Fix These Bottlenecks to Scale Past $1M | Ep 891

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Game with Alex Hormozi | Episode 891: Fix These Bottlenecks to Scale Past $1M

Release Date: May 22, 2025

In this engaging episode of The Game with Alex Hormozi, host Alex Hormozi delves into the common bottlenecks that prevent businesses from scaling beyond the $1 million mark. Through a series of real-world case studies, Alex and his co-host (referred to as "Unknown") provide actionable insights and strategic advice to entrepreneurs facing diverse challenges. Below is a detailed summary of the key discussions, insights, and conclusions from the episode.

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1. Kyler – Scaling a Landscape Lighting Business

Business Overview: Kyler runs a landscape and exterior lighting business targeting high-end homeowners. Currently generating $310K in revenue with an EBITDA of $142K, Kyler's primary revenue comes from temporary, seasonal holiday lighting installations.

Challenges:

• Over-reliance on seasonal revenue from temporary lighting.
• Difficulty in establishing a consistent, year-round income stream through permanent lighting.
• Need for a proven acquisition channel to attract new customers beyond warm outreach.

Key Discussions:

• Seasonal Business Model: Kyler contemplates adopting a model akin to the "Halloween store," focusing intensely on the high season while building infrastructure during the off-season.
• Scalable Workforce: Exploring strategies to maintain a scalable and trainable workforce that can be mobilized quickly during peak seasons.

Notable Quotes:

• Kyler (00:29): "What’s stopping me is I literally make all of that money from that lighting division, temporary lighting, so holiday lighting."
• Unknown (02:00): "How do I continue to gain access to a scalable workforce that I can basically turn on overnight and train up in a weekend?"

Advice Given:

• Focus on Core Strengths: Unknown suggests that Kyler could potentially scale his existing model by increasing capacity and enhancing sales efforts rather than diversifying into new services.
• Avoid Overextension: Emphasizes the importance of not diluting resources by simultaneously pursuing multiple business avenues.

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2. Christine Mattis – Legal Services Scaling

Business Overview: Christine owns a legal services firm specializing in estate planning and real estate matters for high-net-worth families. The business has achieved $2 million in revenue with a consistent 20% annual growth over the past five years. However, the current EBITDA stands at zero.

Challenges:

• Poor financial health despite revenue growth.
• Struggles with compensation structures and pricing models.
• Capacity utilization and the perception of being at full capacity.

Key Discussions:

• Core Model Fixing: Prioritizing internal financial structures before seeking growth through increased leads and sales.

Notable Quotes:

• Christine (07:33): "My EBITDA is terrible. Like zero and. But yet I know we want to get more."
• Unknown (08:05): "I would probably be looking inwards first at basically how I'm compensating people and how I'm pricing."

Advice Given:

• Audit Financials: Christine is advised to examine her pricing and compensation models to identify inefficiencies.
• Improve Cash Flow: By addressing internal financial issues, the business can stabilize and create a foundation for sustainable growth.

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3. Alex – Trivia Nights for Bars and Restaurants

Business Overview: Alex operates a company that sells trivia nights to bars and restaurants nationwide, aiming to enhance their slow nights by attracting crowds weekly. The business currently earns $1.1 million in revenue with a target of reaching $10 million.

Challenges:

• Managing capacity limitations despite a proven concept.
• High churn rates associated with upselling additional trivia formats, such as music mashups.

Key Discussions:

• Stick to Proven Model: Emphasizing the importance of leveraging existing successful offerings rather than diversifying too quickly.
• Sales Expansion: Suggestions to scale sales efforts by increasing the number of outbound calls and hiring additional sales personnel.

Notable Quotes:

• Alex (09:29): "We have a LTV to CAC of about 12 to 1."
• Unknown (13:03): "Do that. You're in a more situation. So how do I get bars right."

Advice Given:

• Enhance Sales Capacity: Increase outbound sales efforts to bring in more clients without overcomplicating the service offerings.
• Revenue Retention Focus: Ensure existing trivia events remain ongoing to maintain consistent revenue streams.

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4. Zara Mutuakil – Home Kitchens and Commercial Real Estate

Business Overview: Zara sells kitchen and bathroom installations to residential homeowners, generating $320K in revenue with a goal of reaching $1 million. She faces internal conflicts within a family-run business involving commercial real estate development, which currently hampers growth.

Challenges:

• Conflict with her father over business focus: she wants to concentrate on construction, while he prioritizes real estate.
• Financial drain from a loss-making commercial real estate side.

Key Discussions:

• Family Business Dynamics: Navigating leadership transitions and establishing clear agreements to take over the business.
• Strategic Focus: The necessity to eliminate unprofitable ventures to concentrate on the more lucrative construction side.

Notable Quotes:

• Zara (15:27): "I want to focus on construction. I like to focus on one thing. I don't like doing multiple."
• Unknown (20:58): "The decision has to come from the Latin root of decadere, which means to cut off, which means that we have to cut off one of these paths."

Advice Given:

• Formal Agreements: Recommend formalizing business transitions and agreements with family members to ensure a smooth takeover.
• Eliminate Unprofitable Lines: Zara is advised to focus on the construction division, which has better margins and growth potential, while phasing out the commercial real estate segment.

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5. Adam Howard – Insurance Services Expansion

Business Overview: Adam Howard manages an insurance services company offering health, life insurance, and retirement planning to middle-income Americans. With $4 million in revenue, he aims to scale to $10 million within two years.

Challenges:

• Capacity constraints due to having only two brick-and-mortar locations serving a DMA (Designated Market Area) of 90 miles.
• Difficulty in training new hires to meet the six-month sales cycle requirements.

Key Discussions:

• Talent Allocation: Debating whether to relocate existing employees to new locations or hire fresh talent, balancing the risks of disrupting current operations versus onboarding unproven staff.

Notable Quotes:

• Adam (23:04): "How do we efficiently scale that quicker and continue to duplicate that then, you know, we thought about that as, as a model."
• Unknown (25:07): "Take one of the five and give him the opportunity for his career to advance."

Advice Given:

• Leverage Existing Talent: Shift successful employees to new locations to maintain culture and operational consistency.
• Gradual Expansion: Focus on replicating proven systems in new areas to minimize risks associated with market unfamiliarity and training new staff.

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6. Alex – Crypto Education Scaling Challenges

Business Overview: An entrepreneur named Alex sells crypto education programs, primarily targeting individuals seeking to meet basic financial needs. The business generates over $1 million in revenue, with aspirations to reach $10 million.

Challenges:

• Declining conversion rates in new international markets like Poland despite previous success in Ukraine.
• Transitioning from a highly effective webinar funnel to other acquisition methods for audiences who don't attend webinars.

Key Discussions:

• Market Adaptation: Ensuring marketing materials resonate culturally in new regions to improve conversion rates.
• Funnel Optimization: Exploring alternative funnels and enhancing existing ones to cater to different audience behaviors.

