn't matter. You know, it doesn't matter who we're working with. And the who is different for all of us, but the fact that we must know our who is something we all have in common.

[A]

Here's a question I always get asked when I bring this up because I 100% agree with you. When. Well, Amy, what if I have two different ideal customer avatars? I have this group over here, but I also have this group over here, and I can't talk to them. Exactly the same. What do you say to something like that?

[B]

Okay, if you are serving two completely different type of people, you're screwed.

[A]

Amen.

[B]

You agree you are wrong. It is. It's not wrong. I can't say it's wrong, but I can tell you you are going to have mediocre results trying to serve two people. Now, here's the caveat. It's different if I'm selling bull riding lessons and ballroom dancing. You can't do that. Well, right now. If I'm selling, if I'm. If I'm talking about the same topic, but to two people who are at a different experience level that, yes, now we can do it. Right.

[A]

Okay. Yeah.

[B]

So I can't talk to, like, you know, single moms and then also, like, married couples at the same time.

[A]

Okay. So I wanted to bring that up because bull riding or whatever you said, very different.

[B]

Very.

[A]

But a lot of my audience will say, yeah, I'm talking to the single mom and then the married couple. Let me give you a great example. I have a student where this is really interesting. She's a therapist and she works with the person that cheated in the marriage.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

She works with the two people, one cheating, one married, or the one that's cheating and the one that's having the affair. And then she works with the one that was cheated on. She has three different ICAs. And so. And which is, you know, a challenge for her. And one thing I told her is we need to find the primary for sure. The primary person you're talking to. I believe you can have a primary and then a secondary.

[B]

Yes, me too.

[A]

You agree with that?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

But back to your point, it's all around the same topic.

[B]

Totally.

[A]

Which is having an affair.

[B]

Yeah. And really I would say that what your real audience there, it's, it's, it's couples struggling with a marital affair.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

That's your one thing. Right. So yeah, who it is changes. But that's like, that's really what we're going after. That's what they all have in common. And then I think the other thing is experience levels. Right. So it's like, you know, we work with a lot of, I mean, we work with personal brands, but we work with a lot of speakers, authors, coaches. But you know, specifically if somebody wants to become a speaker or become like, and speak on the world's biggest stages or to become a best selling author, it's like arguably we do that good as anyone in the world.

[A]

Right? Yeah.

[B]

And so you go, I can help if you're an aspiring speaker, no problemo. Right, but. And if you're the most advanced. Right. Like we go all the way up the experience level, but it's the same. Personal branding is still the same topic, is still the same narrow thing.

[A]

Yes. Okay, so we're on the same page there. So you're saying you need to speak to one person.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

You also talk about one problem. So talk to me about branding and your. The way you look at it, one person you're speaking to with one problem. Right. Why is that one problem so important?

[B]

Because of focus. Right. If, if you're trying to, if you're trying to solve a thousand different things, it's like you're gonna bounce off the wall. If you can become the world's leading authority on blank. Right. Brene Brown is the world's leading authority on shame. She owns the topic of shame. Dave Ramsey owns the topic of debt. Mel Robbins has been talking for years about anxiety and her Panic attacks. Right. So if you can own a problem, it makes you a narrow, a narrow, it gives you narrow focus, which helps you become a deeper expert. Right. So it's part of it is going, what audience can I serve in the deepest way? And what problems am I most equipped to help them solve? So most personal brands cannot answer this question, what problem do you solve in one word? And that is like a huge part of the genesis of building your personal brand, particularly monetizing your personal brand. Because what people pay money for is solutions to problems. Right? And so if I can position myself in the market as a solution to a problem, then people will always have money to buy what I'm selling. If I am a luxury, people will buy only when they have extra money. And so that's why, when some people can thrive in any economy and other people feel this like up and down roller coaster of like, you know, riding with, with the wave of, of the economy. So if the question is, can you do that? Can you answer the question, what problem do I solve in one word? I'll give you example. Brand Builders Group. Yeah, we only solve one problem, Obscurity. That's the only thing we do is we, we help mission driven messengers. That's our who, okay. Practically speaking, it's experts. We help experts overcome obscurity to become wealthy and well known. That's it. That's all we do. Right. So there's a lot of things that we teach on that journey, but we have one avatar, mission driven messenger, who struggles with one problem, Obscurity. They want to achieve one thing, notoriety. And that through line gives us clarity about what content we should create, who we should hire, what systems we need to build, what platforms we should be on, what we should say, you know, what podcast interviews we say yes to and which ones that we don't. So it gives you a tremendous amount of clarity and it helps you make decisions. But if you don't have that, you're going to struggle with priority, priority dilution. You're just reactive to everything coming at you.

