There’s No Easy Business

0:00I sell CFO advisory, really um >> Sell that. CPA CFO advisory, super expensive B2B, it's probably sticky. You're probably operationally constrained though, so keep going. >> Yeah, it and tax planning. >> Yeah. >> Um we will do probably about 2.9 this year. >> Amazing. >> I would love to be at like 20 million. >> Okay. >> Um but what's stopping me? I have we've made all this stuff.

0:27I have two books, I've fired my CPA, I have tax-free millionaire, I've made all these courses. I don't know what to do with them. I don't know how to market and I don't know how to advertise. I've never done any of this. >> Well, you're doing 3 million a year, I mean >> All organic. >> Yeah, I mean you're obviously not marketing shitty. Um so you've got all this stuff, right? You got these books, you got these courses. You make content? >> Yes. >> Okay, so you are marketing.

0:52>> Well, I've never put them out there. Like I don't know what to do with it. >> Wait, huh? Okay, hold on. So you've got all this stuff in your back pocket. So you've got tax-free millionaire book and/or course, you've got fire CPA book and/or course. And you make content about tax accounting [ __ ] >> Yep. >> And so people come in and buy your tax accounting [ __ ] Right? And you're trying to get to 20? >> Yeah.

1:17>> Do people turn out? >> Well, I've never tried to sell anybody on the stuff that I've made. >> Well, but we don't need to but like forget let's erase those for a moment. Those are not real things for the purpose of our conversation. Well if you didn't have those things, what would you do to grow the business? >> People call our office and they come in and I sell them for monthly service and I get referrals for tax services.

1:42>> In person or virtual, yeah. >> Okay, but you're local? >> I'm local. We have a bricks and mortar, I have a billboard, but most I do, yeah. But most of our clients are are are not in Texas. >> Okay, heard. Okay, so they're coming from the content, they call up, you guys sell them, whatever. >> Referrals, yeah, absolutely. >> And what are you growing out annually? >> What am I what? >> Growing out annually. >> Last year I was 2.2. >> Okay, it's great. Yeah, super good.

2:07Whatever 30 35% annual growth is awesome. Okay, so what's the um So you you want to get to 20 and I'm guessing you just don't want to wait like 7 years to get to 20 at that compound rate. >> Yeah. >> Right? So as long as you're keeping customers when I said do they churn that's what I meant. Like are they stay do people [snorts] stay with you? >> The people that are on monthly stay a lot more than the people that come in just for a one-time tax plan. >> What's the um This will be fun for you.

2:34>> Okay. >> So what's the I'll give you like some some business accounting. Um what's sales velocity right now? >> I don't know what what >> units a month do you sell? >> On the monthly recurring? >> Yeah. >> There's probably about 190 clients. >> No, how many do you sell every month? >> Oh, new ones? We're we've closed down for new sales cuz I'm trying to figure everything out. So nothing right now. Nothing. >> Well, that will not grow the business.

2:57That for sure. That There's my I'll be here all day guys. Uh >> [laughter] >> Okay, so So you have a goose egg there. Okay, but okay, you have this other stuff. Why do we care? >> Well, that's what I want to do. Like I like the products. I like to educate. I like to be in front of the camera. Like I want to do all that. >> Okay. Well, what's wrong with the business that you decided to stop selling stuff for?

3:25>> It's [ __ ] hard. That's why. >> me get your >> It's No, like to fulfill on it and >> You could always just start a business where you sell everybody else's stuff. >> Um well, I mean >> get my joke. You missed it. Okay. >> And what I'm trying to get to now like AI what you were saying is going to completely obliterate our industry which I'm really excited about because I want to dive into it. I want to leverage AI tools and even overseas partners doing low-level stuff Um, because people in our industry are really slow and outdated. And they Yeah.

3:56>> But all of these are not things that you would solve with marketing. You're supply constrained and so you're like, how do I market more? I'm like, you can't even take people. >> Well, I want to market like for courses and to buy my books and things like that. >> a valuable business right now. >> No, I I I do. Yeah. >> Why are we Why would we start another business that's not that good? >> me, but I I want to do that, too. [laughter] >> Yeah, I mean like like I make the content I continue to repeat and I get I get my my memes made of me of like, Alex, I'm just going to say it's shit's hard and hard things are hard and hard hard hard. And it's because it just never stops being hard.