Notable Quotes:

• Alex (30:10): "We make over 1 million in revenue... You can go to acquisition.com roadmap."
• Unknown (34:28): "If you can break this model up and just keep doubling down, you could really scale."

Advice Given:

• Focus on Existing Strengths: Enhance and optimize the current successful webinar funnel before venturing into new acquisition channels.
• Cultural Customization: Adapt marketing copy and strategies to align with cultural norms of new target markets to improve engagement and conversions.

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7. Nico – Home Services in Quebec

Business Overview: Nico, alongside a partner, transitioned from a website-as-a-service model to high-ticket home services for clients in Quebec. Their shift resulted in immediate cash flow improvements but led to lower LTV to CAC ratios and customer churn after three months.

Challenges:

• Balancing transformation-focused offerings with the need for consistent revenue streams.
• Retention issues following the shift to high-ticket services.

Key Discussions:

• Strategic Focus: Emphasizing the importance of sticking to a stable, high-margin business model rather than pursuing ambitious pivots without solid foundations.
• Entrepreneurial Prioritization: Allocating limited resources to the most impactful business activities to foster sustainable growth.

Notable Quotes:

• Nico (36:28): "Our LTV to CAC is now very low because my clients are home service businesses."
• Unknown (39:43): "There is always only one thing that is the most important in the business, and if you can't decide, that's on you."

Advice Given:

• Revert to Proven Models: Nico is encouraged to focus on scaling the existing website-as-a-service model, optimizing client acquisition and retention, rather than overextending into new service areas prematurely.
• Resource Allocation: Prioritize efforts that directly contribute to scaling the core business, ensuring that limited resources are used effectively.

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8. Cole – Solar Marketing Services

Business Overview: Cole runs a marketing company for solar providers in California, generating $850K in revenue with plans to scale to $10 million. The company faces challenges in distinguishing its offerings in a commoditized market, leading to price competition and reduced margins.

Challenges:

• Difficulty in creating a unique value proposition in a highly competitive and commoditized solar market.
• High customer churn due to price shopping and the inability to control the product.

Key Discussions:

• Sales Capability: Highlighting the strength of sales personnel in achieving high close rates amid market competition.
• Offer Differentiation: Struggling to create an "apples to oranges" comparison to differentiate from other solar companies.

Notable Quotes:

• Cole (40:12): "I think that our offer is not actually that special in terms of, like, you know, relatively speaking, commodity."
• Unknown (43:08): "You have an ability to sell. Correct. And you know how to generate leads."

Advice Given:

• Focus on Sales Excellence: Emphasize recruiting and training top-tier sales talent to maintain competitive advantage in a commoditized market.
• Shift Business Strategy: Consider diversifying into related services, such as HVAC or tax services tied to solar installations, to create additional revenue streams and minimize reliance on price competition.

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Key Insights and Conclusions

Throughout the episode, Alex Hormozi underscores the importance of:

1. Strategic Focus: Entrepreneurs must prioritize core business strengths and avoid overextending into multiple ventures without a solid foundation.

2. Resource Allocation: Effective scaling requires judicious allocation of limited resources (time, money, effort) to initiatives that offer the highest impact on growth.

3. Sales and Retention: Building a robust sales infrastructure and maintaining high customer retention rates are critical for sustaining and accelerating growth.

4. Cultural and Market Adaptation: Understanding and adapting to cultural nuances in new markets can significantly enhance customer acquisition and conversion rates.

5. Operational Efficiency: Streamlining internal financial structures and optimizing compensation and pricing models are essential for ensuring profitability and enabling scalable growth.

6. Talent Management: Leveraging existing talent effectively and investing in recruiting and training can provide a competitive edge, especially in service-oriented and commoditized markets.

Alex (Final Segment): "Strategy is prioritization. It means how do we take these limited resources and allocate them against unlimited options." [38:53]

Final Thoughts: Alex Hormozi emphasizes that entrepreneurship is fundamentally about making informed decisions and prioritizing actions that align with the business's core strengths and long-term objectives. By addressing internal bottlenecks, optimizing sales and retention strategies, and focusing on scalable models, businesses can overcome the barriers to scaling past the $1 million threshold.

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This episode serves as a valuable resource for entrepreneurs seeking practical advice on navigating the complexities of business scaling, offering real-world examples and expert guidance to foster sustainable growth.

Transcript

[Alex]

And I think that was.

[Unknown]

I tell you a secret.

[Alex]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Very small business owners will never build a stable business because they are not stable. So there's nothing to do with you.

[Kyler]

Okay.

[Unknown]

Hello. How are you?

[Kyler]

My name is Kyler. I sell landscape lighting and exterior lighting basically to homeowners north of half a million dollars for the home.

[Unknown]

Well done.

[Kyler]

I'm at 310 revenue, 310k142 EBITDA. And what's stopping me is I literally make all of that money from that lighting division, temporary lighting, so holiday lighting. So now I know I need to add on landscape lighting, permanent lighting to be sustainable all year round.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Kyler]

I haven't started advertising for landscape lighting except for the warm outreach that I've done to my temporary lighting customers.

[Unknown]

So.

[Kyler]

So now I need to start working on a proven acquisition channel for new customers. And that's what's stopping me.

[Unknown]

Okay. And it's usually like Christmas lighting type stuff. Yeah. Okay. When you. When you spin that up every year, do you just hire a bunch of temps and then you guys put them all up and then you fire everybody kind of thing?

[Kyler]

Unfortunately, yeah. But we also have a washing side. I talked to Ed about that.

[Unknown]

We.

[Kyler]

We might kill that. So I didn't really want to get into the weed that. But I keep a couple on that. Do washing with me. Washing, exterior cleaning, concrete house washing, gutter cleaning.

