015. How to Use Your Numbers to Build Belief

Welcome. I am marketing expert and business coach Melissa Kellogg Lueck. And this is the Doing Business Like a Woman podcast, where we are exploring and teaching you how women are reinventing the way business is done and money is made to help you create greater impact and financial freedom one business at a time. Well, hello, hello. Welcome to the podcast. How are you? I hope you're having a fabulous start to the week. I am in my office today. We're having a kind of a snow day. We had an ice storm, which we don't usually have in Colorado in these parts. But my early morning meeting was canceled and my I was going to get my hair cut this afternoon, that was canceled. So I am hunkered down here at home in the office and I wanted to get this podcast out for you because I want to talk today about something that I find is super important for my mind and it's been really helpful for my clients too, in building our belief around what's possible, and that is looking at our tangible numbers and using that to build a case of evidence that we can refer back to all year long when we are working towards our big goal and when our mind is chirping us and telling us how impossible this goal is. I'm sure you never have that problem, but I sure do. My brain likes to continually tell me how impossible my goal is and all the reasons why. And so it's super helpful to be able to have the numbers in place where I can just refer back to those and be like, well, yeah, it might be impossible in that way, but also look at the way that it is possible. Right. So I have been working with my clients as they're creating their plans for 2022 and beyond around this concept. And I just recently, this week coached with a client that wants to create a million dollars in her business this year. And, and so that sounded far fetched to begin with, but then once we dug into the numbers, we were able to discover and draw up a plan for exactly how it can happen. So you can do this too. And that's what I'm going to walk you through today. And whether a million is your number or not, it doesn't matter. You can put your own number in for the result you want to create and your goal for this year and your goal for subsequent years and apply this process to that. And of course, if you want help on your specific scenario, reach out to me. I would love to go over this with you, help you see how your numbers come together and help you create a plan that's Going to get you there. So. So. And I'm often surprised when I talk to clients or when I talk to, say, students in a workshop or things that they don't really know their numbers and how and their capacity and things. So I want to go over with you today the numbers that I want you to know that I want you to be tracking in your business. So whether you've been in business, you know, just starting your business and you're in the early years, that's awesome. Or whether you've been in business for a long time, like I have, I have 16 plus years of historical data. I don't use all of that because I think that it's not really relevant. But what I want you to take away from this is that there are some numbers that we want to be tracking and watching and keeping an eye on and using them to help us look ahead and see how our goal is possible. So I want to go through what those numbers are that I suggest that, you know, the first one is your gross revenue for last year and for the two years prior. So for the last three years, I guess we could say, if we're going to keep it simple. And so you may have those and you may not have them, but I want you to just take a look back, just go back on a little stroll through memory lane. Because it's fun for me, it's fun to look back and see how far I've come. Now, if you're not experiencing revenue growth and you want to be, the question is why? And so that's also important to know that. Right. And to do some troubleshooting from that perspective. But I feel like I find myself often getting caught up when I'm thinking about my goal in that not enoughness or that gap of how far I am from it. And that is not always helpful. It's actually never helpful to really be focusing on how far we are from the goal, but getting caught up in that not enoughness of being in my business right now. When I go back and look at how far I've come over the last three, four years and see the immense growth that I have experienced in my company, in my. In my business model, and even in myself, it's good to see that growth and it's good to revisit that and really to appreciate how far that we've come. And so I want you to know those numbers. And then number two, I want you to know what your goal is for gross revenue this year. And that can be whatever you want it to be. Right. And so we're going to talk about how we go about validating that number. But I want you to have a goal and because as I've said on this podcast before, that if you don't know where you're going, no road will get you there. And if you don't care, any road will do. Right. And is that really the business and the life that we want to be setting ourselves up for? And the answer for me is no. I want to have a focus, I want to have a goal and I want to be working towards that. So I want you to know what your goal is for this year in gross revenue number three. I want you to see how you see that number coming together with the current offer or offers that you have and the current capacity that you have. Now this is so this was so interesting for me because my goal for the year is 300k. And so I have a very clear picture of how that's going to come together, how many clients that is, what I'm charging. And it's very, very simple. And so I want you to have also the simple way of seeing how it comes together. If it's too complex to figure out, then what that tells me is that it might be a good idea to simplify your business. Because. Because if it's too complex for you to figure out in a scenario like this, it's going to be too complex for your brain to keep focused on all year long. So I want you to have a very simple plan for how that number comes together and with the current offer and the current capacity that you have. And yes, you may be adding offers this year or adding capacity, hiring people, that's also part of the plan and that's fine. But it's also kind of a fun exercise to think about what if you did it with the business that you have right now, today, and how is, how could that be possible? And obviously for some business models, that's not going to work for a lot of folks that I work with that are coaches or consultants or in