Episode 100: Going for your Passion with Tasha Scott

Yeah. Hang on tight. You rolling?

Yeah. Now we're rolling. So, Tasha, you do have your seatbelt on?

I've got it on.

Okay. It's a six point seatbelt strap system. Over the shoulders, around the legs, one over the throat.

And look, got the ankles already strapped too, so I can't leave.

Oh, man, you are not going anywhere. I don't know if you've ever gone to any of those roller coasters down your way, but there's some insane roller coasters, isn't there? Great adventures or Six Flags.

Six Flags.

Six Flags in your area. I don't know if you've been any of those roller coasters. Alabama has the most crazy roller coasters on the planet. My son and I. Well, my son in particular is a roller coaster fanatic. I go along for the ride. There's a roller coaster down there. I swear to God. You strap in everything, like there's parts.

Of your body you didn't even know existed.

You sit down and you know. Most roller coasters drag you to the top. And then you go on a crazy ride. And this one thrusts you forward through magnetic force. Your brain is left behind because it's straight up. That's what you need to be prepared for, Tasha.

Okay, I'm ready. My heart's beating fast now, but I'm ready.

We got you going. All right, Chris. That means we're ready, bro.

Well, we should have ridden that roller coaster today. Cause it's episode 100.

That's right. We made it. We made it. Oh, my God.

And we made it.

I can't believe it.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, gee.

100.

The Profit first podcast, episode 100. You know what? Forget this music. Oh, we're going with this music for episode 100.

Stupid.

I can't believe it.

Can you understand this ridiculous.

There. Oh, no, no. Go, go.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah.

This is a big one. Welcome, everyone, to episode 100. That's it. Oh, the sound clip ended pretty quick there.

Yeah.

This is crazy.

It just fell off the cliff like that was it. Like our budget just ran out.

You want more of this in the background?

Get me fired up again.

So I'm Chris Kern. I'm the founder of Fractal Recording.

And I'm Mike Michalowitz. They said we would not make it. They said if you go three episodes, you'll be walking on water, but you'll never make it past five. They said 100's impossible. And I said, mom, for God's sake.

We'Ll make it to mom, put down the whip.

We did it. And I'm Mike Michalitz. I am the author of Profit first, the author of the brand new book, I hope you have it. I'll get you to 100 episodes. And you're listening to the Profit first podcast. This episode where we talk about all things profit. And I'm joined in studio by my colleague for the hundredth episode, Christina Bulldog.

Hey there.

And it's over to you, Christina.

That's right.

So.

And by the way, revenue is emphatic, but profit is magnetic. Oh, that's awesome.

I had a kind of. I couldn't say magnetic. Magnetic.

Well, emphatic.

You know, Eminem does that. I was watching a video with Eminem. He's like, you know, there's certain words you can't rhyme. Like, like. I don't know why he talked like that, but there's certain words you can't rhyme. Like orange. But he's like, I can like. He goes, moran barang. He's like, I can rhyme anything. I'm a rhyming poet. I'm a bastard.

That's right.

I'll tell you what's about impressive about Eminem. He made up like 70 new words on the spot, just like I did.

That's tremendous.

Master of his craft.

That was horrible. That was.

You are Eminem, Mike Michalowitz. Yeah. So this show, Slim Shady, is available everywhere. But by the way, we always have on the Profit first podcast, we always have a featured guest. And then afterwards, the three of us, Christina, Mike and I, we give our feedback and our golden nugget takeaways from what we heard. Just so you know what's coming up, you can find our show anywhere. Itunes, Google Play, Stitcher, tunein, and especially the website dub dub dub dub dub dub dub dub dud.

Nice. Neil Pert.

Dub dub dub.profit first podcast dot com. Have you been there yet? That's the question. Because if you go there, you'll see funny pictures of Mike and you'll be able to binge listen on all our episodes. And what else do you need in life besides food and water?

And water and the podcast? Yeah, that's basically.

And Barry, is there anything else we're going to need?

Barry, you're gonna need a couple of horses or a couple of mules.

All right, well, anyway, that's what we need. So this is an exciting episode. Episode 100. I do want to just take a moment, if I may, to say thank you to Mike Michalowicz and thank you to Christina for including me in this awesome podcast. This podcast was born because your book Profit first is one of the most life changing books for so many people in their lives. I mean, you, you always tell us, Mike, that most businesses are not profitable. And if you, you've helped so many people become profitable and sustainable and actually they're allow their business to give them a lifestyle that they want, that it's, it's just remarkable. It's been 100 episodes. I'm just really proud and, and thankful to be part of the show.

Well, thank you, brother.

Thank you.

