Sometimes Business Sucks

Welcome to Marketing Your Car, the podcast for funnel hackers everywhere. You're now part of a small group of underground entrepreneurs who are trying to change the world through the products and the services that we believe in. But because we don't rely on venture capitalists, we don't have financial safety nets, so we have to do things differently. We have to do things smarter. We do that through an art and a science we call funnel hacking. This podcast will give you a glimpse at the daily life of a funnel hacker, so let's get started.

Hey everybody, good morning. Today is a beautiful day and I'm grateful because yesterday was a tough day. But today's beautiful. I'm out here, I'm riding my bike again. It's a little chilly and I wore shorts today. Probably a little too early to be shorts. I think I could do shorts or I could do bike but doing both this early morning is probably not a good idea. 'Cause yeah, I'm feeling it already, dang. Anyway, and I hope that, I gotta go back and listen to the last podcast I did on my bike so you guys can even hear what I'm talking about. Hopefully the wind's not too bad but Anyway, heading into the office today. We got a webinar for Funnel Scripts 2.0. It's actually Funnel Scripts, but Jim's added like 50,000 million scripts. Not really, but a lot more. And we're gonna spend a year since we launched it, so we're relaunching it, raising the price, and it's gonna be fun. So that's what's happening today in about 90 minutes.

Ooh, less than that.

Anyway, it's happening here pretty soon. So I would think of like, most of the podcasts I just talk about like happy-go-lucky stuff and cool things we're doing and stuff like that, but sometimes business sucks. Sometimes it sucks. Sometimes it's hard. And so I'm gonna talk about today, and I have another idea for a podcast I might share in the future. I'm nervous about sharing that one, but just going over my regrets for the past 10 years, 'cause I do have regrets. And so I almost did that podcast a little while ago, but then I wimped out. So I have it in my head, and I think I will soon, but not today. Today is not so much about regrets as much as just the sad side of business. You know, It's tough because when you get started as an entrepreneur, like, I don't know about you, but I just wanna sell stuff, right? Like, I just wanna create and sell, create and sell. Like, that's the fun part. That's the part of business that's like so much fun, right? Initially when you start, it's just you in your basement or your closet or on your laptop in your bed or wherever it is usually, or maybe one of you and a partner, and you're starting, and you're starting the creation process, and you're doing stuff, and you're having fun, and you're selling, and you're trying to sell, and dang, it's cold. My fingers are numb. Anyway, but what's interesting is at first you have all these problems like, I can't figure out how to sell, I can't figure out how to do this, I can't figure out who's buying, I can't get traffic cheap, and all the problems that happen in the first year of business, right? And I understand those, I remember those. I work with a lot of people who are going through those. That part of business kinda sucks too. But after a while you figure out what are you selling? What do people actually want? What are they excited for? You figure out how to get traffic, you figure out how to get eyeballs consistently. You start doing some cool stuff there. That part becomes really, really fun, right? Start, excuse me, and everything's working and you're like, sweet, all my problems are solved. I'm making sales, making money, things are good. And then what happens? Well then you start getting a lot of customers that start emailing you and then more people and then eventually you get, you start drowning in like supporting all the customers that come in. I remember for a long time I was like, I always prided myself like I answer all my own emails and then after a couple years that like I couldn't do it anymore. I went crazy, I couldn't go on vacation, I was on vacation, I was stressing out. I couldn't create anymore 'cause I was so busy. So finally I had to hire someone to help support. And that freed me. But as soon as you hire your first support person, now you got people and there's payroll and there's taxes and there's all these new problems introduced, right? And then as you keep growing, then you try to figure out ways to maximize your time and figure out things you like the most and do that and then start outsourcing and hiring people to do the other parts. And you grow from 1 person to 2 to 5 to 10. Now in ClickFunnels we have just shy of 100 people now.

Crazy.