a service based, professional services type business, you can play with these numbers and see what are all the different ways it could be possible. So for example, my coach challenged me to think about how could I create a million dollars with the business I have right now. And it was so interesting because I thought, well, if I'm going to create a million dollar business, like I've got to have these other offers, I got to have a group, I've got to have, you know, all these different things I'm currently a one on one coach only. That's my only offer at this point. So I was thinking, well you know, I can't get to a million with the business I have because I, you know, I don't have all these other offers in place. And she challenged me on that and I, and then I did the math and I was like, well if I had, if I kept the business model I have right now as a one on one coach, and I was coaching, you know, I can't remember what the numbers were. Basically, I think 40 people a year at 25k each, that would be a million dollar business. Now that's not my business plan, that's not the model I'm working on. But what it does show you is that there are a lot of different ways to get to the number, get to the goal, right? So there is possibility. There's so much possibility. And so for me it kind of broke down all the barriers between me and that million dollar mark, right? Because my mind always wants to say, oh, it's so far off, it's going to take so long and you've got to have all these other things in place before you could earn a million dollars. Well, the truth is that if I took my coaching and my value to the level where I could charge 25k per person one on one for my coaching and had 40 clients, that's a million dollars. So really my work is growing my value, growing my capabilities and continually adding to my skill set. And that's what's going to ultimately help me grow my business, whether I decide to remain one on one as a coach and charge 25k or whether I do some of these other things I have a vision for with scalable offers and so forth. So there's a lot of different options. And I know that was kind of a tangent, sorry. But I think it helps to kind of peel back the curtain and see that there is so much possibility, right, that you can get to your goal in so many different ways that you don't have to have the exact how planned out right now. You don't need to have that. What you need to have is the goal. You need to have an offer and a plan now and the, you know, freedom to take action on that and to move forward on that. So, okay, back to our list here. So I want you to know how number three was, how you see that number, your goal number coming together with the offer that you have and the capacity that you have currently. And so number four is knowing your current capacity and I, and I talk to clients a lot about this and I'm, I'm always, let's see, what is the word? Shocked, maybe that a lot of people don't know what their capacity is and how many clients they can help. And I know some business models. It might not be important to know your capacity, but I think it is really important to know how much you can handle in your business and, and to have space for that in your business and to know that that capacity matches with the revenue number that you are making as your goal. So, for example, I had a client that wanted to set her goal at six figures for the year, but in looking at her capacity for clients, she doesn't have the capacity currently in her schedule to accommodate that. And so having that goal, she's actually setting herself up for failure. Right? So we want to make sure that we are. That the two things jive. And if not, that's not a problem we can solve for that. Right. Like I said, you can raise prices, you can hire people. There's a lot of different ways that you can solve for these issues. But you have to be aware of the numbers and, and how you get to the goal number with the offer that you have. So number five, I want you to also start thinking about your marketing numbers and, and marketing and sales numbers. And for example, like how many meetings or consults or sales conversations do you need to have in order to create the revenue that you want to create, Right. So you know that by keeping track of this historically. So like I said, if you haven't kept track of it in the past, it's totally fine. There's nothing wrong with that. You can start today and start keeping track of these numbers so that, you know, you know, if I want to create two new clients this month, I need to have eight sales conversations or whatever that number is, right. And so it's not a set in stone fixed number. It's not a, you know, cut and dry formula, but you have to know kind of basically how many sales conversations you need to be having in order to create the revenue that you want to create. Right? So if I want to have a $10,000 month, you know, I need to be having 10 sales conversations or whatever it is. You know, if I'm only having two sales conversations and I expect to make 10k from that, it's probably not realistic. So that was kind of a bad example because I didn't really have the math underneath that. But the point is, I want you to start knowing basically how many sales conversations you need to be having to create the clients and the revenue that you want to be creating. And then you can go forth and be improving your consults, managing your mind, and growing your skill set as far as serving your clients on those consults. So there's obviously a lot of work that goes into it, but having these numbers down really helps also. So number six is I want you to know what other marketing numbers you want to track. Now, I love spreadsheets, so I can really get caught up in the weeds of collecting numbers and data and looking at trends and all of that. And it's really fun for some people, maybe not for you, but for my brain, it's really fun, but it's also a great diversion and not very productive. So I think it's important to know some of our numbers, like what I was talking about with knowing how many meetings or sales conversations you need to have have in order to create a client. I think that is very helpful to know. But there are other helpful marketing numbers to know, but you have to have some discernment on keeping track of them and making sure it's not taking up too much time and energy to track all these numbers and not really helping you create business and revenue. But I'm going to make a suggestion of four numbers that I like to look at. And I don't look at them very often. I don't obsess on them, but I just keep an eye on them. Because