Episode 426: Business Growth with Athin Cassiotis

Welcome to another episode of the Above the Business podcast. My name is Bradley Hammond, your host. Today's episode, we have Athan Cassiotis. As you'll notice, Athan is from Down Under. Athan, I was— he has a podcast himself. I was fortunate enough to be able to go on his podcast, and so we did a podcast swap. And I think one thing I really— you'll relate to Athan about is he's been able to himself speak with a lot of different business owners and entrepreneurs of varying sizes on his podcast and his journeys. And I think you'll be able to pull out some principles and experiences that can help you in your journey as well. Also, I'm really excited about going into 2025. This our first episode we're dropping, or Monday interview that we're dropping in 2025. We've got some really cool enhancements that we're going to be releasing this year, including we're going to be doing podcast series. So we've got a number of different topics that I'm wanting to do a series around. So we'll be bringing in guests to help us to be able to go deep on a topic, things like leadership, things like recruiting, things about managing financials in your business, sales, marketing. There's so many endless amount of topics. But that way, instead of having it to be one episode at a time, we're going to be able to have 3 or 4 or maybe even 5 different episodes centered around one topic. Now, not every episode like this one is going to be a series-based, but that is a new enhancement coming in 2025 that I'm really excited about. All right, without further ado, here's my conversation with Ethan Cassiotis.

Okay. Pronounce for me your first name and last name. I wanna make sure I grab that correct.

Yep. Ethan Cassiotis. So Ethan is like Nathan without the N. Ethan. And Cassiotis is just, yeah, normally how it's, how it looks. Yeah.

Ethan Cassiotis. Look forward to it. All right. Ethan, let's see. I'd like to go 20, 25 minutes recording time. I record the intro and the outro. Um, afterwards. Um, I actually don't right now, uh, have the date of when we're going to be dropping, uh, this episode, but I'll make sure that, uh, Courtney, my podcast admin, gets that over to you. Sound good?

Sounds good, mate. Yeah. Um, and happy to go wherever. You saw I've got a lot of topics there, so I can go as wide, as deep as you want.

Um, yeah, that's great, man. Appreciate that. All right, you ready to rock and roll?

Let's do it.

Ethan, welcome to the Above the Business podcast.

Yeah, thanks, mate. Awesome to be here, Bradley. Looking forward to adding value to your audience.

Ethan, you're not in, uh, you're not in North Alabama. Tell us where you're, uh, where you're coming from, uh, uh, right now. Obviously we're in, uh, quite literal different time zones with different places in, in the world. And while you do that, also, we always start with background and origin story, so let's I'd love for people to kind of know a little bit of your journey and how you got to where you are today.