[Unknown]

That's actually pretty decent business side note. But. Okay, you're like, I'm selling water. You know, like, it's not a bad. Not a bad gig. Okay. But you prefer the lighting business because it has higher margins and. Okay, yeah. So two potential ways to think about this. So one way is you look at the Halloween store, which you probably heard of, and they, you know, they run for 90 days or two months, whatever it is, leading into Halloween, and they every year just do more and more of it. And that's the model. And he just sticks to that and he just takes off the rest of the year. And so then the question becomes, how do I continue to gain access to a scalable workforce that is that I can basically turn on overnight and train up in a weekend to do all, basically to deliver all these services. So that is not an unattractive business, to be clear. I mean, a lot of people would love to own a business that they only have to work 90 days a year and they just. I wouldn't say chill, but like, kind of. Right. And so the other nine months of the year for that business would be you building out the. The inroads and laying in all of the. Basically building out the rapid work infrastructure so that when people come in it's just like, boom, this is the training. Or like boom, we send our messages out, you guys have 14 days to respond. And you know that every year you get verbal commitments around the year from 100 people. And you know that that translates into 20 people who are actually proficient in work. And so then you just work your, you're basically work backwards from the model. Does that make sense? Yeah. So that's the Halloween store path, which I don't think is necessarily a bad path. Like when I have something, you're like, okay, I'm making 310 on 500. I'm like, cool, let's do like 5 million and make 3 million. Like that sounds chill. Yeah. Right. Rather than like, how do I start another business to like give my people something to do in the meantime. So if I'm you, I would probably try and say like. And Leila has a great frame on this, which is when I. When we're looking at two business decisions, there's always problems on either side. And so we ask the question, which problem would we rather solve or which problem do we feel like we're more equipped or more likely to solve given our current resources, skill sets, et cetera. And so if we're looking at this path, path wouldn't be like, do I believe it's within my skill set to build the network nine months a year and build the training out so that when people, when I send the mass blast out like we're about to go into high season ready to rock and roll, I can get this percentage of people and I can get them trained up in a weekend and then we're off and running. Do I want to solve that problem or do I want to build out basically the ascension path from temporary lighting to permanent lighting and kind of build that whole other business? Okay. The way I asked the question seemed one sided. But like, that's, that's a, that's a, it's a real question.

[Kyler]

Yeah, no, it's a real question because I could spend nine months doing that. But I'm not going to lie, I think I may just get like a little bored, you know, through the rest of the nine months.

[Unknown]

Yeah, get a dog, you know. Well, one of the things you can do. And like. Okay, so, okay, so I define patience as figuring out what to do in the meantime. Right. So we have to figure out something for you to do in the meantime. And so the question is, what can I do in the meantime that could make my core business money during that high season. Yeah, well I could probably pre sell that season all year.

[Kyler]

So I did do pre sales basically last month. We do our pre sale just you know, get cash flow and just real quick side tangent. Basically I went to a permanent lighting training end of last month. They actually said you can lease that permanent lighting essentially. You know, year round lighting if for all y' all that don't really know.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Kyler]

Year round the lighting but basically, you know, have that just recurring every single year. So they're leasing it basically and then if they want they could buy it out. So I was thinking about upselling those customers. We have one year, three or five year contracts and then upselling the people that are on those contracts for just year round lighting and say, hey, do you want this thing all year and it's not going to cost you the 6 to 10k if you don't want to pay that upfront, of course we'd like that. But then offer that same exact price every single year.

[Unknown]

I don't think it's a bad model. Which one would you rather do? I think both will work.

[Kyler]

Honestly, I'm leaning towards just figuring out the landscape lighting because I don't think it's that hard. Great margins to add on to the business in my long term play.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Kyler]

Of making this scalable potentially to other markets. I would like a full year round business instead of just seasonal.

[Unknown]

So I'll say this, it's not that it's not a year round business in the first year. This is me trying to convince you. This is kind of for everybody else to. It's not that it's not a year round business, it's just that you do delivery for 90 days. The fact that you're not working the other nine months is the problem.

[Kyler]

You're right.

[Unknown]

Because could we take 500k and make it 5 million if you worked the other 75% of the year?

[Kyler]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Rather than kind of like creating this other business to keep yourself busy. Okay. Like that's how I think about it. Like you're like, man, if I were. I work a little bit, I make, I make 500, I make 300 grand in a quarter. I'm like work a lot of it. Maybe make 1.2 million in the next year. That's with zero changes in like current capacity. Yeah.

[Kyler]

And honestly, you answered my question. If Sammy's in the room. Really sorry. I tried to ask her a question. She's like, I need literally 98 other data points. But you Just figure it out. Because that's literally the problem I run into is like I had to pull all my advertising, all that stuff last season because I hired on all these people. Half the people don't know what they're doing all the way. There's no time to train. So that makes a lot of sense.

[Unknown]

What'll happen, what would happen next is like if you went the other path of if you decide to do the temporary leasing thing, the demand that you'll be able to generate for temporary lighting will still exceed your capacity with your existing workforce on the recurring work. So you're going to have the problem either way. Yeah. So which problem would you rather have? Okay. That's a you problem. Business wise, either model works. I would recommend not doing both. Yeah. Okay, cool.

[Kyler]

Thank you.

[Unknown]

Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Little round about something. Yeah. These are the easy ones. These are the fun ones. All right.

[Christine Mattis]

So my name is Christine Mattis and I sell legal services in the form of estate planning and helping clients with real estate matters, basically to families. And there are families.

[Unknown]

High net worth families.

[Christine Mattis]

High net worth families.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Christine Mattis]

We did 2 million. So we've been growing 20% every year for the last five years. My goal is 10 million. What's stopping me is really. It was an eye opener yesterday, doing that scorecard. My EBITDA is terrible. Like zero and. But yet I know we want to get more.

[Unknown]

Like, I just do nothing for zero. It's so much easier.

[Christine Mattis]

And our. I know I want to get more leads, but also sales. So I'm trying to figure out, well, what's the, the first thing you would attack when you have this kind of situation?

[Unknown]

Well, I don't understand why we weren't making money.

[Christine Mattis]

Right.

[Unknown]

So I would probably be tackling that first.

[Christine Mattis]

Okay.

[Unknown]

I think we're talking about Y restaurant yesterday. Like, we need. You need to fix the core model. Unless there's some. What I'm pretty confident because I understand the business fairly well. Like there isn't some massive fixed cost. Like your cost is. Is people. It's payroll. It's not like you have some machine that you have to pay or some massive rent that must get paid before you can make, you know, incremental revenue. And so I would probably be looking inwards first at basically how I'm compensating people and how I'm pricing. So it's likely that. So are you at capacity right now with your current team?

[Christine Mattis]

They think we are, but I'm feeling there's more room to grow.

[Unknown]

Yeah. So you, you have a You have a pricing issue, so you're either underpriced or overpaying or a combination of both. Okay. And so I would fix that first, because then you'll fix cash flow, and then that freed up cash flow will allow you to go more. Get more aggressive on the front end. But like, for me to say, hey, let's go get more customers, it's probably not the solution right now. Makes sense. Like, we have to free up cash so you can breathe.

[Christine Mattis]

Yeah, absolutely. Appreciate it.

[Unknown]

Thank you. Yeah, you bet.

[Alex]

How's it going, Alex? My name was also Alex. I own a company that are having.

[Unknown]

The best day ever because you have that name. I mean, that's how I wake up every day. I'm like, I'm called Alex. Like, I'm having the best day.

[Alex]

I sell trivia nights to bars and restaurants across the country. So they'll bring us in on their slow night of the week, and we will come every week and basically fill up their bar for them.

[Unknown]

Cool.

[Alex]

Currently at 1.1 million in revenue.

[Unknown]

Like bar launch.