And I, I truly did not expect us to be here. I didn't really have an expectation. And this is. In all sincerity, I didn't know if we just do 10 episodes and we're done. Yesterday, before we recorded this, we had 2,000, 2,102 downloads of the show. In one day. In one day. I never expected this kind of growth in popularity in the show. And it's amazing. And I think what did it and I think why this episode's special, besides our pure mayhem in the beginning, is that we don't just have experts. And Jonathan Patoknik last, last week, I thought, shared an interesting, interesting insight. He's not an expert as much as a guy who's been there and done it.

Right.

So we have the experts who study it and talk about it with the people that have been there and done it, and then we have the people that are going through it now. And that's why this is already primed to be one of my favorite episodes, maybe will be my favorite episode because Tasha Scott's coming on to share her business that's in a. It's kind of a fulcrum. It's at a point where you can either go with what is working or go with what is a little more risky, but your passion and how you do it profitably. I just love listening to and sharing my thoughts with early stage business owners and helping them navigate profit. So, Chris, thanks for sharing that and I love doing the show. I hope, I hope we do 100 more.

And thank you for putting it all together.

Yeah, yeah. And not charging me. That was not true. That's not true. Hey, dude. What have you been up to?

Oh, all kinds of stuff. Well, the Forbes podcast that I'm producing are going well. I don't know if any of our listeners have gone and checked that out, but if you're a millennial female and you're an entrepreneur or business or career, that kind of thing, there's a lot of, there's at least 11 shows that Forbes is producing for you and all different kind. Yeah, yeah, all different kinds of shows and everything. So I think it's Forbes.com podcasts is the website and I'm, I'm very thankful to be working with them as well, producing all their podcasts and they're just about to start another one as well. So what have you been up to, my brother?

Dude, I've been scam, scamming, scamming our and scamming. I've been scamming all the reviews we have. No, I've been skimming them and I told Brittany Witt two or three episodes back, I'd give her a shout out. Now it's time. On April 15th she posted this about the Profit first podcast. Awesome Wholesome people from Brittany Witt on April 15 and it says I've been listening for months and I never miss an episode. I just heard Christina's story about her grandmother and I'm over here in tears and because of how touching it was. Thank you for sharing that. I always enjoy hearing her voice. Sorry, Mike. Christine is my fave. Thank you for this podcast. It's so real, upfront and helpful. Team Profit First.

Oh, shout out to you, Brittany. I'm glad it resounds with you so well.

Yeah, it's awesome. Thank you, Brittany.

We like to horse around. I like to horse around because it's just authentically who I am. I'm not trying to make a gimmicky show here, even though I'm kind of a gimmick. A gimmicky kind of.

You're red.

I'm a red.

Red and yellow.

I to horse around. That's who I am. But I'm happy that, Brittany, you and I hope so many other folks see just the authentic concern and interest we have in every one of our listeners. Everyone out there being wildly profitable. Well, I want to thank our corporate partners. They make this show possible. Thank you to Fundbox, nextiva, Fundera and Receipt Bank. We to give you more details about them at the end of the show and I'll share some personal insights on working with them. But now we're going to bring on our guest. Her name is Tasha Scott and she is a speaker, certified life and business coach for women in business, a workshop leader, an entrepreneur and an author. And trust me, being an author is not easy. She's a wife and mom. She's a founder of the Don't Limit Me and the Women Connect movements and she also has a court reporting business is now in the decision Phase, which way to go? Well, we're about to talk with her. It's a pleasure to have you on the show. Welcome, Tasha.

Thank you, Mike. I'm so excited to be here.

I'm pumped. Now you're really. It sounds like you're at a decision point in your life that you have a established, successful six figure court reporting captioning business that I believe you have for quite a while, and I want to learn a little about that. But now you also have this opportunity to pursue and go all in on business coaching.

Yes.

Tell me about what brought you to this point.