Yeah, definitely a little bit further away in Sydney, Australia. So yes, we're in the, in the future right now. I guess a little bit about myself is I grew up in Adelaide, South Australia, which is like a smaller capital city, like a big country town. My parents are high school teachers, so wanted me to go through the, you know, the school system growing up. Um, I started my entrepreneurial journey selling VCD movies, if you remember CD burners back in the day. Fast and Furious number 1, it's number 10 now. Um, you know, I'd burn that, sell that to my classmates at 15 years old. And then towards the end of high school, in my final year 12, I wasn't enjoying it anymore and I dropped out. Um, and you can imagine my parents didn't like that, being teachers. My dad told me I'll never be able to study, having 3 degrees himself. And one of my teachers told me I'll never be successful. And because I'd won a lot of sporting championships in soccer and tennis, I was never the naturally I'm the most talented, but, you know, I was there. Well, watch me, I'll prove you wrong, and I'll build myself into what I need to be. Um, got a job, worked my way up in that company, did a lot of great things. The head office in Sydney headhunted me, and they moved me to Sydney. Um, so yeah, did a lot of cool things there. And then I wanted to learn more about business, and everyone at these— at our Friday drinks and that would, um, you know, be talking about the degrees and the universities, and I had nothing, right? I just worked my way up. And so I wanted to learn more about business. I realized that one of the top universities here in Sydney, I could get into doing an MBA, a Master's of Business Administration, just based on having 8 years of experience working, which I had at the time. So I got to skip school and the bachelor's, so to speak, and go straight to the MBA. And even though it was challenging for me to study, I had a purpose, and I did most of the core subjects. And then there was a big change in management, didn't enjoy it anymore. So after 10 and a half years, I left that company. Started my first company, which is waste management consulting. So I took all our knowledge from the waste and recycling industry, took it to the market. Westfield shopping centers, I know you have them in the US as well, that was my first big client. I saved them $4 million a year, $20 million over 5 years. Kmart and Target, which I know you guys also have there, I have been working with them for over 6 years now. I've saved them many, many millions of dollars as well and worked a lot of other big brands, Defense, all these people. And then I'd go to networking events and people would ask me questions about business and like, Ethan, I've got this challenge, what do you think? And I'm like, Why don't you do 1, 2, 3, 4, 5? And they're like, that's really good. I need to write that down. Can you tell me that again? And this would happen multiple times very quickly, right? In a short period of time. I'm like, okay, I've got a very good strategic brain, a good memory. I can see the patterns from my own business experience, from my MBA, from my coaches and mentors that were helping me. So it's like, well, better create a business out of this, right? It feels, you know, natural to me to do this. So I started business coaching, mentoring as well, still doing the first business too. Business coaching being about 5 years or so now that I've been doing that. Worked with over 30 different industries, clients in over 10 countries, all the way from startups to 6-figure, 7-figure, 8-figure businesses that I've helped there. And yeah, really enjoying from, you know, being able to help people in all my 9 keys of business growth mastery. And I'm also became an NLP master practitioner, so I can also reframe mindsets at the same time as the business strategies and tactics there. And started a podcast as well, which I recently had you on, which will be coming out soon too, uh, The Business Grow Show. And, uh, yeah, really enjoyed that. Over 230 episodes over 4 and a half years, every week going strong, uh, there, which has been great. And yeah, looking at doing other deals like buying businesses, helping people get investment, getting equity in companies, a lot of other cool things now that I've been building business over time. So I've really been loving business and, uh, you know, getting straight into it. So That's the sort of the quick version of my story. Understand that it wasn't a conventional route, you know, which got me to where I am today.

Do your parents ever apologize to you?

No, it was funny, right? I got all these big brands that I'd work with and I still didn't— my dad still didn't really think I was successful. Well, when I completed my MBA, that was when he finally said, oh, well done, Ethan, like you did well. Because obviously he's the old school mentality of you know, 3 degrees, but he didn't have a master's, right? So I sort of did better than him to an extent because he had 3 normal degrees, um, that he went past it. So, um, I think, I think I'm a little bit like— have you seen The Last Dance with Michael Jordan on Netflix where he has that, like, he needs that negative person to sort of tell him that he can't do something and he rises up? I think I've had that a little bit growing up with sport, you know, that area there. So I think he gave me fuel, um, not Not that you should use it always as fuel, um, you know, in that area, but, but it gave me there. But no, they don't really understand. I think it's like entrepreneurs compared to people that are just, you know, keeping comfortable, right? They don't really understand what I do, but they, you know, I'm doing relatively well so that they're happy, I guess, in their own way.

Yeah, I've seen Last Dance about 20 times, um, one of my favorite documentaries. I, I would say, yeah, I agree with that. I think you just use what you got. So for some people it's pain, trauma in their past growing up or even trauma recently. And so if that fuels you, you know, do I think you can burn dirty fuel for the rest of your life? No, probably not. I think that there's some clean fuel that we can burn that, that is more sustainable. But you know what? I think you use what you have as an entrepreneur. And so if that's to prove— it's just to prove somebody wrong, parent, you know, family member, the uncle, the teacher who said you're not going to amount to something and you're out to— I mean, you know what, I think that's the great thing about it is you use, you use what you got. You use whatever it is as motivation. And to your point, yeah, Jordan, he would just make up stories, you know, in his mind. And we're like, wait a minute, was that true? No, it wasn't true. He just made it up, you know. It's like, well, he used what he, what he had for sure. Um, okay. So what, what— I mean, goodness, you rattled off obviously just a really wide variety of businesses, even from small startups, entrepreneurial businesses, all the way to, you know, Fortune 500 companies. What is the sweet spot that you really love to work with businesses and why?