[Alex]

Sure, if you will.

[Unknown]

No, I mean, that's what I did. That's what I did for a living for two years.

[Alex]

So currently 1.1 million. Would like to be at 10. What's stopping me right now is capacity. But I think really I just a couple hires away from. From getting that. So my question is really more about our upsell. We do have an upsell that we present to bars right now, but it kind of sucks.

[Unknown]

Cool.

[Alex]

And that our core offers of the trivia nights themselves, our LTV to CAC is about 12 to 1.

[Unknown]

Love it.

[Alex]

So I like where we are there. But our upsell, I mean, people churn out after like three months.

[Unknown]

You mean they do a couple trivia nights and then they dip or the bars, the.

[Alex]

The bars themselves will use it for about three months. The upsell and then what is the upsell? The upsell is basically a different type of trivia night. It's called music mashup.

[Unknown]

More of that.

[Alex]

It's like a music style trivia.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Alex]

So my question is, this is fun.

[Unknown]

Right now.

[Alex]

I'm trying to just improve the music mashup game to make it something better.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Alex]

Do I keep doing that or do I just fail?

[Unknown]

Okay, so this is. This is like super applicable to a lot of people here. Okay, so let's say this is a customer journey. This will be trivia. All right, so where do you sell? Ideally on this. On this life cycle. Where do you sell?

[Alex]

Where do I sell?

[Unknown]

The best time to Sell. This is our value line at the.

[Alex]

Bottom at the pain point, right?

[Unknown]

Yes. Okay, so you're delivering trivial ends, right? Yes. We have now provided value and we're selling here, but they're already full. So I give the analogy of if I go to, I go to Yalls restaurant, right? And I say, hi, I want a steak. I'm starving, right? And. Sorry. I go to the restaurant, I say, I'm starving. You say, would you like a steak? And I say, sure. I eat the steak and you guys come back over and you're like, how was it? I'm like, oh my God, it was amazing. And you're like, awesome. Do you want another steak? I'd be like, no, no, I'm. I'm good. Like, I'm good. And they're like, oh, you don't like the steak? I'm like, no, I like the steak. I'm. But I'm good. It's like, well, then why don't you have another steak?

[Kyler]

Right?

[Unknown]

It gets really awkward, right? But that's actually kind of the situation a lot of business owners are in. And so, but after I have my steak, I might have the desire to have something sweet. And so now I'm, I'm full on my value vector for steak eating, but I'm empty on my value vector for dessert eating. And so then I'd be like, ah, you should try our apple cobbler. It's delicious. Whatever. And so what we want to figure out is sometimes the point of greatest value, also on another vector, becomes the point of greatest deprivation. And that's why sometimes they overlap. Often they don't. And so I think it's one of the big mistakes that people make is when they time their upsells. And so for. I'll give you a B2B example and then I'll. I'll circle back to the bar. So if I help someone get more leads, right? I have now provided value. But now that I've provided this value, they're like, now I have to work all the leads. And so then that creates the opportunity to sell the lead, nurture services or the other things that they need to go with this problem that I just created by solving their first problem. And so upsell timing is one of the big mess ups, I think in a lot of businesses. Okay, back to the bars. So trivia nights is the. The qu. So what's the. What stops you from just having basically just continue to do trivia trivial nights with them? What do you mean? So you do a trivia night. You Bring a bunch of people on Thursday, next Thursday. I still want a bunch of people. Why don't I do trivia night? Oh, no, that.

[Alex]

That is the business model. Everything is weekly. So Ball will hire us and we will come in every week on that day at that time and bring back that crowd. So we develop regular sport.

[Unknown]

Okay. And that's. And that's sticky though, right? Yes. Okay, then what's the problem with just doing more of that?

[Alex]

That was my question, is whether I should just focus on doing more of that.

[Unknown]

Yeah. Okay. You're like, I've got this really sticky thing that we're really good at and people like it. It's like, do that.

[Alex]

Okay, so follow up question to that would be at what point? So let's say I just. The next however many years, I just keep milking the trivia nights over and over again.

[Unknown]

Right.

[Alex]

At what point do I even consider bringing on an upsell? Because right now we have no upsell.

[Unknown]

I don't think you necessarily need one. Are you running good margins? Yeah, they're fine. Or 25ish percent? Yeah, 12.

[Alex]

25.

[Unknown]

25. Okay. I was like 25. Okay. Yeah. I think you're just in a. You're in a more situation. So how do you get bars right.

[Alex]

Now, primarily cold, outbound, A lot of cold email, cold call. Some inbound. About 20% of new clients come via referral.

[Unknown]

Cool. So, and that's. I can understand that because they're not trying to refer the bar down the street because it's like, it's. Yeah, I get it. So we had some of the issues with Jim Watch. They only refer somebody who's like out of state. That's part of it.

[Cole]

Right.

[Unknown]

I get it. How many outbound actions are you taking per day to generate your sales velocity?

[Alex]

One sales guy full time, and he'll make about a hundred sales call cold calls per day.

[Unknown]

Yeah. So I mean, that guy should probably rip like 300, but just as a baseline. But I think hiring like three more guys and having all those guys do 300 a day would probably get you a bunch of sales as long. Because the biggest thing that I would want to solve if I'm you is how do I make sure that bars that do trivia night just keep doing trivia night with me. Yeah. If that's not a problem and they are just all continually doing that, then you have solved the hardest problem in business, which is that you have revenue retention. So we just don't need to be fancy. We just need to do a shitload more of it. Cool. Thank you. Rock and roll. Yes, ma' am.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Hi, my name is Zara Mutuakil. I sell. Zara Zora.

[Unknown]

Nice to meet you.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Nice to meet you. I sell kitchens and bathrooms to residential homeowners. I would. Our revenue is about 320. Would like to be at 1 million. The problem we're having is we have a sister company that is commercial real estate development that is taking the money from the construction. It's my father's interest to keep that. The real estate. I want to focus on the commercial or the construction.

[Unknown]

Who founded this business?

[Zara Mutuakil]

My father. Both.

[Unknown]

So you founded both of them? Says family business.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Family.

[Unknown]

Your father here?

[Zara Mutuakil]

No.

[Unknown]

Okay. All right.

[Zara Mutuakil]

So I want to focus on the construction. We are partners with Home Depot for three of their stores. I was told, try to, like, do more with Home Depot, get more stores. But we do have all those leaks in the real estate. Like, properties aren't selling. Properties aren't being rented to the max. All these bills, and they take the construction money. So I was.

[Unknown]

So you have one business that makes you money and another business that loses money.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Zara Mutuakil]

And we're kind of stuck in the.

[Unknown]

Are you stuck?

[Zara Mutuakil]

It's like a fight with my dad.

[Unknown]

Oh, yeah, that's.