what it does tell me is that my audience is growing and that there are people that are coming to know me and people that I want to be developing relationships with. And so I do keep a look on these four numbers. Number one is freebie signups. So just keeping an eye that I'm consistently having people that are signing up for my freebie and getting that all of that value. And I have new people coming into my universe. I also look at podcast downloads. So thank you for downloading, thank you for being here. But that one is just kind of a fun thing that I look at. I like to see. I when I started this podcast last year, I did it with the intention and the goal of learning how to trust my own voice and interact with my ideas and putting my ideas out into the world and not really expecting much of a return. And when people started listening and telling me that they were listening and I started getting feedback, I was really very pleasantly surprised. So I have started looking at watching the freebie freebie the podcast downloads, and that's just fun. It helps me really build up my belief in myself and trust my voice. And I just love knowing that you're out there. So. And that's another point about looking at these numbers. You know, we can use them as something that builds us up or something that tears us down. So make sure that the numbers that you're looking at, you can see them as just neutral numbers, but then also you get to choose how you want to think about them. So, like, I just told you my thoughts about my podcast download number and what I have really enjoyed looking at is like the, the exponential growth of listeners, which I think is so fun, but it's still a very small number, right? So, you know, if you were some very fancy podcaster looking at my numbers, you would probably think, oh, that's abysmal. How could you ever be proud of those numbers? But for me, I choose to really be proud of them. So you get to choose how you want to look at your numbers and what you want to make them mean. So I also do keep an eye on social media followers and that is also just a part of. And I also look at the insights on my social media and the purpose of that is to just be seeing the audience grow and thinking about it helps me to build my belief that all the clients I'm ever going to need are already in my orbit. I love thinking that way. And yes, I want to be inviting more people in, but I love thinking about the enoughness and the, the abundance of the audience I already have. And so that's how I look at those numbers. And I don't really, I look at the insights for just some basic information like what kind of posts are resonating with people and things like that. But I don't really get into heavy duty analytics with my social media and I am not currently doing paid advertising, so I'm not looking at anything, you know, in regards to paid advertising on social media. So number four, I want you to just be looking at how many new people are coming into your universe. And so we always want to make sure that we are offering opportunities for people to come to know us and that we're seeing that growth happen. But again, this goes back to, you know, it doesn't matter if you have 2,000 followers or 200,000 followers. You can build an extremely successful business by offering value to the audience, to the universe that you are already serving within. So it's not about hoarding contacts, it's about serving at the highest level, the people that are already here in your orbit. So that, that is part of the numbers. I like to look at around marketing. And you get to decide which ones that you want to track and keep an eye on and what. You get to decide what you want to make them mean. Right. And that's where we come with the blending of the mindset and the mechanics. So we're looking at the actual numbers, but then we get to decide what we want to make them mean and how we want to use them to build our belief. So that is why I wanted to bring this topic to you today, to really just encourage you to create a plan. Have the numbers in front of you around your gross revenue, what you want to create this year, and whether the capacity in your business with the offers that you currently have will support that. And if not, then that's something to solve for. It's not a problem. And then just knowing your marketing and sales numbers, like how you will be bringing these new clients into your business and how that happens. And so I would love to help each and every one of you build a solid plan that you can go forward and achieve your 2022 goal and beyond. And if you need that support, please reach out to me. You can set up a free consultation and we can go through your numbers and I can help you to see how you can create that revenue number that you want for the year. So I absolutely love that. And I also love thinking not only about the mechanics of how these numbers come together, but using that to help me build the belief again that it is possible. And then going forward and creating it and tracking the numbers as you go, and the more data, the more historical data that you gather, then that will help you to be better informed about what it's going to take for you to get to that number that you want. So I hope this has been helpful for you. I know that it really has helped me as I have tried to learn the balance between mindset and belief and also having the evidence and the numbers of how I can make it happen. And so this is the balance that I found has really helped me. And then having that plan of exactly how it could happen and being able to offer that to my brain every time my brain says, what, you're crazy. You've never made that much money before. There's no way you're going to make it this year. And I can just say, yes, it is possible, brain, see, all I have to do is X, Y and Z, and that's how we get there. And so. So that's been super helpful. So I hope that's helpful for you too. And I hope you have a great rest of your week and I would love to hear how it goes for you and putting your numbers together. And if you need any support, of course, reach out. All right, I'll talk to you soon. Take care. If you like this podcast and want to take this work deeper, I invite you to coach with me one on one. It all starts with a conversation. Let's get on a call together and I'd love to learn more about you and your business, and together we can identify what is standing in the way of creating the business and life you envision. And then we'll create a plan to get you there. So visit my website@melissamkellogg.com and find a spot on my calendar. I look forward to seeing Sam.