Yeah, to me, I really love working with businesses that have some traction, right? So maybe they're in the multiple 6-figure, 7-figure range, right there, where they've, they've proven that whatever their product or service is can make money, right, in that area there. And then it's like, okay, how do we ramp this up? How do we build the business so that it's scalable? And, you know, I have my 9 keys. So, you know, mindset can be a portion of that, right? Because sometimes, you know, a lot of the time I can teach the same strategies and tactics, you know, to 10 different people people get 10 different, you know, results because of their mindset. So there's probably some mindset tweaks that need to happen, um, you know, the strategy of the business, do we need to adjust it? Maybe, maybe not. And planning, that's, you know, that's the key foundational things. But then from there, we look at the branding and the marketing and the sales and going, okay, well, is what, what we have as a brand, is that going to get us to where we want to be? Do we need to, you know, um, adjust that brand? Um, how are we getting leads and clients? Is there only one method? How many methods do we need to you know, put more of a machine behind that. And then, you know, the final phase is around numbers, systems, and leadership. So what, you know, what are they measuring in their numbers? You know, I know you're big on systems yourself as well, right? What systems are we doing to automate things within the business? And then, you know, being a leader is obviously getting the right people. Do we need to remove people? Sometimes we're removing toxic people, right, in the business. Um, are we getting the right people that are aligned to the vision and the mission? So they've got some traction, they don't need to really— how to get to that next point growth, and then we can get them from 6 to 7 or 7 to 8 figures, right? You know, in that area there, um, and keep growing them. So that's really the ones that I, I love working with the most because you're working directly with the business owner right there, and you can make quick action, um, to be able to make a difference, as long as they're obviously open to taking the action. You can lead the horse to water, you can't make it drink, so to speak, but, uh, you know, you aim to do it there. So that's my favorite people that I work with. Yeah.

Let's say hypothetically there's a, there's a company out there listening to this, they're doing half a million dollars in top-line revenue, and they say, I want to get 3. What are the mindset shifts first and foremost that need to happen for me to get there?

Yeah, it's a great question, and I think there's a two-prong approach answer to this. There's a general ones that I'll talk about, then there's individual ones where there's probably something that's happened growing up, right, that their parents told them. You know, a lot of our beliefs came in the first 7 years of our life. Proven there. So it's very unconscious. So as a good coach, myself or other people that understand this, is you've got to listen to what they say, right? They're not aware of it, right, about what they're saying in their beliefs. Going, I just picked that up. Okay, let's work on that, right? And maybe it's business is hard, whatever it is, right? So find out what's specific for them, number one, right? And then we will work through those beliefs. Number two, if we, if we look at it generally I think the biggest challenge for people that are making around that amount and really going to the next level is about letting go, right? It's— they want to be like, ah, no one can do it as good as me, or, um, you know, I want to control these parts of the business. And there's a bit of a bottleneck, right, that's going on there. So it's about going, well, even if someone does it 80% as good as me, that's good enough, right? No one's going to do it as good as us because we're unique, right? No one's going to be exactly the same as us. So being okay with that, putting good systems behind that, and just allowing people— like, find good people, be a good leader, and just let them do their thing, right? Don't try and micromanage them, um, and be that bottleneck. And if you can let go and get the right people into that business and then focus on the revenue-generating tasks, right? Because I think if we all do an audit of what we do, there's a lot of tasks there that are not high-level tasks right? There could be admin tasks, it could even be home tasks. Are you mowing the lawns? Are you going to buy shopping, right? Are you cleaning the house? Like these types of things even in your personal life, as well as admin standard tasks that are not really needed, whereas we should be focusing on the sales, the marketing, the partnerships, that area of the business, right? Um, so it's a bit of a mindset shift going, what are we going to focus on? And then hiring the team members that are actually going to be fulfilling, you know, the delivery and these other admin and other parts. Of the business there and allowing them to do that and just building great systems around that so they can, um, yeah, grow very quickly. And as long as we get those shifts from the general sense of that, and then we shift their mindset shifts— I'll give a very quick example, right? One of my clients came to me, 7-figure business, dropped down, um, went from 15 staff to 5 staff, you know, in a downward spiral. Found me online through a podcast interview, reached out on LinkedIn, booked a session. Signed him up as a 12-month client. I could tell his mindset was the biggest challenge. I said, we're going to do a mindset session, that's it for the first session. I did it and he had his biggest month ever in his business the month after. No strategies, no tactics, right? Just one mindset session with him. And this is where that specific mindset trait— so this could happen generally where you are, or you could be on a downward slump for other reasons, right? That things are happening that sometimes you need that bit of a lift. Then we implemented the strategies and tactics and then we got even more exponential growth to keep the momentum going, right? So I think it's a two-pronged approach that you need to tailor it, but also understand that bigger scaling, you know, business owner and really investor mindset. And I would say not just the mindset, it's also the identity, right? Where you need to change from a business owner identity to more of an investor identity. You know, Rich Dad Poor Dad, you know, he talks about being the investor. So how would you look at yourself as an investor of your business, and then, you know, ideally an investor in other businesses, and then build a business that, you know, doesn't need you, so to speak, within that, so you have more freedom to do what you want to do?