[A]

That one word is so, so hard. We've been trying to do it in our business ever since you taught us that. Why one word? Just because of the clarity of it?

[B]

Yeah, I, I think part of it is the academic rigor it requires you to really go through. And I think the, and so part of it is for your team to focus and have clarity on. But the bigger reason is because the problem that you solve is the signal you send out in the marketplace. So here's a, here's a. I'll call it a mistake that a lot of personal brands make. They're so passionate about their topic, they want to go teach the solution and they want to go tell everyone the solution. Yes. Okay. And I did this early in my career. Self discipline was my passion. And, you know, my very first book was all about the psychology of building self discipline. I was like, my company was called Discipline Dynamic, and I was like, discipline Dynamic.

[A]

And.

[B]

And it was super clear. But nobody bought it because nobody wants that, even though they need it. But when you, if you think, here's the, here's the like analogy. If, if we're in a crowded room and we're all talking and there's this murmur, right? And it's like a networking event or something, and then someone says, amy, you immediately. You immediately hear it, right? When someone says your name, it. It literally is enough to yank you from one conversation and immediately pull you to another. And it's not the intensity of the signal that matters. It's not the volume of the signal. It's the specificity of the signal that yanks your attention. When I put a specific problem out there in the world, a very narrow issue, and, you know, there's a lot of people listening, a lot of people watching. When I say obscurity, most of your audience said, ah, that. That maybe is not my issue, but some percentage of your audience just went, oh, my gosh, that's what I need. I am. I am struggling. I'm the world's best kept secret. I have expertise and a calling inside of myself to share my message with the world. I know I can help people, but I'm. I'm. I'm the world's best kept secret. I'm struggling with obscurity. There's a small percentage of the audience that goes, that's what I need. And so it's the intent, the specificity of the signal that really matters. So when you're able to broadcast, right? When Dave Ramsey is able to say, you know, debt is dumb, right? Then you go, oh, my gosh, I'm in debt. I need Dave Ramsey. Or you meet your friend, you know, all my friends in debt, hey, you need Dave Ramsey like we. That message transmits because of its specificity. So it's, it's. The power is in how specific it is for you as a team and guiding you and what you're doing. But also in the marketplace where people respond, we ignore the billboard that, that says, you know, you need a new water heater. Until our water heater is Broken. And then we see it. It's literally neuroscience. It's your reticular activating system that we're talking about here. This collection of, you know, brain cells that. That all operate and they notice when you have an issue, you start. You start tuning in. But if I'm not broadcasting a signal of what I can help you solve, then people, they don't tune in, they don't hear it, and everything is a fight.

[A]

In my marketing, everything becomes a fight. Two things that you made me think of. Number one, a really fun exercise that we did with our team is we said. I went to my leadership team and I said, what? In one word, what do we solve?

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Okay. So everyone came back with something a little bit different. So right away we're like, okay, we've got some work to do on that. So anyone listening, if you want to know, where do I start with that one word. If you have a little team, ask around and start the conversation.

[B]

Because.

[A]

Because we'll get there. But that was a little eye opening to me.

[B]

It's hard.

[A]

My team feels that way. Imagine my audience, right.

[B]

If. If we're not clearly broadcasting it, then how clear is it being received in the market? It's just. It's tough.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

And it doesn't mean you won't be able to survive, but it means you maybe are not reaching your optimum level of potential.

[A]

Exactly. And I've recently done a kind of a rebrand, a pivot. So I think, you know, courses would probably. I don't know if that's a problem,

[B]

but certainly the topic that you've been. You've owned for a long, long time.