[Zara Mutuakil]

So I tell him, relax, take a chill pill. Let's do the construction. But he's like, real estate is what makes you rich. And I'm like, no. Like, that's like, you save and you invest with real estate, but that's not the business. And that's where we have the different opinions. So that's where we're trying to plug in the holes. And I want to.

[Unknown]

I want to just give you this, which is that your father's logic is sound. The practicality of it tends to be different in reality. And so the vast majority. This is super. I would say it's more common than. It's uncommon, is that people who get into construction, they make some money and they're like, oh, I'll just start also doing construction and real estate, and then I'll start flipping things. And then all of a sudden, they've got like four businesses that are kind of real estate adjacent. And they're like, well, it's actually an ecosystem. And you're like, oh, God. Anyways, real quick, guys, I have a special, special gift for you for being loyal listeners of the podcast. Layla and I spent probably an entire quarter putting together our scaling roadmap. It's breaking, scaling into 10 stages, and across all eight functions of the business, you've got marketing, you've got sales, you've got product, you've got customer success, you've got it. You've got recruiting, hr, you've got finance. And we show the problems that emerge at every level of scale and how to graduate to the next level. It's all free and you can get it personalized to you. So it's about 30ish pages for each of the stages. Once you enter the questions, it will tell you exactly where you're at and what you need to do to grow. It's about 14 hours of stuff, but it's narrowed down so that you only have to watch the part that's relevant to you, which will probably be about 90 minutes. And so if that's at all interesting, you can go to acquisition.com roadmap r o a D map roadmap. So I think, say you're on stage here. What do you tell you?

[Zara Mutuakil]

What was that?

[Unknown]

What do you tell you if you were on stage?

[Zara Mutuakil]

I want to focus on construction. Like, I like to focus on one thing. I don't like doing multiple. And it just gets to the fight. Yeah.

[Unknown]

You know what to do.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

So I think you have. So. So let's get real for a second. So you have a question of what you want to do in your life so you can continue to work in your father's business. So you have basically three paths. One is stomach it. I don't think your dad's going to change his mind. How old is it?

[Zara Mutuakil]

I'm waiting like five years for him to retire. He's 56. Yeah. Because he tells me, he's like, I'm going to give you like five years. And then he tries pushing it, like 10 years.

[Unknown]

Yes. I think it'll be five years away for the next year.

[Zara Mutuakil]

And I tell him, I'm like, I'm going to take over. It's me and my sister and hopefully my husband comes back because he kicked them out.

[Unknown]

There we go. It's a whole family of fit.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah, it's crazy.

[Unknown]

Okay. He's getting so juicy.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah, it's crazy.

[Unknown]

So this is one where there's high drama, very simple solutions. Other ones you have, like, no drama and very complex solutions. These are more fun.

[Zara Mutuakil]

I tell him, like, I'm gonna take over. You should focus on what I want. And it's kind of just like repeating that into him.

[Unknown]

Wait for your dad to retire in five years. Know that it's not going to be five years or I'm leaving. That's what you start with.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

And under these terms, I'll stay.

[Zara Mutuakil]

I feel like I've done the third, and that's why I'm here.

[Unknown]

But do you believe that? But you just said he's moving them. He's pushing them back.

[Zara Mutuakil]

But I tell him I'm the boss. Yeah, it's very. And he listens. But it's a fight. Like, it's fight.

[Unknown]

But did you sign something?

[Zara Mutuakil]

Sign what?

[Unknown]

An agreement. No, I put it in paper. And I know this sounds wild, because it's like, it's family. The thing is, is that I don't think he's going to take you seriously. You're his baby girl. Yeah, right. And this is big, rough construction. They're going to take advantage of you. You don't know. I smile. I've been doing this longer than you, right? And you're like. And in the short time that I've done it, I've made more. So my units of, you know, my income per unit time is actually way higher than yours is. You don't even say that. He'll hate you. So. But honestly, you have. You have life choices right now. The business decision is actually really easy. You know, the construction business is what you should be doing. Stick to the one that you have really good margins and you have all these growth opportunities that are sitting in front of you, and you have. You're throwing good money after bad. Right. That's like a pretty standard thing that happens in the entrepreneurial journey. But you just have that choice to make. Now if you're like, well, I already did three, it's like, then you didn't do it. Right. And so fundamentally, he doesn't believe you. Now there is a world where he will just never relinquish power. And then you've got to figure out what you want to do with your life.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Yeah, I'm gonna hope for three, and then we'll see what happens.

[Cole]

But you have to.

[Unknown]

He's got to take it seriously, though. So here's how I would do it, how I do it. I want to buy the business from you because you saying, wait until you retire, it's like, what am I going to do with my time? And like, I, you know, I got to do something, right? So it's like, I'm going to buy the business from you, effective today, and I will pay you over the next five years. Then you have a clear date or three years, whatever. And then you work essentially for free, and then you take the profit that you would. You know, you agree on a price, and you start Paying it. Like, you have to have an agreement and you have to send money has to change hands. Either way, it's going to have to change hands. Otherwise you're going to have a tax event regardless when he gives you a business. So you might as well do it now. You talk to the estate attorney. Right? Like, there's a way to do this in a tax efficient manner. But if he is going to transition the business to you, which I'm sure he does want to do, then we need to put a clock on it when you start making payments towards it. That's how three actually works. If it's just like, hey, I'm the boss now, it's like you're just going to keep doing this loop for the next 20 years.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Okay.

[Unknown]

And you seem like a very kind person. And so I need you to put your. Take your teeth out a little bit.

[Zara Mutuakil]

That's what my sister is.

[Unknown]

Yeah, she's here.

[Zara Mutuakil]

And I'm like, is she here? No, she's not. So the deal I made with him when I wanted to come here was to invest in the construction. And he said, okay, you go, you pay for it. If it works, I'll give you your money back. So that's what I'm hoping, like, okay. I mean, if I say you can remove this problem. Yeah. And I don't want to do the real estate. Yeah.

[Unknown]

But this is it. There's no. There's really no more to. To go over on this one.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Do the paperwork. This is the deal.

[Unknown]

Agree on a price and then agree on the terms. And then start the car.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Okay.

[Unknown]

And if he says no, Then you'll actually be able to see it. This is like, I'll give you a totally different example. Girl dates guy. Guy promises to marry girl. Girl asks for engagement ring. He says, I'll give you a promise ring. Wait, when are we getting married? Don't worry, I gotta close up some things at work first. Two years pass. When are we getting married? He's never gonna marry you. And so you just have to, like, you have to conf. There's a decision that has to get made. And so. And if you want to use this quote, you can. Which is decision comes from the Latin root of decadere, which means to cut off, which means that we have to cut off one of these paths. Otherwise you haven't made a decision.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Oh.

[Unknown]

I define commitment as the elimination of alternatives. Right now you have three alternatives. You have to eliminate two. Okay, cool.