What are the— for someone listening to this, what are the things that they can do to identify what I guess would be considered limiting beliefs? If you have a business doing $600,000 in top-line revenue, throws off $100,000 in profit. You pay yourself a W-2 salary of, I don't know, $50,000. You're making $150,000, and nobody in your family has ever made that kind of money. What can— not for everyone, I want to be very clear, but for some people, they go, they'll kind of stay right there because they've already kind of gotten themselves to a point. And so they'll aspirationally say things like, oh yeah, I mean, I'd love to double my personal income, as an example, but the mindset is actually holding them back to do that, right? I mean, they'll kind of wish it, but, but, but, but they don't realize it's actually— they're gonna, they're gonna sabotage certain things that will purposely keep them at a place of comfort. Let me— I, I think you get this, but I, I know you do, but what, what I'm going to share this kind of analogy with par, um, and I've done on a podcast actually, but for our listeners, so it, you know, when I was playing golf in college, I would always, uh, I played on scholarship, I was a pretty decent golfer. And so when I would go out and play golf, I was kind of fighting against par. And so when I would play, if I got it to 1 or 2 under par, say through 9 holes, I would be thinking, let's get this in the house, let's get this in the house, this is a good day, and I'm good. And then I played with a couple of All-Americans, and then when they were 2-under, they would go to 3, and then they'd push it to 4, and then they'd push it to 5, and then they would just want to keep going. They, they didn't even— it's almost like it didn't even register with them that they're 5-under. And I've had that, had that a couple times where I've said Like, hey dude, do you realize you're like 7 under par with 2 to go? And the guy was like, no, I had— I didn't even know. And I'm like, how did you not know? And they just got really comfortable playing at that level. And I think that's kind of the way it is if we kind of apply that somewhat of a mindset for the businesses, whether we think about it in the context of business revenue or we think about it in terms of the personal income that comes because of the business. What are your thoughts?

Yeah, it's definitely an amazing point, right? And I think it all comes down to your environment, right? And how you built— like, to me, I'm very similar, right? I always wanted to be the best. And even in a funny analogy, I, you know, just side note, I used to do eating competitions, right? Um, growing up, I used to be able to eat a lot, being force-fed as a— for my Greek grandparents. And I did a burger competition with a guy, and in Sydney here, and we were going to this burger festival and we got the 5 burgers and I had 6, right? And I could have stopped there. I'm like, no, all these guys didn't believe that I could eat a lot. I'm going to keep going to show people how much I can eat. I had 8 burgers, I had 10 burgers, then I had a snack pack and everyone— I was, I was hurting, right, after. And everyone just couldn't believe it. No one ever challenged me after that, right? Do you know what I mean? Because I showed them that I'm going to do my very best, right, in this instance. And I think That's the first mentality that you need to have. The other side, the biggest one, as I mentioned, is your environment. Are you around people that are just staying comfortable? Are they okay with the $50 grand paid or the $100 grand, right, as net profit that's there? Because ideally you want to be around people that are striving to be more. So are you in the right circles? Do you need to get into other circles, whether that's in, you know, business masterminds with other coaches? Maybe it's other higher-level networking events where people are going 'Oh yeah, I paid myself $1 million this year, but I really want to pay myself $2 million,' right? You know, and then you're like, 'Wow, my $150,000 is really nothing,' right? Do you know what I mean? Like, so they're stretching you to be able to go to that next level. So the normal is up here, the standard, and I think that's where we need to do it. And it's not just about the money, right? It's about understanding the impact that we can make with the money that we do, because the more we can pay ourselves the more we can provide, maybe the more we can give back, we can contribute, we can grow ourselves, we can help our family, we can make a difference in this world with our business, right, in that area there as well. So I think that's the, you know, what we want to be doing with our money and creating that wealth, that life. If you're paying yourself a lot more, then you'll be able to— maybe it's buying houses or buying other businesses or other things like that, so that you're setting yourself up and your family later to have wealth, right? So I think that's the big shift is who are you hanging around? Because the saying, as you would probably know, is, you know, you're one-fifth of the 5 people you spend the most time with. And are they mostly positive people, over 85%? And are they, at least some of them, much further down the track than you? So that you are then going, okay, what do I need to do to get to that point? And I want to strive to get to that point. So I think, I think that's the biggest difference. And they say even for children, they're bigger— even if, if you, if we are the best parents right? Their biggest determinant of success is their environment, who they hang around, not their parents, right? And really, the parents of the kids that they hang around is the biggest factor of our kids being successful and in turn us being successful. So when you know that, it's like, who are you putting yourself around? And maybe you have to cull people. Maybe you have to get rid of people in your circle. I just, I just drift, right, as I call it, from people where I just stop contacting them, right? Or Maybe I, I play soccer with some mates, but some of them are quite negative. We go, we play a game, we do well. I don't go back to the house after and talk negative stuff, right? Because I know it's going to affect me, right?