[A]

So as that shifts, I have some work to do to kind of move with that. And I think it takes time as well. I don't think this happens overnight. Another thing you said, though, you know how you were talking about discipline and that was your. Your thing.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

It's so interesting you talked about you can't lead with that per se, because we. We were leading with the solution on social media, and Morgan, who is my content manager, she caught this where we were leading with predictable revenue. That's the solution. You need predictable revenue for a training I'm doing. But we realized if we lead with the problem that they are facing and pull them in that way, then they understand the solution and they're there. We were leading with the solution, and it makes a huge difference because when,

[B]

when you promote the solution, people are immediately going to judge whether or not they agree with it.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And by definition, they're already not good at it. They already. And so they're not going to see the value of it. If they saw the value of it, then they would have already solved the problem themselves and they would not have it. Yes. So you don't market the solution. You. You market. So the solution is what we would call the vehicle. That's how you get there. Right. Predictable revenue is like, okay, that's the thing. Now what we want to do is we want to market. We want to market the problem and we want to market the payoff and the destination and not. Not the vehicle. Now, predictable revenue is a little bit of a payoff.

[A]

So yeah, there's something there.

[B]

Yeah, it's not horrible. But discipline is not a destination, it's a vehicle. And so that was like a horrible mistake. And I struggled for years because I was like, discipline dynamic. And nobody was like, no, thanks, man. You know, but even though they need it.

[A]

Yeah, that's the thing. For those listening, we know they need it. That is not the question here. But it's almost like, you know, where you give them what they want and

[B]

then sell them what. You sell them what they want and give them what they need.

[A]

It's a little bit like that very sense. It is exactly that.

[B]

Yeah, it's exactly that. And any of you who have kids, right, I have two little kids at home. It's just like we put the broccoli inside the scramp, like inside the omelet to get the kids to eat. If we need them to take vitamins, like, we crunch it up in a smoothie. Like, yes, we, you, you, you have to do that. And that is, it's. That's a service to people. It's making the. It's making the hard thing palatable.

[A]

Quick interruption, but we'll be back soon. Earlier I mentioned the Millie Club, my private coaching program for female founders earning 500k or more annually. Well, I wanted you to hear what happened. For one founder and after joining, her name is Sarah, and here's what she said. When our business was on track to end the year in the red, joining the Millie Club felt like a leap of faith. And it turned out to be the smartest move we've ever made. One conversation with Amy gave us the clarity and strategy we needed to refine our offer and completely transform our results. By the end of that year, our revenue had doubled, our profit margin hit 3, 30%, and our business was stronger than ever. The Millie Club truly changed the trajectory of our company. How good is that? That's what happens when you get outside eyes on your business strategy from someone who's done what you want to do, and a community of women who understand the complexity of growing to seven figures. So if you're earning over 500k annually in your business and you've already tried it all, and head to amyporterfield.comclub to apply. I'll be in touch personally soon.

[B]

It's making the hard thing digestible. Because guess what? Being successful in anything requires you doing things you don't want to do. By the way, that's where the Take the Stairs book title came from. The whole metaphor is all of success comes down to doing things you don't want to do. So as business owners, we're trying to. We're trying to help people do things they don't want to do.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And by the way, my career changed the moment I start. I stopped marketing discipline and I stopped. I started marketing procrastination. That was when my speaking career took off. That was when everything took off, was because I went from trying to be the world's leading authority on discipline to the world's leading expert on procrastination. And by the way, what that led me to create was three different types of procrastination, one of which is priority dilution, which we're talking about today. When people hear discipline, they go, ooh, yeah, I know that probably good, but I don't want it. But the moment I say priority dilution, they go, oh, crap, that's me. I'm. I have, I have that. And if they go, I have that, then they go, I need you to solve that. That's why we market the problem and that's why there's gotta be specificity about the problem.

[A]

So those listening, I want you to look at your social media, like let's say the last two weeks, and look at where you've been really focusing on the solution versus the problem. With. Once you know this, don't you agree? You just, you see it right away,

[B]

you'll see it faster.