Swore I'd never get back to this spot, but we've been a lot smarter this time around. And so, with 100 people, there's all sorts of new challenges and issues, especially in my business where 90% of your employees are all entrepreneurs and they all want to be selling stuff. And it's hard to keep them focused, and that's a constant struggle on my side. And there's other things, tax issues, trademark issues. Now as we got all sorts of people out there using ClickFunnels, now we're hiring a full-time legal person just to scour the internet for compliance. Success breeds a whole new level of challenges and hard things that you don't think about when you're trying to figure out how to sell something at the beginning, right? But they come and there's just different, what do you call it, there's different SWOT analysis, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. There's different opportunities at each level. But of everything, the thing that I think sucks the worst in this whole business is when there's people you love and you care about and people who've done great work for you that for whatever reason you have to let go of. I have to let them go and I still can't get over that. I remember the first time I fired someone, I cried for the next hour. And the person was a horrible person. Looking back now, not only should I have fired him, I should have called the cops and locked him up, but I still cried like a little baby. Anyway, so yesterday we had to let go a couple people that I've known a long time that I care about. It just didn't, it wasn't the right fit anymore. Man, for me, it destroys me. All day yesterday I couldn't even function or think or eat or like just, ugh, because I hate it because I know what our business means to me and if someone took that away from me, how I would feel. And I think I'd place all those things on them and it's just, it's horrible. But it's one of those things that has to happen and doesn't always make logical sense, but sometimes you, I don't know, you know. So I just wanna share with you guys today 'cause I know that depending on where you're at, like there's different pains you guys are all going through and there's different pains every step in this process. But the ones for me that are always the worst is parting with people that are amazing that you care about and you want to succeed. But, and this is what the one thing that has given me comfort is just, I feel like, I feel like if someone's not completely happy in a spot or doesn't fit or doesn't make sense, sometimes us as business owners try to like, try really hard to make it work and try to, what do they say, like put a round peg in a square hole or vice versa, whatever.

And like, we can do that, but I think not only does that hurt the business, I think it hurts them more often than not. And so usually there's like this huge pain of like, we have to let someone go, but like looking back, I look back now over the last almost 14 years now of having employees and seeing some of their journeys afterwards, it's like, man, like it was so much pain letting that person go, but I look at like what came from that and it was the best thing. Like if we hadn't have done this, that new door in their life wouldn't have opened. And like for example, oh, I can't get into details, but someone we had to let go about 6 months ago, probably 8 months ago now, it was really painful. I care about them, their family, their kids. It was, ugh, I bawled my eyes out. And then, but I look now, 8 months later, and like where that person went to get the next job opened up a door which radically changed that person's life. And had we selfishly kept them, it wouldn't have served us or them. And anyway, so that's the only thing that kind of gives me solace, is that the right word? Solitude, solace? I think solace. Anyway, makes me feel a little bit better. I'm just trying to say this. So anyway, I just wanted to kind of give you guys that podcast and let you know that wherever you're at, whatever the challenges are you're struggling with, like I get it. Felt at different levels, and I think the biggest thing is just understanding that and being okay with it and just keep moving forward. Don't lose sight of your vision of what you're trying to create and who you're trying to serve, because at the end of the day, that's the most important thing. And there will be people that come and go that help you on your mission at different stages, and I think those people were brought into your life and out of your life on purpose for different reasons. And when you look at it that way, hopefully make some of the challenges a little bit easier. So, that said, it's a beautiful day today, it's webinar day, can't get better than webinar day. We get to sell some amazing stuff and change people's lives, so I'm looking forward to it.

Grateful for the sunshine this morning, and grateful for all of you guys.

So that said, I will talk to you guys all again soon.

Bye everybody.

Thanks so much for listening, we hope you enjoyed the behind the scenes look at our funnel hacking project. You can also watch the Funnel Hacker online reality show and watch us build and launch funnels live www.funnelhacker.tv. If you'd like to come hang out with your fellow funnel hackers, come join our Facebook group at www.projectclickfunnels.com. Oh yeah, and don't forget, you can get a free MP3 player with the first 257 episodes preloaded at marketinginyourcar.com. Join us next time, and remember, you're just one funnel away from your dreams.