4:33It just always sucks. Like the course thing will suck, too. You just don't know it yet. Ask the course people, they'll tell you it sucks. >> That's great advice. >> Right? They're like, it sucks. Yeah. Customers aren't sticky, they'll expect you to do everything. They're like, I'm not a tax-free millionaire already and I bought your $17 course. Like, [ __ ] you, you know, like like that's you know, that's what's going to happen.

5:00But you have you have a service that people aren't turning out of. I'm guessing Yeah. >> some, but they're pretty sticky. >> Yeah. No No one who No one who has bad churn stops selling. I'll say that. So, like the fact that you're comfortable enough that you're like, oh, we don't need to take customers for a while, like I'm sure your stuff is better than you think. Um, but I think that we have to think Basically, you're supply constrained. And so, we just need to fix the supply constraint of your business. Because if I said, "Hey, we found a way What are your margins right now?"

5:31>> About 20, 25%. >> Okay. So, if we said, "Okay, let's see if we can find um, offshore talent that can give your existing team two or three x leverage. So, you don't have to increase internal head count, you can increase external head count. And then when AI comes in, you can basically wipe those guys off the map, and then fine, right? So, it's like, yeah, they don't have jobs or families. Uh >> [laughter] >> So.

5:56They're overseas, they're not real. Um I'm kidding. So, I know half you guys are overseas, that was a joke. Um But yeah, so I think that we need to create operating leverage. We have to look at basically how the services are being delivered so that we can figure out how to get each person two or three more, you know, X in terms of their ability to deal with customers. Um probably there's a little bit of tech that's missing because this is for everybody. Everybody Every entrepreneur I talk to is like, I want to be AI first, right? And then you're like using ChatGPT for emails. Like, that's not how you're AI first. Um the first thing that you have to do in order to have an AI first company is you have to be a data first company.

6:32Because AI works with data. If you don't have data, then there's no [ __ ] AI. So, you have to have complete data first from your approach and have an architecture in place so that you know all the elements of the business from data, and then we can with the AI layer on top to put reinforcement training in place in order to actually train it to do stuff. So, if that's where you want to go, which does have tremendous operating leverage, and like just for everybody, this is the once-in-a-generation move right now. So, 25 years ago, cloud computing came out, and then, you know, software went from CDs to cloud, and that and then all of the software companies and all that boom was last 25 years, and all the billionaires were made. The next boom is this, right? And so, we're early, and so the hard of this is like, well, the pieces don't all fit together perfectly yet, and it's like, well, that's the figure out that we make lots of money from, right?

7:18>> Okay. >> So, I don't think the solution is you selling a course cuz you just happened to have recorded it. I think that we need to sip fix the supply constraint first, and then you'll use all those things as marketing assets to increase demand when the time comes. So, save those in your back pocket, there's nothing wrong with them. But I want to look at the model, increase operating leverage, that'll probably also increase margin, start making this number more than zero. >> Okay. >> Which I promise, you can take this at the bank, if you make that not zero, you will grow faster.

7:46Um you'll make more money if you sell people. Uh and then I think from there, so it's like increase operating leverage through offshoring, add in data layer. Once the data layer's there, then we can add in the AI component that further increases operating leverage. Once you put the remote team in, you'll then be able to sell again. If you get to the point where you're like I've now reached my new two or three x capacity without even marketing, then great. If you do need to market more, then use the assets that are in your back pocket to go do more delete gen.

8:19It was like four or five steps, but that's how I think through it. >> Thank you. >> Real quick, I'm going to show you the exact 10-stage roadmap from zero to 100 million plus that less than 1% of companies finish, I've now done multiple times. And so I can say with a lot of confidence that these are the stages as head count increases that you need to get through. And I broke each of these down by each of from functions of the business, what the constraint feels like, like what are the symptoms of it when you're going through it, and then what steps we actually took to graduate. And we've done this across software, physical products, uh service businesses, brick and mortar, all of this, and it works.

8:53And it's my gift to you, it's absolutely free. And so the link's in the description, but you just go acquisition.com/roadmap, just enter info, and it'll spit it right back to you all free.