[A]

Once it was pointed out to me, I'm like, oh, I get it. Yeah. And you never go back, which is great. Okay, so talk to me about some mistakes you see people make with a personal brand or just branding in general, because this is your expertise and you've seen a lot of mistakes. But what are some that like, really rise to the top?

[B]

Okay, can I share with you the number one mistake that I'm going to? I'm going to. Somebody's going to get mad at me. You Might get someone writing on the show. When I tell you this, I'm nervous.

[A]

Okay?

[B]

This is the stupidest advice on the Internet today, is having multiple streams of income.

[A]

Rory. Yes. Amen. Multiple streams of income. I feel guilty because years ago, I did an episode where this woman had, like, 10, and I interviewed her, acting like it's a great thing. I want to take the episode down because I fully am against it.

[B]

Talk, buddy. Nobody who got rich. Okay? And, and, and, and, okay, I don't want to sound like a jerk, but I'm just gonna say this, right? I have seven billionaire clients, seven clients who are private clients that are worth a billion with a B. We've got dozens of hundred millionaires. And. And then. And then we have people who are just starting out in our community, right? So we got a vast community, but nobody who got rich. Nobody got rich from multiple streams of income. Everybody who got rich got rich from. From one amazing stream of income. And then once you're rich, then you diversify, Then you spread it around and you put your money to work from you. But for you. But in the beginning, right? I mean, Jeff Bezos made all his money from one place. Amazon. Bill Gates made it from Microsoft. Even Elon Musk, he does a bazillion things today. But in the beginning, he made his money from PayPal, right? Sarah Blakely made all of her money from Spanx. You know, our friend Jamie Kern Lima was one of our dear friends. She made her money from it. Cosmetics, like, these are not people who got rich from a thousand different things. It's one thing. You don't need multiple streams of crappy income. You need one amazing stream of income. And the smaller you are as a business, the more important it is to have fewer streams of income. So can I share a framework, please? Okay. Okay.

[A]

Oh, I love a framework.

[B]

Okay, so this is. This is. This is actually a pretty advanced framework. Okay? This. We teach this inside of phase four, which is where we talk about scaling, okay? But if. If you were. So in every business, it doesn't matter if you're a solopreneur or you're a Fortune 100 company. We make the argument that all businesses have eight departments. Eight. Eight core functions, no matter the size of the business. There is marketing, then there is sales, right? So marketing tells people. Marketing, sales, delivery, customer service, operations, and it, Then human resources, then administration, and then finance. So marketing has to tell people that you exist. Sales has to convert them to customers. Delivery has to satisfy those customers. Customer service has to deal with unhappy customers. Then you got to have human resources hires all the people to do all that operations, and it gives you all the systems for all that. And then you got administration deals with all the legal and strategy, and then finance counts up the money from all of those activities. So you have eight core functions. Now, for every revenue stream you add, and I want you to think about this like a grid, okay? So the eight departments I just listed, these are your rows. Marketing, sales, delivery. Okay, those are your rows. Now, every single time you add a new revenue stream, you're going to add a column. Revenue stream. One, revenue stream two, revenue stream three. For every single revenue stream you have, those eight things must exist. They have to. You cannot operate a successful revenue stream without somebody checking off those eight things for every revenue stream. So if you're a small business, here's what I want you to do. I want you to put somebody's name in those boxes. So list out all of your revenue streams as columns, and then list those eight departments as rows. It's going to give you a grid of empty boxes. And one person's name needs to go in every box to say, I own marketing for this product. I own sales for that product. I own customer service for that product. And if you don't have someone's name from your team in that box, guess whose name goes in that box.

[A]

Amy? Yeah. A lot of my years listening, they're putting their name in everything.

[B]

They put their name in every box.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So how can you, the smaller you are, how can you have multiple streams of income where you have to. For every stream of income, you have at least eight jobs.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Right. When you add a stream of income, we tend to think, oh, I'll just add more income. No, you add eight jobs. At least a minimum of eight jobs for every stream of income. And if you're a solopreneur, you got two people or five people. Like we, we, we.

[A]

We've.