So if you get—

if you're going to go to a certain area there, maybe you have to limit, right? Whether it's family, whether it's friends, whether it's sports, um, and then get yourself into the rooms where people are playing that higher game. And all of a sudden you're like, I've got a big— and, and what's that bigger, that bigger vision, that bigger purpose behind you do something, right? Like, if you're just doing it to make money It's not about that. Is it about your family? Is it about who you can help in this world with your products and services? When you have that drive, it's our obligation to an extent, right, to be able to do more and provide more value where we can.

Yeah, let's take it.

Let's stay on the path. Let's say we did— I do the mindset work, or maybe a better way to put it is I'm in the process of doing instead of I did. I'm doing the work on my mindset. Um, but I still got a half a million dollar business, it's doing $40,000-$50,000 a month, and I want it to do $250,000 a month. Okay. Um, what do I need to do? What do I need to do? I'm working through the mindset stuff. What are the things that you do, whatever you call it, a path, roadmap, or what, what's, what, what are the things that you're gonna guide me through to, to, to really try to accelerate, uh, the growth of the company to that level?

Yeah, so now it comes down to the strategies and tactics, right, that we're implementing into the business. So firstly, I would look at the business model and going, okay, how are you currently making money? Like, what are you offering? Is it one product or service? Do you have multiple products or service? What's the price point for that? What's the, what's the profit margins in here, right? So really understanding the crux of those numbers and going, okay, if we want to hit, you know, that 150, 200, right, a month that you're saying, how much do we need to sell? Is that possible, right? Like, depending on how we're offering it, do we have the capacity for that? So you're really breaking down the numbers, you know, from a really big sense here, because then you can see from the current business model that the business has, can we do it with the staff that we currently have? Is it possible with man hours or depending on what you offer, right? Especially for services, it can be a bit more intangible. Um, so understanding that, then do we need to provide new services? Do we need to adjust things? Do we need to change prices, right? Like in that business model first on what we're offering. So that's what I would do first. Let's say what they're offering is good, right? It's scalable, uh, just to make it simple for now. Um, there, so then it's like, okay, then we look at it from a brand perspective going Like, how are we positioning ourselves in the market? Are we being the, the Kmart and Target, right? Um, or the Walmarts that are the cheap price, right, in the market? Or are we doing— are we more the premium, you know, the Lamborghini or the Ferrari in the market? Or are we somewhere in between? Because, you know, how we position ourselves is around pricing, right? So how we price things can be really important there. How we perceived as a brand, a business brand, a personal brand as well— there's both of those elements. So that's important. So we may have to make a shift in the brand potentially to change the way we do things, to justify maybe charging more, um, in that area there if we need to, to be more profitable. Um, because a lot of the time if you're a smaller business, you don't necessarily need as much margin because you've got less overhead with people. But as you grow, you probably need more margin, right? Because you only need to bring more people on. So that will likely be a change. Then the biggest thing that's going to obviously do it is the marketing and the sales, right? So you've got to build that that marketing engine. So right now, like, if a business just is based on referrals a lot of the time, that's— you can't really build a sustainable business that way because you don't know if the referrals dry up, right? If you don't get any referrals for 3 months, then you're in a bit of a pickle. And everyone loves referrals because it's like very high trust, you know, very high conversion rate when they come through. It's a bit of a— they should just be cream. That's the way I would say, people. Referrals should just be cream on top. You should have Marketing, I look at like a chair, right? If you think about a chair has 4 legs, you should have at least 4 ways of getting leads into your business so that if one falls over, your business isn't, you know, in the shit basically, right? And you've got other ways to make business, you know, whether that's organically, you know, different paid methods, partnerships. There's a lot of different ways, right, to make leads. And I think partnerships is the biggest one that I would do, right? Because one partner could be worth $1 million, right, in revenue to your business. Um, if you do it well, um, you understand how to partner with other businesses well and you're feeding each other and, and everything there. So, you know, we would look at doing ways of how to get clients, and marketing is a lot of testing, right? As you would know as well, it's not like everyone would have a billion dollar business if it would just do this and you would get clients, right? So there's that element of testing in the marketing, but I would focus a lot on partnerships because I can get big growth very quickly. And then, and then the sales element is looking at those numbers going, okay, well, how much are we converting as clients? You know, I guess referrals versus everything else. And then going, do we need to upgrade those sales skills? Because if they're only— person's only converting 10%, 1 out of 10, if we increase that to 30%, let's say, which is a decent conversion rate, like almost 1 out of 3, that's a 300% increase in the business without doing anything at all, right? So you would go from a 500, you know, all, all things equal, if you could have the same team, you have the capacity, you could go from a $500,000 revenue business to $1.5 million revenue business just by increasing your conversion rate from 10 to 30%, right, in the business there as well. So that's what I would do, um, to really get to that area there. And then understanding, can we do this in-house, or do we need to like maybe outsource some of these areas to really build that machine? And once you crack that code, it's like you know, the business can just go and then, you know, you're, you're on for the ride of growth. Cool.