[Zara Mutuakil]

Thank you.

[Unknown]

Alex. Hello, sir.

[Adam Howard]

My name is Adam Howard. We sell health insurance, life Insurance, retirement planning to middle income Americans. We currently about 4 million in top line, want to be about 10 million here. I think we can do it in two years. Our constraint is we've got two locations, brick and mortar. We have a DMA about 90 miles from our, you know, brick and mortar. We're at max capacity at this point.

[Unknown]

Awesome.

[Adam Howard]

And so we need to, you know, we're looking to bring another location on outside of this dma.

[Unknown]

Right.

[Adam Howard]

And so how do we efficiently, as we're thinking through the strategy, find good talent that we can eventually groom into leadership to lead that office and then do so cash flowing as quickly as we can? Because one of the challenges is taking somebody from unlicensed to license to learning the business to. We have a six month sales cycle as it is. Once we start marketing, how do we do that as efficiently as possible?

[Unknown]

What stops you from taking one person from your current locations and giving them the opportunity to own a small chunk of that one?

[Adam Howard]

Yeah, we've thought about doing that and then the thought process is there. Well, we kind of disrupt the flow of that existing office.

[Unknown]

How many guys are in each office?

[Adam Howard]

They're small. So our, our west, west office is two people and then we've got five in our, in our home office.

[Unknown]

Okay. Yeah. Do you think you can take one of the five?

[Adam Howard]

No, not. No, I don't, I don't think so.

[Unknown]

Okay. No. Well, which problem would you rather have? So either you can take your 5 location and bring it down to 4 and then backfill within that location that's already cash flowing positive, has the culture there and bring somebody else in, or do you think it'll be harder to get somebody who's brand new, not surrounded by anyone to get up to speed?

[Adam Howard]

It's a great question. I, I don't know without testing it and I know that, you know, both have risks and you know, you know.

[Unknown]

We might, you're only.

[Adam Howard]

Yeah, exactly. So I'm always thinking about how do we mitigate the risk and how do we.

[Unknown]

Yeah. So I'm, I'm, I'm leading you where I'm where I, I think that it is lower risk to take one of the five and bring them over to the other location and have them seed that with all the values in the culture that, you know, they already know how to run the business. And so now you only have one new variable which is the location. You know, the guy's good, you know, he's going to do your values and then you can spin that location up and then the location that you have, that is your mothership, it can take a little bit of a dip, right. If it needs to, because it can weather that. You've got cash flow, you've got existing contracts, you've got premiums that are coming in. If you do new guy, new location, everything's new. And you're not sure is it the market that's bad, Is it this guy who's bad? Maybe he's good, but he's not a culture fit. But now I got to turn the whole location over because he ends up hiring two other people underneath him that also aren't cartrifits. So like to me it's, it's, it's a pretty straight like I think the risk on going from five to four, taking the one of the best guys, give him the opportunity for his career to advance. Which also paints a picture for everyone else in the organization that hey, you do a great job, you might be able have your own office that you can lead. I think that's a really good story. And you're in the talent business. It's hard to find good guys, right? For sure. Yeah. I own insurance company. So I, I, I get it.

[Adam Howard]

Question for you to follow up on that then. So to efficiently scale that quicker and continue to duplicate that then, you know, we thought about that as, as a, as a model for it. So then, but it's, it's kind of slower. We got to build this up. Find a guy from here and then move him here. Right. Guy or gal from here or how do we eventually across state lines now find somebody that's two states over. You know, you got somebody's like, I don't want to move to states over.

[Unknown]

Maybe they do.

[Adam Howard]

Because the upside so good, you know, so opportunity. Creating a good enough opportunity.

[Unknown]

Yeah. And this is career pathing. I think it's actually really good for the business because people do eventually they build a big enough book of business. You know, I'm thinking about hanging my own shingle. It's like, cool, let me just take care of that for you. Hang your own shingle. But under our bigger flag and you get all of our systems, all of our infrastructure, our support, our lead generation, everything that's in that area, we'll just immediately send to you. You'll hit the ground running.

[Adam Howard]

So from initial onboarding, having a good process to sought out, you know, from A to Z. Hey, if you get to this point, this is an opportunity.

[Unknown]

Yeah. And I think that paints a really compelling picture. Yeah. That's what I would do. I also would just, this is for everybody. A lot of the problems that you have are based on timeline, which is just like an arbitrary line in the sand there. It's like I must get to this point by this, you know, by the state, which is basically irrelevant, just made up. And so I think at the end of the day, if you thought, well, what would it take to make this, you know, insurance company one of the biggest in the, in the US in 20 years, you probably grow very strategically off of this culture that has worked really, really well and trying to seed each location with the best, best seeds from the ones before. So you just keep those values kind of all the way through. So I think that's the much lower risk path. Appreciate it. Thank you. 100%. Hi again, yes, my name is seller Ukraine number one seller in all Ukraine spends lots of money on ads. You've gone to Poland and you haven't been able to get the market to convert. We talked last night. You take the words, look at the cultural differences on chat gbt, translate your existing marketing copy back into the Polish cultural norms so that the right language is used so that it converts there. What's the question?

Wow, you have, you have AI here already neuralink something like this. I prepare a little bit different question. Thank you, thank you. I promise that you don't remember me. And we sell crypto education to a wide audience and mostly who want to meet their basic needs. So there are no specific audience. We make over 1 million in revenue. We operate in Ukraine and are watching in other countries. I want to reach 10 million. I more or less understand how by expanding to new markets and we run cold traffic from meta, Google influencers, telegram and et cetera through funnels. And one old webinar funnel had generated over $20 million and still working. And we tested VSL, we put same content like in our, in our autowebinar but shorter and without comments activities. We tested advertorials, we tested lead magnets, funnels and nothing works as well as autowebinar funnel. Okay, that's where the magic happens where we are creating new off the webinar funnels and testing new topics, even new faces within these funnels. And I want to reach the audience that doesn't attend webinars. And my big question is how to find best practices and what else could hypothetically work. And I'm reading your book about offers right now and it, it's inspired me to build funnels for specific high paying segments instead of just wide audience. And I'd like To ask you your opinion about this and is it the right way that I, that I think right now.

So are you doing a million dollars a year or. Because you said, I remember the $20 million more.

Over a million dollars per month.