Okay, so my court reporting captioning business, It's. It'll be 14 years old this year. And in this journey, first of all, I have to say, when I first read your profit first, the very first chapter, you were talking about me. And it's been a six figure business, but I feel like I have nothing to show for it. And around tax time, it's always been like pins and needles, like, oh, God, what am I going to do? And I'll have to say that for these 14 years, it's felt a lot like I've been winging it and not doing business on purpose. And what I mean by that is when I first started, the first year I crossed the six figure line, I knew how. The very first year, I knew how to build relationships. I knew how to get clients, I knew how to hustle and, and, and hone in on my niche in the industry and all that. And the money, making the money, getting the clients has not been the problem. It's been the managing of the money. And I've never. I felt like I've never understood business. And so for a while, I felt like a fraud, you know, because, you know, I've got this business, I've got subcontractors, my tax returns. On paper, it looks, you know, it says six figures. But basically what happened was I reached a breakdown point. My husband and I filed bankruptcy personally in our personal finances, and the business was still the constant, still remains, still kept going strong through these 14 years. And something happened where I just had a meltdown and I reached out and when I started getting support through coaching and at first was a life coach, that's when I started really asking myself, why am I doing this? What am I doing? And being honest about the fact that I don't know what I'm doing, you know, so what happened was during that period of getting life coached, really understanding, who is Tasha? What is it that you want? Why are you doing this? Something was birthed out of that whole experience, and it was a love for mentoring. I've been mentoring for years, and I decided to transition from mentoring into coaching. So two years ago, I wrote my story, which the book is called Don't Limit Me. And it was me telling myself in the mirror, tasha, don't limit me. Because I realized that it was not about making excuses or blaming anybody else. It was time for me to take responsibility. And so from there, I started really just telling my story. And women started coming to me saying, can you help me? I'm hiding behind a mask. I'm stuck. And it turned into an empowerment movement of sharing my story, helping women to come out of hiding, to help them understand they weren't alone. And that's when the coaching business, that's when it was born and people started asking me to come speak. I started getting paid for it, and then I started forming mastermind groups and support accountability groups around this movement.

But you've run the court reporting business the entire time while you're also pursuing and building your personal brand. I guess it is, right?

That's right. And I'm still in the business, you know, I never closed shop. I'm still in business in the court reporting. But I'm at a crossroads, I'll be honest. And the crossroads is because my business now, I've built up enough clientele to where it's been word of mouth, marketing, it's been relationship marketing, all of that. And I'm at a place this summer where for the first time in the 14 years, there, nobody. I don't have it. I mean, there's no clients. It's like trickling in. And I've never been in this place in the business before. And so I'm asking myself the question, is this it or, you know, do I keep pressing it for all there there is in it, or do I now just go this other direction?

So, so just so I'm clear, this is the court reporting business that has slowed down so significantly?

It has. And the summers are always the slow time anyway. But this is the first time where it's been like literally for the month of May, there was nothing.

Jack squat.

Yeah.

And is there ongoing expenses for your court reporting business?

Yes, I do have subcontractors, which they get paid by the. With the jobs itself. I have an office I have because we do captioning. So there's a lot of Internet based expenses surrounding that.

Okay, so let's dig into the exact numbers, if it's okay, around the court reporting business. And then I want to learn about the emotion you're feeling. So what, what is your monthly carrying cost? This is the cost that occur and reoccur, no matter what, to keep the business open, regardless if new business comes in or not. How much is that roughly?

Okay, so now. Okay, you got. I'm gonna be honest, you caught me off guard with that. So.

Yeah. Okay, so I'm talking about your office rent. That's an expense that won't go away, right. I'm talking about the Internet cost. What's that cost you to keep the doors open?

Okay. Okay. So my rent for the office is $740.

Okay.

Every month. The other stuff is, I would say to keep everything running. If I didn't have any business, no subcontractors, it would be 1500 every month.

Okay, so 1500 bucks a month is going out. And for you to break even is not $1,500 of new revenue. Because when you bring on a new project, you then have to have a subcontractor actually do the work, right?

That's correct.

Okay, so what, what do you get paid for a new project? Do you get hourly pay?

It is hourly. The captioning we get paid, it's two different tiers of it. For the. Our clients are colleges and universities that we do captioning for. So to do the regular classes, it's $80 an hour. Then when we do conferences, it's $125 an hour.

Okay, and do you do more of the $80 an hour work or more of the 120?

More of the 80.

Okay, so let's. Based on the 80, what do you pay someone to do that 80 hour work? Like, what do they get paid?

My subcontractors get paid $50 an hour.

Okay. So you have what's called a gross margin of $30 an hour. That's the difference between 80 and 50. So you make $30 an hour.

Right.

Which if I divide 30 into $1,500, your carrying cost, that means you need 50 hours of time to cover that monthly cost.

Right.

So your first 50 hours doesn't generate a penny for you.

Right.

And if you're short of it, it's actually costing you. So if you don't do 50 hours, and that's what's called the minimum threshold or the hourly minimum threshold, you have to know what your number is. And we just calculated it that that's your base minimum generally. Now we have to pay you a salary, profitability. And as your business grows, meaning you do more work There may be additional other costs, supplies, materials, stuff like that. Is that true?

That's true, that's true.

Okay, so generally the rule of thumb is whatever your minimum threshold is 50 hours, multiply it by two, and that usually brings you to the profit point. So we need 100 hours of billable work or $8,000 in revenue, really, for a business like yours to likely experience profitability and start paying you a consistent salary. Did that happen at all this year? Does that happen regularly? What are the good months like?