Okay, so I, I like pretty much every business that I work with is doing $300,000 to $3 million. I mean, that's a space that we really know. And I like to break those, break it down into businesses doing $300,000 to $1 million, and then businesses doing $1 million, uh, million to $3 million, recognizing that obviously you've worked with companies in that space, but then even obviously past that, what is your number one recommendation? And look, feel free to go back mindset-wise if you feel like that there's— this is applicable. Okay, so don't feel like it has to be just business model. What is the biggest things that you have seen that hold somebody back? Maybe one or two things. I recognize, be very clear, I recognize that there is oftentimes multiple factors that go into it. But in your own anecdotal experience and working with others, what is the biggest thing that you've seen that hold business owners back in that space from going from $300,000 to $1 million? And then secondly, same question of business owners that are at that right at $1 million mark trying to get to $3 million.

Yeah, it's really understanding what got you to where you are is not necessarily going to get you to where you want to be. Because you would already be at $1 million, right? As an example, if you were in that 6-figure, $300K+ range. So you need to have an awareness going, what do I need to learn? What mindset shifts? What skills, strategies, tactics do I need to learn? Who, who's in my corner? Do I have coaches and mentors, right, that can help me to push me past that point? Because we can't see, you know, we're in the bubble, right? So we don't— we're not aware of what other options there are a lot of the time. That's why I have coaches and mentors, as well as I obviously help other people like you do, right, to get that point. So find people that can help you to see what the opportunities are, because you're not ideally seeing it. And changing and being open to change is a big one. You know, I work with some people and, you know, I say to do certain things and they don't take the action, right? And we're working on the mindset, we're doing all this stuff. It's like, how much do you really want this? Are you changing your habits? In terms of what needs to be done, right, to actually get you to that point, and taking in and, and listening and following that path. So that would be a big one, right, is, is understanding those elements there. And then I would say, you know, when you're moving forward, right, in that business, is what else can you be doing that is different to what you're currently doing? And a lot of the time people are, you know, there's a thing called conceptual implementation, right? So if you're just doing what everyone else is doing in the industry, that's a bit of a war zone, you could call it, right? Because you're competing in a similar space. Where there's more of a bank zone is, yes, you want to be doing at least the minimum of what people are doing, but you also want to be doing things that people are not doing, right? So understanding what's your competitive market, you don't just want to be looking at your competitors to match them. It's just to understand what the market's doing and go, what can I offer that's different, that's additional to what people are doing? Maybe it's a guarantee there that differentiates you, right? Like, how are you different? How— why are people going to pick you over 10 other people that do a similar thing to you? And really understanding what that is and crafting that message so that it cuts through to what you do. And a lot of the time, you got to remember, as an entrepreneur, we're solving problems, right? As the business owner, that's, that's the simplest facet of what we're doing. So making sure we're really solving a problem for people, and ideally it's a need instead of a want where possible as well, right? Where people need what we're offering in our product or service. And if you can say it in their words Don't just create something that you think people want. Create something people actually want and they're telling you and you're understanding the words that they're using and you use those words in your marketing and all of a sudden it's like, wow, I actually offered the thing that people are saying that they want, right? And now all of a sudden people are taking this on board and it's taken to the next level. So don't create what you want, right? Is create what other people want. Right? And being really clear on that, and whether you have to do focus group sessions, putting it out to your network, interviewing clients, like whatever it is, right, that you need to work that out is really, really important. And I think the other part as well is around the financial side. I think a lot of people have some fear, right? Is like, it's a bit of a jump to hire that next person, right, to get to that area there. And sometimes you have to put yourself into a bit of a pit with money which means that you gotta go into the red, right? A little bit because you've gotta back yourself and go, okay, I need this hire. I sort of don't exactly have enough money for them, but if I hire them, my capacity will grow up or they can sell more for me or whatever, right? That this particular hire will do. And you've gotta back yourself to go, this is gonna work out for the best. 'Cause a lot of business owners will go, oh, I don't really wanna take that risk. I just won't hire. And eventually they'll just plateau, right? And they'll just stay there. Whereas you have to, you have to take the risk, right? Calculated risk and go, let's do this. Go into a bit of a pit, but it's an artificial pit, right? You're doing it on purpose. You're realizing you're, you're gonna be going down, but there is a, there is a plan that once you do this and you implement all these things with this new person, that the business will go up and you'll be in, in a much higher revenue point. So it's, it's willing to take that risk And if you do that and you have the right people on board and you implement the right things, then you've got a very high chance of success from there. So that's some of my biggest tips that I would say to people, um, in, in those ranges to really get to that next level.