Per month. Okay, okay. That makes, makes me feel better. Okay. Because you're like, we're the biggest in Ukraine. I'm like, million bucks a year? I don't think so. Yes. Maybe in crypto at, you know, maybe at 12 in Ukraine. I don't know. I don't, I don't know what the proportional GP is there and I know there's war and all sorts of stuff. So I'm sure it's tough over there. Okay. So if the goal is to get bigger either, I mean the simplest thing to do would just be to add an upsell to the existing Ukraine market. That would be the simplest thing to do. Highest likelihood impact. That would just make you more money. That's the, that is for sure the easiest money button. If you wanted to expand front ends, then I think the idea of like trying to hit the people who are not on Google and meta is not the framework that I would use. And the reason for that is one, everyone's on it secondarily, the people who aren't on it probably aren't buying crypto. Like if you're not on Google, you're probably not buying crypto. You're not on web two, Web three is going to be like, what is going on? And so I think that like the first thing I do is probably add the ascension path. That would be like thing one. And then in terms of expanding into new markets, it was kind of what we talked about last night, which is, I think that the marketing that you're doing is just simply not resonating in these other markets because it's not your first language. And so marketing is so nuanced in terms of how copy's written, how like what analogies are persuasive, what visuals resonate within a given, a given audience. That that's in my opinion what the highest likelihood gap is for, why it's not converting in those new markets.

Yes, I understood. We do upsells, we have continuity, we have high ticket products inside and we I think do everything. The main point is what, what the best practices in funnels can work with us. Maybe I don't understand clearly about Google. Yeah, Google banned us every day and we can work with our crypto. We are not a crypto project. We are not some.

Well, everything crypto related. There's A lot of. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, fundamentally the business as it is today is just going to be a cash business. It's not going to be something that has enterprise value. And so you're, you're running a basic arbitrage business which is just, I buy media for a buck, I make $8 on gated media and I just run that as much as I can. And so really the only, the only way to grow that business is to just market more, spend more, that's it. And the only way that you can do that is that you continue to increase ltv. And so you're going to reach a natural cap based on the amount that you make per customer and the cost of eyeballs. And then over time that gap is going to shrink and your margins are going to compress press. Which is why like right now you have. When I remember I did Company one, Company two yesterday, I walked across here and I said, you're, you're company one, you're a marketing machine and you're, you know, blowing tons of cash flow in the door and that's a good thing. I call this a smash and grab opportunity. It's unlikely that it becomes something that has like sustainable long term enterprise value. When I say longterm, I mean like 10 years. Like you, you can for sure run this for more years than now. But it's just going to be a more thing like how do we spend more money and how do we make better ads? But if you have converting language, if you like auto webinars or whatever is converting really well for you, then there's lots of little things. So. Which is probably out of the scope of what I could answer in a verbal Q and A, but it's like have we split test the first 30 seconds of the VSL with three or five, you know, three to five different hooks, you know, on the ad side, like how many new pieces of creative are we putting out a day? I don't know how many you're putting out, but like if you get up to it's basically about 50, 50 pieces of creative per $10,000 per day.

Yeah.

Five pieces per.

Hundreds per day. Hundreds per month.

Yeah. So that would be from a creative perspective. So it would really just be looking at every step of it and just looking against the checklist and saying like, like all we're going to be doing with that business is just improving it. There's not going to be a big order of magnitude change that's going to happen. It's just going to be a Hundred small things because it's already profitable. You already have a client acquisition system. So it's just like how do we go from 8 to 1 to 12 to 1 so that we can then double ad spend and be at each one again but at twice the spend. And that's literally the process. You just do that over and over again. Got it.

Thank you so much.

Yeah, you bet.

[Alex]

Hi, Alex. Hello, my name is Nico, I'm from Quebec. Also with another guy from Quebec too, my friend. So first.

[Unknown]

Yeah, yeah.

[Alex]

We help home service businesses stuck between 100k and their first million a year to reached their first million a year with a three step client acquisition formula called TNT. But before that, for five years we were a was so website as a service we sold 2.1 million over the last year. Net profit is like 950k. We would like to reach 500k a month collected for Quebec market and have less complexity. Okay. Situation here. So we have like 700 active client on the whole old system which was a waste 200amonth thing. It was super cool but super frustrating. The team was started. Started to feel like robots. So we got emotional and we're like, okay, let's move to High Ticket. So that's what happened. Four months ago we started High Ticket. We're like cash flows here now. But the thing is, I realized yesterday actually that my LTV to CAC is now very low because my clients are home service businesses. I'm in Quebec. We can only run ads for like four months for them because there's. There's snow everywhere for like seven, six, seven months a year. The other thing is once the ads work, they stop the ads because they are limited by capacity. So what's stopping me to grow?

[Unknown]

What do you want to do with this business?

[Alex]

What we want to do actually is. Well, you want to.

[Unknown]

Because the first business sounded like a great business. Right?

[Alex]

I know. The thing is we wanted to create a real transformation and I think that was.

[Unknown]

Can I tell you a secret?

[Alex]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Very small business owners will never build a stable business because they are not stable. So has nothing to do with you. Okay. And this took me a very long time to figure out and I kept trying to bang my head against the wall being like, how do I fix Turner? How do I fix retention? Like Shopify has best in class retention for vsmb. So very small business owners prosumers, if you will. And they keep 50% per year. That's best in class 100 billion dollar company. And so I have only seen one model work with Small business owners and it's ultra low priced and you build the entire business around having high gross margins but low prices. Right.

[Alex]

So the West. Yes, that was a good thing because I feel like I'm trying to push a high.

[Unknown]

Thing that happened is you just got impatient.

[Alex]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

You had 700 customers making you 200amonth. You're making 140amonth. Yeah. Probably good margins.

[Alex]

Yeah, yeah, it was nice.

[Unknown]

And you're running away. Right. And so I think honestly, like, you know, the best thing that would have happened would have been that you didn't take the last four months and build this other thing. And you would have just kept doubling down and taking all that extra energy and said, what were you doing in sales per month with the W? I just like saying the west were.

[Alex]

Boarding like 40 to 50 new clients a month. What's churn was we were keeping like 85% of people year after year.

[Unknown]

Good business. Right. The thing is super high gross margins.

[Alex]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

85% annual revenue retention.

[Alex]

When we started high ticket, we're like, whoa, cash flow is insane now, like on month one, but then maybe not later.

[Unknown]

Well, you're certainly not making transformations now. They leave in more months.

[Alex]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

So here's. Okay, so instead of thinking about transformations, just think. So Elon has this really good frame around this. He said, either we can help a very small amount of people a ton or we can help a lot of people a little bit. And he's taking the perspective to helping a lot of people a little bit. And so I think with this business, like they have demonstrated with their dollars that they value what you give them. They don't cancel it. They like it. When you give them the other thing you think you're selling, you're selling out of your own wallet. You're saying, I wouldn't want this, I would want this. And then you're saying, they're not like me. Duh.

[Alex]

And we can still like sell the high ticket to the nuggets in the West. Yeah, that would be the thing.

[Unknown]

You know, be even cooler not doing that.

[Alex]

Okay. Not even.