The good months? The fall is always the busiest time of the year because we, the colleges pay us to provide captioning for their deaf and hard of hearing students. So the fall is always. The enrollment is up in the colleges. So from August to right before the holidays, I would say around Christmas, booming. And I would say probably a little less than half of our gross revenue for the year comes in that fall semester.

Okay. And I bet you it's more than half because that's five months. August, September, October, November, December. How much? Okay, what's your gross revenue during those five months?

Typically it's easy. Like I could say the last year fourth quarter was probably about 80,000.

Oh, good, you just made it easy on me. Because 80,000 divided by $80 an hour, that's a thousand hours. I divide that by five, you're doing 200amonth on average. And 200, if we look at our 50 hours, that's profitable. Now you have five months that are profitable and you have seven months that are not.

Well, let me back up because January through April is the second busiest time.

Okay.

Of the year. So the summer is the slowest season out of the whole year.

And what kind of revenue did you do this past January through April?

It was about 60,000.

Okay, so January, February, March, April, that's only four months. And you did 60,000. That's actually almost equivalent in revenue to the prior month. So you're also approaching roughly 200 hours. And then the summer just drops to zero. Right.

Not every summer like this is the first summer where it is zero, because other summers we've done a little bit, you know, but in that semester is from June into August.

Okay, so here you have a business that is clearly a. Well, from face value in a five minute conversation is a profitable business. We have what's called seasonality challenges. And what we do in profit first is as revenue comes in. I want you to realize that if you want to keep this business, and then we got to discuss the emotional component next. But if you want to keep this business, when money comes in, that 80,000 came in between August and December, we need to then have that money earned or paid out to us over a longer period of time, and we call it a drip. So say 80,000 just came in as a deposit in August. Just to make it real easy, you wouldn't put that all into your different accounts. Profit and pay and expenses. You would instead, every month, take a portion of it out and drip that into income. So it kind of flattens out the income and gets rid of that seasonality. Does that make sense?

It does.

Okay. Because yours is a predictable season. There's nothing that happens in the summer. We need to sustain that income to some degree and spread it out. But here's the question that really concerns me. It doesn't sound like your heart's in it anymore.

I think that's the problem. And what's happened was, because it's seasonal, it's always like, I feel like I'm catching, trying to play catch up. Like, because the low seasons, not having that backup savings. Because there was a discipline issue, too. Because I didn't. That's a whole nother story.

Hold on. There was a discipline issue for me.

Yeah.

You know what that means?

What's that?

You're a human being. You are a human being. Congratulations. Hit the horn, somebody. You are a human being. Yeah. So, yeah, what pains me, Tasha, is so many people, and I know our listeners, too, say, God, if I want. I was. If only I was more disciplined. This is the bane of all humanity. I'm telling you. Discipline is not the issue in this case. We need to set up guardrails or a system around you. If you're trying to willpower your way through it, it's never gonna work. So one idea for you if we decide to keep this business going as is that seasonality. When a deposit comes in, starting today, I want you to divide that revenue up into 24 parts. Basically, you put it in. We call it a drip account. You put all that money when it comes in, say, $1,000, and you put it into a drip account. It just sits there. Then you divide 1000 by 12. Now, I don't have my calculator in front of me, but let's just say it's roughly $100 at a time. Then every month, you take out $100, and you put into your income account, and you treat that as income. You never touch the drip, but you put in your income account, and then you deal with that money. You run your business based upon that money. That's dripped in. And that's the way you set guardrails around our human side. This way you don't have to be disciplined saying, oh my God, I got to not use all that thousand. Now you don't have access to it. It's dripping in. So that's how you address that.

Gotcha.

Make sense.

It makes perfect sense.

All right. Talk about your heart. It sounds like your heart's elsewhere.

It is. That's the thing, Mike. So, okay, so when doing the speaking, first, that's how it started off, was started with speaking. I felt alive and I felt like I was making a difference. Not felt. I feel. Feel like I'm making a difference. Feel like I'm helping women. And especially when I hear the feedback from the women. Like one of the first times that I started sharing my story, I had a woman email me her journal that night, like, literally before I got home, it was in my email box and. And she was saying, thank you so much. I felt like I was all alone. I felt like I was the only one. And then other women started coming out. And so when I'm doing the speaking and coaching, I do, I feel alive. I feel like my heart's beating again. It's something I feel like I could do all day, every day.

So if there's one lesson I've learned for myself and I so encourage you to do, the heart wins over everything else. I can't tell you how many people I've met that pursue the dollar at the compromise of their soul. And I've never seen someone achieve happiness because that's the way they stuck with going after the money. The irony is this. The most money is where your heart is. Because when you speak from your heart, when you're playing into your passion, you're positioning yourself to serve millions. And if you want to make millions, you must serve millions. You are reverse engineering your profitability by following your passion. So you're feeling, when you speak and stuff, you feel it there. Why is it, why do you feel so strongly about. Why does that speak to you?