Yeah, people don't always do what they, what they need. They do what they want. Um, yeah, and, and I totally agree with that because, you know, if we all did what we needed to do, we would all eat salads lean meat, uh, low carb. We'd, you know, we'd never eat fast food, we'd never do that, we'd never go to Starbucks and drink, you know, cold brews and other things that they have. No, we do it because we want to do it. That's what we want to do. And, uh, and so yeah, I totally agree with that. And there's— if we can blend taking something that people want to do and also what they need, it's really powerful. Athan, it's been great. People want to connect with you, where would you point them to, to be able to, to do that?

Yeah, so my website is probably the best point, my personal brand, which is athancassiotis.com. A-T-H-I-N-C-A-S-S-I-O-T-I-S.com. Um, it's got everything about what I'm doing there, all my different businesses. I've also got my ebook on there, The 9 Keys to Business Growth Mastery, so you can get that for free. I won a competition for this ebook, you know, with over 400 people. So it's a good thing to model even as well as the gold information, but quite short and to the point. And also, I'm Athan Kastigiorgis on all social media platforms, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, you know, X, TikTok, all of those fun ones, YouTube. There's only one of me to find online, so it makes it easy. So definitely connect with me on any platform. I add a lot of value with my podcast and other things that I do as well. And feel free to reach out. Happy to, you know, help you, um, in a short period of time, or, you know, put in the right direction to somebody else, uh, to help you, you know, on your business journey as well, mate. And I just want to say, uh, thanks, Bradley, for having me on your podcast as well, mate. It was a pleasure getting you on mine, and now, you know, um, doing a podcast swap, so to speak. Uh, you asked a lot of great questions, and it was a pleasure, you know, giving a lot of value to your audience as well.

Yeah, thanks so much. All right, last question: what do you think working above the business means to you?

Above the business. Yes, I remember interviewing, interviewing you as well like this. So you talk about, you know, work— a lot of people talk about working in the business and then working on the business, right? So that's more the strategic element. Uh, you talk about working above the business as the higher level. From that, I still got a very good memory, uh, from when, you know, interviewed me. I would say working above the business is really that high-level vision, right, that I would say is where am I taking this business in that bigger sense? What's that long-term plan that you're not in the trenches at all, right, in that area there? Um, and when you take that step back, then you're able to then go, okay, this is where I'm going to lead this business, right, in that bigger sense. Then you could maybe get involved of working on the business and in the business if needed. Ideally not in the business where possible as the business owner, but in that on-the-business strategic element. But I would say it's that vision, that big part above there because as a business owner, we need to be the visionary as part of our leadership element that people want to follow us. And that's to me working above the business.