[B]

We've had clients that have more revenue streams than they have employees. It's not going to work. No, it's not going to work. You need to cut back and have one amazing stream of income. And you're actually, you know, so, so you're a great example of this. Yeah, you had a great, You've been a great example of one stream of income. Like, you took one product, dca, and you sold the crap out of that thing over and over and over, and you had it dialed in and you had affiliates and you had a community, and you answered every single question everybody could possibly have about how to Sell it, how to fulfill it, how to market it. And you guys optimize and optimize and optimize. And, you know, I don't know how much you've made, but 60 million, 61 million.

[A]

And 60 million.

[B]

60 million in revenue.

[A]

Yes. From one course. And here. And here's what is. I really want to point out two things. One, you get really good at what you do.

[B]

Bingo.

[A]

And then doors start to open. You get invited to the stages. You get invited to the podcast. Success magazine wants to write about you. Like this really happens because they know what you stand for. So that I. I will stand on that hill forever. But also, Rory, what people don't talk about and why it doesn't happen a lot is entrepreneurs like variety, and they get bored. And were there times that I did not want to talk about courses? Absolutely. And I didn't want to answer the same question a million times, but I did, because two things. One, I like to be known for something. One, I made a bigger impact. Two, I made a lot of money from it. And number two, I didn't want to be pulled in a million directions. So I'm really passionate about this topic. I think it makes a huge difference.

[B]

Well, clearly it did. Clearly it does. And. And look, this is. Let's get. Okay, I'm gonna. I'm gonna upset more people with this. Okay, Let me tell a story about my mom.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Okay. So when I was five years old, I was raised by a single mom. And When I was 5, my mom put me in martial arts. And so I started studying martial arts.

[A]

I just saw you with like a little karate.

[B]

Oh, yeah, I was. I was a little karate man. And so by age 10, I had been become the youngest black belt in Colorado to ever get beaten up by a girl in a tournament. This is a true story.

[A]

I did not think this is where it was going.

[B]

I lost to a girl badly. She beat me badly. And I was like, mom, I don't like this. This isn't fun. This sucks. Like, I don't enjoy this. And my mom said something to me that changed my life. She said, that's okay, Rory. Enjoying it isn't a requirement of doing it. Enjoying it doesn't factor into the equation. Doesn't have to factor into the equation. Now, I'm not saying you should hate your job. I think you should love what you do, and that's part of why you being an entrepreneur. But I can guarantee you, every single successful entrepreneur has a long list of crap they had to do that they didn't enjoy doing.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

So whether or not you like it kind of is irrelevant. It's like, we're going to be successful or not. That's what it comes down to. And you're a great example of someone who did that.

[A]

I always quote Layla Hermosi. She says, do what it takes to get what you want. And 90% of do what it takes is not necessarily going to be the stuff you love, but the stuff you do love. Really pay attention to that because it makes a difference. But. And this is a. This is a touchy topic because people then hear, Amy, you want me to do things I don't love. You want me to build a business I hate. I don't think you and I have. We hate.

[B]

No.

[A]

But every day I probably do one or two things I don't want to do. And Hobie hears it.

[B]

Totally.

[A]

And then he tells me to go talk to my boss and I have to look in the mirror.

[B]

And then what you do is those are the things you hire out over time.

[A]

Yes, over time.

[B]

And because, believe it or not, like, the stuff you hate to do, somebody freaking loves it.

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

Like, people are always like, oh, man, I hate spreadsheets. I freaking love spreadsheets. Like, give me a spread. I love spreadsheets. Right. And there is somebody who loves doing the thing you hate to do, but until you can afford to pay that person, you have to do it. Your name goes in every box. We call it the T model matrix. Is every box on that that that revenue grid has to be filled out with somebody. And every one of those boxes, there's parts of marketing that suck, there's parts of selling that suck, there's parts of finance that suck. You have to get past that. And that's the barrier. Most people aren't willing to pay the price. And one thing you taught me, Amy, and I lost sight of this because early in my career, you know, I started with take the stairs. And I really started as, like, you know, a motivational speaker of sorts. And then when we sold our first company, we started Brand Builders Group, and I got away from some of that motivation. And I remember you said one time, you said, hey, you need to make sure inside of your course, you include these little motivational pep talks along the way, because people get burned out. And I was like, whoa, I've totally lost sight of that. Of how important it is to, like, people need to be encouraged and they need to be cheered on.