Because I remember being in that dark time as an entrepreneur when we were going through the bankruptcy, even relationship, like, personal problems. I remember how bad it was during that period, but I also remember when somebody reached out to me for help, which was a life coach. And I remember during that six month period of coaching with her how I literally, she became my safe place. She helped me to literally unveil all the baggage and the blockage and all of that. And I remember how much freedom there was in that. And so after that I told her, I said, I want to help other women get free like this. Because how many other women are suffering in silence?

Yeah.

That have businesses, they're leaders, but. And it looks good on the outside, but nobody knows they're imploding on the inside.

Yeah, I'll give you the answer. It's everybody. Yeah, it's pretty much everybody. Are you getting paid to speak right now?

Majority yes now because it started off where it was a volunteer, but I am getting paid to speak now.

How much are you getting paid to speak right now?

My average is 1500.

Not bad. Not bad.

Nice.

All right, so I want to give you a plan just because we're tight on time. Normally in a circumstance like this, you and I should be sitting together drinking a margarita for quite a few hours. But I want to give you some. I want to say this is advice as much as experience. A few things you can do in circumstance because it sounds very similar to mine. The business that you have, the court reporting business, is a extremely viable business. And you've proven it out. Here's where it's not viable. It's not viable for you anymore. Your heart, your calling is really being as defined and going through that dark period in your life, I think, and maybe you already feel this way is your biggest blessing in so many cases because you now know intimately the pain that other people serve. Have. And you can serve it, you can fix it.

Yeah.

But your, your court reporting business is a very saleable business. You have achieved predictability and sustainability. You've been around for 14 years. I would get this thing on the market soon and I would make enough effort in the meantime to make sure that it keeps pushing forward to see it through to the very end. How do you get in the market quickly? Get a business broker there. You know, this is not an investment banker, this is not a venture capital firm. Your business is way too small for that. But this is perfect for a business broker. Just go on the web, type in business broker, make sure you get some recommendations from recent transactions that she or he did and get your business on the market. There's value in there, particularly because you have established relations. One other tip, if you can go to the schools you've been working with and get a committed contract from them saying, listen, I know there's no business happening now, but are you willing to sign a two year contract to keep working with us? That becomes a very, very valuable asset when you sell the business because now they get guaranteed business.

Wow.

Does that make sense.

Makes perfect sense.

Okay, but now here's the juicy part. Besides you and me having margaritas, this is the real juice. I'm gonna. We're gonna get you paid more to speak. You're in a position that I wish I was in when I started my speaking career that you already have a relationship with. Some colleges. Right?

Right. Okay. Right.

There's a secret in psychologists. All colleges have a thing called the Student Activities Fund or the saf. Every single university, county college, junior college, they all have student activities funds. These funds are reserved by the college so they can bring in outside talent. Now, often we think about the big show they bring once a year to the student body. Maybe a band or a comedian or something like that, but they also use it to fund clubs. And every college has a women's empowerment club, has entrepreneurial clubs. Here's what you do. Call them up or email them and say, hey, I'm a speaker. I wrote a book called Don't Limit Me. I speak to women's empowerment, to finding your calling, to building your business. I would love the opportunity to come in to speak at your event. Would you be interested? Wait till the student president or whatever response to you says, yeah, because, by the way, they're mandated to hire or bring in outside experts. That's how they keep their status as a club at the university. So they'll want you. Then you say, normally I get a $5,000 fee. You know, make sure you pick a number. That's what you want to target and say, listen, I'm willing to reduce my fee because I know how difficult it is for a club to get the funds. And by the way, I realize. And I'll reduce my fees to, say, $3,000. But I also realize that for you as a club, to raise that money isn't possible. But there is this thing called the Student Affairs Fund at your university. I prepared a templated letter for you that says, we'd like to bring in Tasha Scott as our keynote speaker for our club, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And as a club, we're going to do all the promotional activities. We're going to do all these things. We just need the fund to provide us with $3,000 to pay for her. You give them this template letter, and over and over, these student affairs or student activities funds will provide the funding. Now, you're walking into a university with a $3,000 check being written out to Tasha Scott. And we're not done yet. We're making another margaritas to serve another one. But we're not done yet. Now what we're going to do is you're going to ask that club president that you would like the student journalist to be there and write an article or interview you at the completion of your event so you can share additional tips and tricks. That student journalist comes in, they interview you. It gets published in school paper. Now here's the great thing. The best SEO in the world is any articles written on a Edu site. They're more credible than dot coms or anything. If you go to Alabama University, one of the widest, most recognized, biggest, prestigious state schools out there, this is huge credibility to you. Now they've paid you money. Now you're in the article where you're being referenced. And when you go to the next speech, now you can ask for 3500 and you can keep ramping it up.