That's great.

I love that.

You know, some of the takeaways today, I think that we've come at the idea of business from a lot of different angles and it cannot be understated how important your mindset is and how you will subconsciously— probably not consciously, but subconsciously— sabotage to get yourself back into an acclimation of where, like, I'm— you're comfortable in that, in that zone. Whether it's, you know, I'm comfortable going diving if we dive 20 feet, but if we dive to 60 feet, I'm not. That's outside of my comfort zone. I gave the golf analogy, but I, I'm good with skiing at 10,000 feet, but if we go try to ski at 15,000 feet, you know, the air becomes thin. And so when you get around other people who, like you said, are, you know, disappointed because, you know, that, hey, I made $1 million this year and I was really hoping to be able to, to crank $2 million, and you're like, wait, wait a minute now, my business not even doing $1 million in revenue, it really reorientates what, what you think is possible. The only caveat I would give to that is sometimes if you surround yourself with people that are like 100x around you— I've said this as like the most extreme example— is if I had the opportunity to be in a room with Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, clearly I would take it. Not anybody would not do that, okay? I'm talking about from a business sense. The problem is it would be really difficult to know even what questions to ask them at that level. And furthermore, they're so far past where I am well, quite frankly, where most people are, okay, that the things that they would share, it would almost get really hard to implement that. And so when you're finding a community of other people, you want to be around people who are past where you are, but also it's not so far that you can't even see how that's even possible. Right? And so if you're at a half million, you put yourself around businesses doing a million, $2 million, $3 million, you can kind of see that, right? If you put yourself around a business doing $100 million, yeah, I think you can learn some stuff, sure. But again, it's, it's kind of so far to see, see that. So those are some of my big takeaways. I love your thoughts around the $300,000 to $2 million and the million to $3 Athan, appreciate you, my man. Great having you on.

Thanks, mate. It's been a pleasure.

You know, one of the things I pick up whenever I'm talking to other people with a podcast is that they seem to have a similar sentiment as I do in the fact that whenever they talk to other small business owners and entrepreneurs is that they've been able to kind of see the similarities amongst businesses. Yes, there are absolutely differences and nuances depending on the industry that you're in. We know many of our listening audience are insurance agency owners, and being around other people in your industry is valuable, and maybe the company that you represent is certainly valuable. But hearing— and that's what we try to bring here at Above the Business— it's just a different perspective. And to think about it from a the business skills and tools perspective, not just the specific nuances to your industry. It's my fundamental belief that if you become a great business owner, then you can become a great technician at whatever it is that you do. Insurance agency owner as an example. But becoming a great insurance agency owner does not necessarily mean that you get the other, that you become a great business owner. So I love to be able to share different business skills and tools with all of our listening audience, regardless, regardless of the insurance, regardless of the industry that you're in. All right, I want to give a good— all right, I want to give a shout out to our podcast sponsors, Autopilot Recruiting. If you're wanting to grow your team going into 2025, reach out to Autopilot Recruiting. Go to autopilotrecruiting.com. Autopilotrecruiting.com. So many of our listeners, so many people in my membership in 2024 reached out to them, and almost to a person they said, why did I not do this sooner? When you bring them on and you want to develop your team, if you are an insurance agency owner, go to coachpconsulting.com. Coach P coachpconsulting.com. He will help give you those specific insurance-related skills and tools and insight, and you'll get to hear from him, his team, and you'll be able to be in a community of other insurance agency owners that are wanting to be able to grow and scale their business in 2025. coachpconsulting.com. Understanding how to use your financials is not something that is just, you know, you kind of have to do it, but learning how to read and understand your financials to make better decisions in the business so you can grow the top line, have more margin in the business, more profit, and be able to take home more personally, make the investments that you need to make where you need to make them, to grow your insurance agency, that's where Club Capital can help. Go to club.capital. Tech that you use in your business can either hinder you and the team or can help you. But if you use Today App Pro, go to todayapppro.com, todayapppro.com, you won't have that experience. It's a seamless experience where they can pull in your WordTracks and not only pull in your WordTracks but be able to have a place where your bonus and your compensation plans for your team are all in one place. Of course, it's going to sync across your corporate-approved CRMs as well. TodayAppPro.com. TodayAppPro.com. All right, everyone, till next episode. Lead well and go be great. All right, team, thanks so much. Let me know if you had any audio issues here.