Warum der Exit-Plan eines Millionen-Gründers nicht aufgeht

0:00Unternehmer/Gast So, we sell a soccer training program to soccer players who want to go pro. >> Cool. >> a million dollars in revenue. >> Sweet. >> We would like to be at 12 million dollars in revenue. This is what's stopping us. We actually kind of don't know. We're getting told >> [laughter] >> We're getting told it's a leads issue, so to just do more volume. >> Can you handle more customers right now? >> Yes. >> Okay, then it's a demand. So, it's a demand Yeah, well, it's totally demand-driven.

0:26>> We We also think we're playing the wrong game because >> Also fair. >> We're the only ones doing it in this space. >> Well, that doesn't necessarily mean that you're playing the wrong game. >> Anyone else who's done it sells a physical product. >> Mhm. You'll make way more. >> So, >> but you'll have other issues. What do you guys want You said you want to make 12 million in revenue? >> that. >> Do you want to sell the company? Do you just want to make cash flow? Like, what do you guys want? >> Sell. >> Yeah, well, yeah, digital definitely won't sell.

0:54Yeah, so if you want to like have an exit, then you'll have to build a brand, and then build a product that your audience really likes, and work very heavily on that product. So, that doesn't mean you're going to white label something. That means you actually have to make something that is different and better. And as soon as you do that, and if you actually get any modicum of success, prepare for China to make dupes and start um selling the same thing as you, and that's why brand matters. And so, they have to want to buy your thing because of who you are, and because of what it is.

1:21And so, it's like you have to not skip on quality. You have to look at all the details that other people would skip over, and show the attention to detail that you guys have in terms of how you build something. The alternative path there is like if you can figure out a way to sell your education to teams or something like that, that can be um more residual, some sort of subscription that's more reoccurring in nature. That could create something that has more enterprise value if the goal is to sell it.

1:47Alex Um I will say if you if you approach this with like we just want to build it to sell it, it's really [snorts] I it's it's actually like super rare unless you go into a really boring business for that to actually happen. Like guys who are experienced M&A guys who then go in and say, "All right, I'm going to roll up these H facts." That's different than somebody who's like, "I want to start a business and I want to sell it." It's you you need to take like two steps back into like the the shoes of your consumers and say like, "How do I provide value on a consistent basis so that I can make something that people want to keep giving me money for?" And then if you do that for a very long time, then you have something that becomes valuable enough that somebody will pay for it.

2:23>> Got you. The whole selling thing is kind of what we discussed here. >> Yeah, you're good. >> Um but in terms of leads issue, everybody's going to tell you guys to do more. And just thinking about that that whole problem, we're going to run into this constraint where since he's the face of the brand, I do everything at the back end. He obviously can't like pitch a tent and live at the football field and continuously fill do do do content, right? He's going to die.

2:47Alex >> Why not? I thought you wanted to win. >> Yeah, Tim told us the same thing. >> [laughter] >> Right? My Asian immigrants, that's right. >> And we were just basically like through all the conversations that we've had, we know that it's a leads thing for the thing that we're selling currently. Like right now, we're selling like a $397 product to those young footballers.

3:13How could we get to a million a month with that if leads is an issue and the whole content creation process? >> And your And your primary thing right now is this all organic, right? >> Yes. Yeah. Everything's organic. There's no paid. >> Yeah. Um well, first off, you could make it annual or a 6-month thing, so at least for you know, $397 recurs every 6 months. That would be an option. Um another thing that we could consider doing like I think it'd be cool if you could make this into like an association of some sort.

3:44Um where if you can get a lot of buyers, you can create aggregate discounts for things that people who buy soccer-related stuff could benefit from. And typically discount related associations, if you can do like 10x value, meaning if someone pays $400 a year, it saves them, you know, $4,000 a year uh for being a part of it, people that becomes very, very sticky. And it also creates a true network effect where the more people who get added, whereas in a you know a a service based business, the more people get added, typically the quality of the service will will will go down or degrade. Uh whereas when you have a network based business, the bigger the network gets, the higher the buying negotiating power that you have in order to get more aggregate discounts for that community.

4:26Alex Um but fundamentally, you have a one-time purchase product. You would like to have something that has higher LTV. You either have to make them worth more or you have to sell more of them. So, you probably have to do both of those things in order to grow the business. If I had your business, I would be trying to solve the equation of like what can I what can I sell these people that will they will not want to leave? Um or and this is totally okay, what this tells out is that like you might just sell something that's like $4,000 to a smaller percentage of those people as an upsell to the $400 thing um and like triple or quadruple the business. And then with the excess cash start running ads and you'll get to about a million dollars a month. You won't have a sellable company, but you'll make more money.

5:08Alex >> Okay. >> So, if you're like I would be cool making $10 million a year, the path would be to add a back end and then with the cash from the back end start running ads. You have to keep pumping out more content. You'll have to learn how to run paid ads. That would be the like the lowest operational change thing that you'd have to do to get to a million. You won't build something that will sell, but you will make more money. >> So, before we even tackle the whole league thing is like fix the the offer, basically.

5:33>> Yeah. So, option one is you just add a back end. That's very simple. Just add higher touch uh you know, services to some degree to the people who you know, one out of 20 of those people who buy the $400 thing buys the $4,000 thing, whatever, maybe it's one out of four, we'll find out. Um that's that's option one. Option two is you keep it digital and you add some sort of recurring element to it. It'll be significantly easier for you to just add a more expensive thing. Um but those are the two options.

5:58Alex >> Do you recommend touching the the front end offer first or do the back end thing? >> No, I think you just call the people who buy the $400 thing and ask them to buy a $4,000 thing. >> Exactly. Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> [applause] >> Yeah, so for you guys it'll be it'll be two triples. It's like the first triple happened when you call all the people with the $400 and sell them a $4,000 thing. And that'll give you the first triple. And then with the excess cash from the first triple, you then spend more money on ads and then you get the second triple.

6:29Alex That's what it'll look like. You'll just prob like the real realistically, if you're making I'm guessing almost all profit right now, um you'll go from making a million dollars a year in profit on a million dollars a year revenue to like three-ish, maybe four million dollars a year in profit on 10. So it's going to be a different game and you will make three or four times more money. So that's what it'll look like. It will not be sellable. And you come back at that point and be like, "Hey, what should I do?" And I would say, "Well, I'd go back to the beginning and build a business that had a recurring revenue stream that made it super viable, but it will be slower and harder. But that's also why businesses that are sellable are more valuable because they're slower and harder to build." So that's a you guys question of what you want. You guys are young.

7:08Sometimes it's nice to just make money. Um if you're like, "I want to have a big exit," then just build it the other way. But those are the two paths that I see from where you're currently sitting. If you want to build a physical product, it's media-heavy, brand-heavy, product-heavy, and making other associations of other faces that aren't you guys um with the product and then eventually having a suite of products that people associate with other cool people in soccer.

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