Wow. I love it. I love it.

Are you a little bit drunk?

Oh, my gosh.

Drunk on knowledge.

Drunk on knowledge. Drunk on coffee.

Yes, yes. I love it. I love it. And I do have, like, that is my clientele. It's colleges and universities.

Yeah. When you said started saying that, literally Christina's like, did the hand wipe to the face move? Because I had saliva dripping down.

I was salivating.

I was salivating. I am like, Tasha. I wish I was Tasha. Scott, you are in the perfect position.

Yeah.

I'll tell you from my experience what won't work. Trying to serve two masters, trying to cater to that business that you have that your heart's not in, and trying to build something on the side. I found inevitably, you got to go all in. It's an all in bet. And the best all in bet is to go in where your passion is.

Yeah, yeah.

I want to. Before we go, I want to read a quote on the wall. This is by a gentleman named Howard Thurman, a very influential African American author and philosopher. I have it on my wall today. I think it's one of the most important phrases I've ever heard, and I will never lose this memory of what he said. Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and then go do it. Because the world needs. What the world needs is people who have come alive. But the world needs is people who come alive. Sweet. I'm telling you, Tasha, I cannot guarantee the success. I've given you some tools that hopefully will help, but I can guarantee the regrets. If you don't go all in on what you're being called to do. You will regret it if you go all in and it fails, at least you'll be able to walk out proud, saying, I tried. I went after my dream. But the real likelihood is you go all in on your dream, you're going to make it, and probably make more money than you ever have.

Wow.

Wow.

This was phenomenal. I needed this.

I'm getting teary eyed.

Yes.

Not proud of you, Tasha. And you know what really impresses me is that the fact you have the courage to come on and tell the raw truth.

Yeah.

Yeah. And that's what my. When I'm speaking and I'm coaching, that's what they tell me. We love your transformation. I mean, your transparency. I'm sorry. We love your transparency. And that's why I want to speak and tell the. You know, the real story, you know, because I feel like when I was going through, I needed to hear something like that, you know, So I knew I wasn't crazy.

No, for God's sake, you're not. God's sake, woman. You are not crazy. You are not crazy. You're crazy not to do it. You're crazy if you listen to what the world is going to tell you and say, do the obvious. You have a business. Stick with it. You're crazy not to listen to yourself. That's the only craziness.

You're crazy like a fox crazy.

All right, here's the deal. Yo. We gotta go, and you gotta come back six months from now and tell us what you did. We want to know.

Absolutely.

Okay.

You just lit my fire. Thank you.

Episode 100. All right. Hey, get your ear real close. So I'm gonna share one more thing. Okay? Can you hear me? Is it coming through clearly?

Yes.

All right. Yeah. I just beat you now. Now you have to do it.

Ouch. I felt that.

All right, Tasha, thanks for coming on this show.

Thank you.

Thanks, Tasha.

Great job, Chris. I think I've whipped every single guest we've had.

Everybody.

I whipped you. I wish I had more than three sound effects on this.

Yeah, well, you know, you either get.

Broad, you get Darth Vader yelling. No. Or you get whipped. Okay, how's that for episode 100, Chris?

Wow. I loved it. Tremendous. And we're gonna. We're gonna talk about our takeaways right after we mention our corporate partners, because they, especially on episode 100, need some.

Hundred lovin' 100 lovin' here. I'm gonna start with lovin Nextiva. Why? Because they're just a loving company. I hope. I hope Tasha gets a nextiva phone system as you build her Practice. I hope the world gets it, because Nextiva. Listen mechanically. I'm sure there's many VoIPs systems out there. I'm sure there's some that even compete with nextiva. Nextiva is exceptional, but really, it's the company behind it, our system, which, by the way, it's been, like, spotless for, like, the last couple years.

Don't jinx it.

No, don't jinx it. Was going down for a little bit. Like, it would cut out and stuff. And I was like, oh, my God. I called nextiva. They'd walk me through and say, here's what we got to do.

And.

And they kept on saying, listen, the problem is your Internet connection, but we're gonna help you get it. They got hold of Optimum. I don't even know who he is. I think it's Optum. Got the guy out here, he rewired the cable connection to Internet and boom, they fixed it. What company goes that far to call another company to actually get fixed?

Their customer service is amazing.

Amazing. Nextiva. Crazy. Nextiva. Plus, they drink after 4:00. I was out at their office. I know, I know. We gotta start that here.

Yeah.

Did we not drink at Cinco de Mayo this year?

You failed to make margaritas this year.

Oh, shit. All right, maybe we'll do Whip yourself.

Cinco de Juno.