[A]

Yes. Because they. It's so easy to get burned out. Right. And when they hear from Someone like you who's gone before them, and they, you know, what it takes to get there. It helps so very much. So much. You know, Rory, when you were talking, one thing that we haven't really touched on is AI. And there's really. It's hard to have a conversation these days about marketing, branding, or any of it without going there. How do you think AI is going to change how we build our brands and how we scale our businesses in terms of branding?

[B]

Okay, so I'm going to separate that into two questions. You said, how do I think AI is going to affect the future of how we build our brands? And then how do I think AI is going to affect the future of how we build our businesses?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

So let me talk about first. How do we think. How do I think AI is going to change the future of brands? And this is just an opinion, right? Yes.

[A]

I'm curious.

[B]

Nobody knows what's going to happen. I'll be the first to admit. Like, I don't know. Like, I'm a little bit like, we're going on a ride here, folks. But here's what I think. As the world becomes increasingly artificial, more and more our humanness is going to become our uniqueness.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

I think that personal brands should be doubling down on putting more personality, more of their personality into their personal brand. So one of the reasons I'm excited that you're doing a video podcast.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Is people need to see you. They need to see your face, they need to see your expressions, they need to see your gestures. They need to see you interact in the beautiful way you do with other humans, and they need to feel that energy. I think this is a really good move. I think the more you share things about who you are and your life, I think that is really important because people can build an AI avatar in about 10 seconds that can get a whole bunch of followers. But you can never meet it in real life.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

You can never have a conversation with it in real life. And so you can with the human. I also think doubling down on in person experiences. AJ saw this coming about two years ago. We bought a building. We bought an event center. You know, you spoke at it for one of our events.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Because AJ was like, I think the world is going to be craving smaller. Right. Our event space only holds like 60, 70 people classroom. It's really like 50 people in rounds.

[A]

But she was right.

[B]

But she was right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's like we want the intimate human experience. So I think we need to lean into sharing more of our Personality, more of our humanness, more of our failures, more of our stories. That I think is going to matter more because on an information basis, we might lose pretty quickly to AI and made up avatars and just, you know, AI scouring the web and grabbing viral, viral stuff and slapping it together. But you can't, you can't build a relationship with that. So, so I think that's one thing. Now, how do I think AI is going to shape the future of our business? This is a question mark, but I will, I will share with you the question that I am thinking about relentlessly.

[A]

Okay?

[B]