[Unknown]

No. Like it. Hear me out. So, so no, this is, this is like I, I will, I will keep the entertainment for, for entertainment purposes, but I want you to, I want you to really think about this. So, okay, there is going to be. I didn't explain one of these other frameworks, but crash course. So with every one of the implementations that you do, you have limited resources, Time, effort, money. Right. And so strategy is prioritization. It means how do we Take these limited resources and allocate them against unlimited options. And so if you are not sure, it's because you're not doing the job of the entrepreneur. There is always only one thing that is the most important in the business, and if you can't decide, that's on you. And so you have the stuff, you've got your team, you've got your money or whatever. And so instead of being like, man, we should start this ascension thing, because you probably have really good LGBT CAC on this other business. The was business.

[Alex]

Oh, yeah, yeah. This one.

[Unknown]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. And so instead of saying, hey, let's start this whole other business, right? Because it's a totally different service, totally different price point, whatever, Right. Just say, like, what if we took all. All of that energy of starting this other business and just said, how do we get to 200 customers a month? True. Yeah. That would quadruple the business. Yeah. And if you did that, you'd be at 500,000amonth in six months.

[Alex]

That's right.

[Unknown]

And it would be really good. $500,000 a month. Amazing.

[Alex]

That helps.

[Unknown]

Cool. Thank you. No, you bet. All right.

[Cole]

My name is Cole, so I sell solar. I'm. I'm like a marketing company for. For solar providers in California. So we sell the homeowners. I'm currently. We opened up last April, and I did $850,000 last year, so I want to be at $10 million.

[Unknown]

The biggest.

[Cole]

I know, I know. The biggest concern that I have.

[Unknown]

Huh? Yesterday. Yesterday. Yeah.

[Cole]

I think that our. My biggest concern right now is that I think we have a very much of an apples to apples comparison to other solar companies. I don't think our offer is actually that special in terms of, like, you know, relatively speaking, commodity. Yeah, for sure. And so I've been trying to find ways to create an apples to oranges comparison. Our sales rates, like, me and my business partner, we're very good at sales, so we have like a, you know, we did door to door for like decades. So, you know, we're like 80% close rates. But it's a battle, right?

[Unknown]

We.

[Cole]

And we do lose people to price shopping, which is, you know, we're 100% virtual. So I'm trying to figure out how to create an apples orange comparison in the solar industry, which is very much a commodity market.

[Unknown]

But you don't have control over the product, right?

[Cole]

That's correct.

[Unknown]

Yeah. I. I'll be honest. It's very tough. Like, you can't. You actually can't really change Your offer. Right. And so the only thing that you can do is change the terms. But it's a zero sum game. So every dollar you take out of your pocket, you put it into, you know, the, like every dollar you give the customer, you're taking out of your pocket because you, you can't control the variables. Right? Yeah. So what were the margins that you made on the 800?

[Cole]

We made half of that.

[Unknown]

Okay. Yeah. So I'll say this. I don't think the constraint of the business is that it's commoditized. Okay. So although it may be frustrating, you're running 50% margins on a business that you have very little operational complexity around. And so if you want to hit 10 million, you absolutely could hit 10 million. There's tons of solar companies that go from 0 to 10, 0 to 20 in like 12 months, 24 months. Not that uncommon. Yeah, but the business that you're really in is the recruiting, hiring, training of salespeople business. And that's, that's the game. Right. The business is not super sellable. It, I mean it is sellable. Like you can sell like one times and then you can basically meld your team into some other guy's distribution base and it all gets aggregated. Yeah. And that's kind of how that industry is going. But I don't, like, basically you don't have enough control over the business to really materially change the, the offer. Yeah. And so I don't normally say that, but essentially, and like this is hopefully you're not taking as a slight. It's just like you're a hired gun, you know, and so you've got two hired guns and you guys are both really, you're mercenaries, you're both really good at, at sales and you're making basically the same amount that a top tier sales guy would at, at a sales Org. And so the only leverage that you're going to get is training your ability to train onboard, recruit other guys who can do the same thing as you, and you get an override on, on their commissions. Yeah. And so if anything, I would say that. So we're getting to the answer. So basically where you can have a competitive advantage is not on the customer side, but on the salesman side. And so I would reorient all my attention to being like, how can I make the best offer to salespeople? How can I get more salespeople onboarded? How can I have superior training? How can I have better data and analytics and better lead gen for them so that their job of Selling is made easiest with me for everything else, minus the core offer. Yeah.

[Cole]

My, my vision long term is with solar, especially in California. It's, it's a savings oriented sale. So it's like your bill is this, you're going to pay less money, et.

[Unknown]

Cetera, as long as the credits are there.

[Cole]

What's up?

[Unknown]

As long as the credits are there.

[Cole]

Which is also a problem.

[Unknown]

But so soon. Yeah. I divested from a solar company. What was that you. I divested from a solar. Oh, did you really?

[Cole]

Interesting.

[Unknown]

For this exact issue. Yeah.

[Cole]

My ultimate vision, what I, what I'm kind of been obsessed with is instead of selling on savings, I would way rather find a way to add services on top of that. Whether it's like, you know, some sort of H Vac arrow seal thing or you know, the tax services with depreciation losses.

[Unknown]

Dude, I'd rather you just like you. So let's say so when we're going zooming all the way out strategy stuff. Yeah. What you have is an ability to sell. Correct. And you know how to generate leads. Yeah. And if tomorrow you said, I'm not selling solar, you'd have to fill out the, you know, the next 180 days max of contracts and make sure that the shit gets installed, whatever. Right. Then after that you could do whatever you wanted. Right. How many employees do you have? We have four. Yeah. So it's not, I mean, it's you, your partner and two other people. Yeah. Yeah.

[Cole]

Or three other people.

[Unknown]

Okay. Yeah. So I think that it just might be. You might be better served. And I don't normally give this kind of advice, but like you might just be better served taking that skill set and putting in a different opportunity vehicle.

[Cole]

Interesting.

[Unknown]

And just like you're like, how do I do this solar thing With H Vac it's like, just do H Vac, just go to door sell H Vac. And H Vac has phenomenal multiples and has great revenue retention. Once people do, the H Vac, person comes back every year, services again, upsells more stuff. Cool. And there's problems in that business getting H Vac, you know, people, the, the fixers, the technicians. Yeah. Is the constraint of that business. Usually getting, getting customers is actually not the constraint. So it might be kind of fun for you to be like, oh, my phone's ringing. This is weird. People are calling me because their AC is broken. Not like, hey, can you sell me solar? Like no one knows that.

[Cole]

Yeah, sure.

[Unknown]

Right. And so I think like if the goal long term is to build something that has pure enterprise value, given the fact that you have so little control over the existing process, you're basically just an acquisition machine. Which I respect. I came from that in the gym world. Then recombine it into a business model that actually has enterprise value. Got it. Cool. Probably not what you expected, but not at all. Thank you, sir. Sweet. Was that helpful? Was that cool? Interesting. All right, good.