Yeah, I know. Cinco de Juno. I love that. That's even funnier.

Cinco de Juno. Love it. Well, Barry's here, too. Barry, do you think Mike Mallowitz is ever going to leave nextiva?

Nah, it ain't going to happen.

It's right there.

He knows it.

But you know what is going to happen? I am going to scan in my receipts from nextiva in my Receipt bank system.

Oh.

Because nextiva sends an invoice every month detailed out with what we've done. And we do a lot of international calling, and we set up the flat fixed rate so it's always the same. Which is great, because with International Calling, we're doing. But when you get that bill, you need to keep record of it. What I do, boop, boop scan. It takes two seconds. It gets reconciled through Receipt bank to our accounting system and says, yes, the transaction has been processed. Everything's hunky dory. Because of Receipt Bank. We actually caught two fraudulent transactions. Remember we happened a couple weeks ago. I don't know why. I have to look over my microphone. Can you see me? You can see me. I'm like, peeking over the microphone set because of Receipt bank. It didn't reconcile out. Red flagged it. We looked at it and said, oh, those aren't legit transactions. We caught someone buying Macy's and Bloom.

And a hotel room.

Yeah, hotel room. Yeah. And then there was somebody, they bought these inappropriate videos and we knew that was Chris. Then there's fund box, fund box, fund box, fund bugs. Did you ever invoice someone for someone?

Yes.

And say, hey, where's my money? Have you ever said, hey, Mike, I've been working here for a year now. I still haven't got my plan.

Where's my frickin money?

Yes.

You could call Funbox and say, mike is not paying me. And they'll say, here's the money, we'll take care of it.

Oh, thank God.

Now here's how they take care of it. They say when the money comes in, we're not going to call Mike, we're not going to stalk him. But when you get the money, Christine, just return the funds to us. That's how it works. You don't lose the customer relationship, but you get the money.

That's a cash flow thing, right? Sometimes you need the money and if you're not getting it, you need it.

Show me the. Show me the money.

Yeah, it is. It's a cash flow. It's totally true. Fundera, you need a loan. I'm not saying you need a loan, but if you need a loan, Fundera is a loan funding source. Like I need to get a new soundboard that does something else besides this and that, Right? I need something that can do a couple more sound effects. Well, Fundera, if I didn't have the money, I could call Fundera. They would source me the money by scoping it out with all different lending sources where there's funds and give me the best option. That's what Fundera does, right? Soundboards to employees to anything.

Right? So you need money, Fundera goes out to all the different banks and finds you the money.

Exactly. Yeah, exactly.

Or you could go to every bank yourself.

It doesn't get easier than that. They do it for you.

Now I want to share one more thing that we did. Specialist episode. We want to reveal what happened. I don't know if you noticed, but this was our subliminal episode. And this is new technology. The Internet is advancing so quickly. We've been paying attention to a lot of podcasts and we believe we're the first podcast ever to implement subliminal technology. Next Diva. Next Diva, right? Next Diva.

For God's sake, buy next Diva stuff.

We need Their sponsorship. Yeah. So I hope you enjoyed our subliminal episode and. Well, whatever. Maybe you noticed, maybe you didn't. You probably did. All right, Chris, let's do our takeaways. I'm kind of rambling a little bit here. So what was your big takeaway, Chris?

Well, I. You know, you rightly recognize that her passion is in the speaking, and of course she admits it because it's. That's the truth. And her business this season is a little lower than usual or a lot lower. It just brought into focus for me this idea of timing. You know, things change in life. You know, she's been doing the business for 14 years.

Yeah.

Sometimes things change. Your interests change, your passion change. Like, everything changes a little, and then it just becomes clear, like, okay, well, that business doesn't light my fire anymore. It's going. I won't say going downhill, but it's going through some. A time when it needs some loving or whatever. And I want to do this new thing. So, I don't know, it's just like the tide of life. Sometimes you can. If you're able to step back enough, you can actually see and feel it. And, you know, like you said, Mike, we're not supposed to do the same thing forever. I mean, usually not. Some people do the same thing forever, but these days, that's just not the case.

That's true.

Yeah. Your path changes, I think. You know how you never really know what other people are going through around you. They may have a very happy exterior, but inside, you know, something serious could be going on. This kind of hit me in that way where you can do the smallest thing for somebody on the street. You can hold the door open, you can say hello, you can buy them a cup of coffee, and that could change their day drastically, and you would have no idea. And to me, for people like Tasha who are going through the same type of thing, if you have a specific passion, you owe it to yourself and you owe it to the people around you to pursue it. Because once you're successful in what you're meant to be doing and what's making you happy, it will drastically impact other people's lives in a way that you will never know. But it's what you're meant to do.