And the question is simply, how do I help my customers succeed faster? That is a question that I wake up and go to bed thinking about. How do I help my customers succeed faster? They used to say, you give away the what and you charge for the how. And that was always very good. And I think now what's happening is we're going to give away the what. We're probably going to give away for the how, and we're going to charge for the result. Because people can learn about AI. Like, what I'm seeing is, right, is like, you can go learn about all this AI and it's like, hey, there's, there's MCPs and there's APIs and there's, there's OAuth and there's, you know, SSO, and all of these things, like you can tell us together. And I think most of my customers at the end of the day are going to be like, yeah, I don't have to learn all that crap. Can you just build it for me?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And they go, I just want someone to do this for me. And so that's what I'm waking up going, how can we solve problems for our customers? And it comes back to the same question we said, what problems do you solve? Right? And from a tactical perspective, I go, okay, what are the obstacles people have with overcoming obscurity? And how many of those problems can we systematically solve? It's one of the reason we started a publishing company. So many of our clients want to write books, but they're burnt out on traditional publishing. Couldn't get a deal, couldn't get a literary agent to call them back. And they're like, this is ridiculous. Or they're like, I'm not going to give up the ownership of my intellectual property for like a very small advance. But I want to, I want to hit the New York Times or the Bestseller list, and I want to be able to do something on my timetable. I also don't want to wait two and a half years to publish a book. And it was like, oh, we can start a publishing company. We partner with Simon and Schuster for the fulfillment. And we had four hybrid clients hit the New York Times bestseller list last year.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Two years ago, people said it was impossible. Four times it's happened. One of them was this book, mine and my wife, you know, A.J. that's a hybrid published book distributed by Simon Schuster. So we did that. Why did we buy a building? Right? We started Nashville Creative Spaces. Why? Because our clients are going. We need to have a place to host our podcast. We need a place to host our event. And if you haven't looked lately, try to host an event at a, at a hotel. It is insanely expensive. Ridiculous. We were paying $8,000 for coffee that literally no one drank and threw away. You know, you try to rent a studio for a few hours, it's like you easily are spending a few thousand dollars and then you go, what about this microphone? What about this lighting? And it's like, our customers are like, can you just solve this problem for me and not make it outrageously expensive? So, so those are the things we're stepping. So I don't have the answer. All I can share is a question. And I think that question is, how do we use AI to help our clients succeed faster? I'm not just teaching them the information. I'm building the tools to help them apply the information. And you know, we've said for a couple years, it's in, it's in that book. People don't pay for information. They pay for organization and application. And I think they're always going to pay to shorten that window. And so I'm just trying to go, how do we use AI to do that? But there's still going to be a place for motivation and inspiration and community and accountability and humans. And I do think our humanness increasingly will become our uniqueness.

[A]

And I think you do it beautifully. Uh, some people are listening and they're like, I need to build my brand. I need to get more clear. I don't know my one thing. So you have a solution how? If people want to know more about what you do at Brand Builders, how can they learn more?

[B]

Totally. Okay, so if you go to freebrand, call.com/amy porterfield. Okay, free brand, call.com/ amy porterfield. What we do is the first call is for free for everybody. And what we will do is we, we take all of our clients through a four phase process and we will actually tell you on this free call. We will show you the whole playbook. We will tell you exactly the process that we take people through. And then we'll create a customized roadmap for every person about what they need to do, whether they work with us or not. So we will, we will go, we'll do an intake of your story, your team, your, you know what, what assets do you have, where are you at in your journey? And again, we work out with people. We work with people who are just starting out, barely beginning, like don't have a ton of money all the way up to the, you know, Amy's and the Ed Mylets of the world. But, but we only help, we only work with personal brands. We don't work with companies. So you have to be an executive, it's a person. And you got to be a mission driven messenger who cares about money, but cares more about impact than making money. And if you do that, you know, we will walk you through that process. Freebrandcall.com amyporterfield the first call is on us. And then, and then we'll be able to tell after that, after we do an intake if we're a fit to work together. And we've got multiple programs for different people and stuff. So that's, that's the starting point.

[A]

Okay, perfect. So that's where everyone should go. And I will put it in the show notes as well. Rory, it is always a pleasure talking to you. Thank you so much for taking the time to do so.

[B]

Yeah, it's my pleasure, Amy. And you know, you are also such an example of the epitome of a mission driven messenger. You care about people, you focused, you're disciplined, you work hard, you don't, you always try to over deliver. And like to me, that's the recipe, I think, for all of us. Let's not forget that the best marketing in the world is a transformed life. And you've been so committed to your students and to the people, the listeners, helping them change their life and you've built a massive personal brand. I don't think that'll ever change.

[A]

Thank you, my friend. I appreciate it and I appreciate you. That conversation clarified something that I've been feeling for a while. I think so many of the founders that I work with, they're working hard, they're showing up, they're doing all the things and then they keep wondering why it still feels like they're spinning their wheels, why the revenue is inconsistent, why what used to work has stopped working. Here's what Rory helped me see what when you're unclear on what you're known for, you end up trying to do everything. You spread yourself across Too many offers, too many messages, too many audiences. And diluted focus gives you diluted results. The fix is clarity. One word problem, one audience, one message. When you get that, everything else gets easier. You know what to focus on. You know what to say no to, and the spinning stops. If you're watching on YouTube, subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. And if you're listening in your podcast app, hit follow so new episodes show up automatically. I'll talk to you again soon.