Yeah. Yeah. What landed with me is when Tasha talked about her personal bankruptcy. You know, first I hear, and, you know, just trying to observe my own behavior. She says, first year at 100,000 plus dollar business, oh, my gosh, that's quick growth. And there's a little bit of jealousy. There's a little bit of, oh, I can't touch that. You know? And then she says, but then my husband and I went through personal bankruptcy, and it was devastating. And, like, wow, that's tough. And she went through this arc in her story that just makes her so relatable. I bet I've never seen her speak. I bet she is a powerful speaker because of her absolute candor. That's very inspiring. And after hearing her story, I feel like, oh, I can do some of the things she's done. And I bet you the people that watch her speak feel the same way.

Yeah.

Which is the definition of a powerful speaker. Someone that can move an audience to where they need to be. I hope she goes all in on that career. I hope so too. And I kind of hope she kicks my ass on the speaking stage one day, because.

Duel it out.

We duel it out. Hey, Tasha, bring it. And then she'll, like, knock me over. Like, don't break it again no more. Don't bring it. Don't break. No, I hope she does. I. There's a lot of bad speakers out there. I hate to say it. There's a lot of bad speakers. And I'm not saying I'm a great one or whatever, but there's a lot of people that are speaking to the mechanics and are saying, here's what you should do and haven't been there. I want Tasha to kick my butt and everyone else's, but because she's lived through this, and she can teach others to get through this themselves. So just wishing her huge success.

Definitely. So thank you again to Tasha and thank you for listening to this episode 100. We really owe it to all of you listening, and not all of you. You listen because, Mike, remember, you're supposed to talk to a single person when you're podcasting.

Oh, my God. Rule number Michael, pay attention. Yes.

So thank you for listening for 100 episodes. And if you haven't heard all 100, because probably very people have, although we've had people admit to us they've literally listened to every single one. Mike, right?

Oh, yeah.

Lots of people.

Yeah.

So again, you can go to the website Profit first podcast dot com. That brings you to Mike's website, where there's, well, funny pictures of him, but also every episode we've ever done. Here's the thing. Comment on the posts of the episodes. If you want to share your story, you want to share your passion. You know what? Share your story and put a link to your website. Why not? I mean, don't be spammy. But, you know, please. Or ask Mike a question. The prince of profit is here to answer you.

I don't know why. That was good timing.

That was tremendous. So there you go. So profit first podcast.com is the website, and you can rate and review us everywhere. But here's the thing. Profit First Professionals is an organization which is pretty much changing the world of profit and sustainability in businesses. You talk about changing someone's life. Making a business profitable is huge. And that's what you and Ron are doing. Mike and I love it.

Yeah, yeah. So we have built an organization. We. I mean, it's 129 now, 130 people and growing that have joined us to bring profit, advisement, profit coaching, if you will, to businesses just like yours. I actually hope Tasha one day as she grows her practice, maybe she could join us too and help spread the word on how to navigate through these challenges like personal bankruptcy and come to the position where you're profitable again. Now we focus on businesses, and we have accountants, bookkeepers, and business experts just like Tasha, who navigate you through Profit First. The book I wrote, they address the nuances. They help you become profitable very quickly and do it once and for all and stay profitable permanently. All you have to do is go to profitfirstprofessionals.com, click on the find button, give some details about your business, and we'll make sure we hook you up with the best Profit First Professional to make you profitable once and for all.

I mean, who ever thought that their accountant and bookkeeper could be looking out for their profitability? I mean, they're not just number crunchers anymore. There's a consultative approach to accounting and bookkeeping. That's what you're providing. That's the opportunity that you have as a listener is to meet some of these people. Even just contact Mike through the website and talk to some of these accountants and bookkeepers and say, hey, what are you doing that's so special? Tell me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The irony is this, Chris. You need an account or bookkeeper anyway for your business, right? I mean, you need one. Why not have someone that's a profit advisor first and also provides extraordinary accounting and bookkeeping? You're paying that anyway. Why not hire the person that will drive the bottom line of your business, the most important thing? That's right.

So thanks again to our guests, Tasha Scott. Thank you, Mike. Thank you, Christina. Thanks to Obi Ron and the lumberjack in the background, and thanks to you for listening. This has been episode 100. We're really happy to have you here with us and share this fun that we have. So thanks for listening, everybody. And, Mike, who's up next week?

Oh, Kirby Haseman's coming with us on episode 101. Dude, I'm talking to Kirby. I say, man, I want to talk about delivering more profitability to businesses. How do you do? He says, by delivering joy. I'm like, what? So we're going to talk about how delivering joy to your clients, to your company actually brings the most profitability.

There you go. See y' all next time.

Bye.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Oh, perfect.

Wow.

That's how you wrap up episode 100.

See you all next time.