Episode 16: Tips for Starting a Profitable Business with Melinda Emerson

From the studios of fractal Recording, this is the Profit first podcast episode Sweet sixteen.

Yes.

Oh, man.

Sweet sixteen. Sweet sixteen, bro.

You're right.

We're in our teenage years.

Oh, my goodness. Welcome, everyone.

Sixteen's a dangerous time, right? This is when things start changing.

Hey, now. Welcome to the Profit first podcast. We have a great time on the show. I'm Chris Curran. I'm the founder of fractal Recording.

And I'm Mike McCallo. It's the author of Profit first, you know, and on this show, we talk about the bottom line. In fact, we talk about lots of business things, because everything ultimately comes down to the bottom line. But we get the essence of how to make money doing what you do.

That's it. And we're available as a podcast on itunes and Stitcher. Those are the two big podcast directories and also the website profitfirstpodcast.com. and we've interviewed 15 other awesome people.

Yeah, no, we've had some great guests. And talking about great guests, my colleague Christina Buld back.

Yes, I'm back.

Yeah, she's back.

A lot of our listeners were saying, who was that great singer who didn't sing? Who didn't sing last week? We wanted to sing more. So Christina, just so everyone knows, has vowed to do a little more singing. Perhaps a volunteered. Perhaps even a national anthem may break out today.

She was coerced, I think, you know.

We'Re gonna be talking about today, dude, starting a business from scratch in a little bit. I'm gonna introduce one of my best friends in the business community. Her name is Melinda Emerson. We. We went to college together, and we may have hooked up. We didn't know we did, but there was. Well, she's listening in right now. She knows that it may be true. It was pretty racy. So really, we're gonna talk about our college experience together on the show. Not really her typical topics. But before I introduce her, dude, we haven't talked in a full week now. What's going on with you, man?

Yeah, man, I've just been pretty busy, actually. Believe it or not, my spiritual guide was in New Jersey for the last two weeks.

What was that mean? I don't even know. That means he was a person.

He's a person. He's my spiritual guide. So I got to go meditate with him, like, every day for almost two weeks in the ashram.

Meditation is silence, right? Or is it not necessarily?

Yeah, meditation is silence. Technically, it's thinking of one thing continuously. That's the definition.

Okay, so then you Have. Why do you need someone else there is that make it even?

No. A spiritual guide. Well, if you want to learn tennis, why would you hire a tennis coach.

To play tennis better?

Okay, so in spirituality, same thing applies.

He can't read in your mind, or can he read your mind? Like, he's like. He's not. Like, dude, you're not thinking of one thing. Damn it. He slaps you.

He helps you on the path. He says if your forehand is not good, hey, try this. He's been there. He's a tennis star. He won the championship, and he's teaching you how to play tennis.

Are you breaking into an analogy, or is he also a tennis star? So, dude, for me, because your topic just blew my mind there, right? I just noticed I haven't been getting my hair haircut. And, like, how can you forget to get your hair cut? I forgot to get my hair cut. It's just getting longer and longer. And I notice every time I look in the mirror, I age by 10 years. The longer this gets. It's just a big moppy thing, awkward.

Parts, alfalfa thing going on.

Yeah. Alfalfa grease, hair curling around.

I know how you'll never forget a haircut again. Tell your hairdresser. Is that what you would call barber?

I actually call barber.

Sorry. Tell your barber to call you every three, four weeks and tell you that he has M and M's at his barbershop.

Oh, yeah, I've been down. Me and Christine. Christine's like, I'm not gonna eat those. I'm gonna eat those. And all of a sudden, she grabbed.

A cup full of embatting over the cup.

Yeah, I stopped eating because of my receding gum lines, which we'll talk about next episode. We're drifting. I want to thank our sponsors real quick.

We have great sponsors.

We have awesome sponsors. Literally. Nextiva's been with us from day one. We're now on Sweet sixteen. They've been supporting us. We'll talk more about them later. Fundera Source for funding. They've been with us since episode four. T sheets since episode four. And now people are calling us to sponsor us. We actually had to turn someone away because it wasn't a complimentary fit for the other folks. But we are welcoming more sponsors. Yeah, it's kind of awkward, right? Yeah, Sorry. All right.

We like awkward silence on this show.

Are you okay with comforting?

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay. All right. I think we killed enough of the clock. Now I want to introduce our guest.

Let's do it.

Her name is Melinda Emerson. She is America's number one numero uno numero small business expert. That's the only languages I know. Spanish, German, and English that can say one in. Do you know any other language?

French.

Oh, that's German.

She is America's numero un small business expert. She's the longest running live chat on Twitter for small business owners. This is true. I think she's 100,000 plus followers on Twitter compared to my three, just to give you a sense. And she's a regular columnist for the New York Times. She's also a contributor to Essence magazine and is the lead instructor for the Black Enterprise Small Business University. With no further ado, Melinda Emerson. How are you?

Hi, guys.

Hey, Melinda.

Hello.

Welcome.

Thank you for having me.

Was the college tryst we have together. Is that accurate or not? Truthfully?

You know what, Mike? You need to stop lying about that. I don't know what woman you were with when you were in college, but it was not me. You need to stop telling that once you go white.

You know, you're right.

You had jungle fever in college. It was not with me. Michael, where did you live?

Which dorm did you live in freshman year?

I lived in Lee hall, freshman year.

Oh, yes. Sixth floor.

I was on the basement floor. See, that's what I'm telling you. You were creeping into some other chick's roof.

Oh, my God. I totally got you confused with someone else. She was in Lee. She was on the sixth floor, which is the very top floor of Lee, I think.

Yes.

You know where I was? No, I was not in Pritchard. I was in Miles.

Oh, okay.

Do you even know where that is?

Yeah, I know where Miles is. I lived in Miles junior year.

I thought Miles was a male only dorm.

They did a. I think they added female florist to that one. I thought.

Oh, okay. Where are you from originally?

Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania.

And then why did you go to Virginia Tech?

Because they recruited me. My dad said you're supposed to go somewhere where somebody wanted you.

Did you get a scholarship?

I did not have a scholarship to go to Virginia Tech. But the deal I cut with my parents was if it didn't cost more to go to Virginia Tech as an out of state student than it cost to go to Duquesne or Pitt. I could go back then and back then and it's really like back in the day, it was like $11,000 to go there as an out of state student my first year.

Oh, my God, that's awesome. Yeah, back in the day, this was 89 to or 89 to 93. Right?

I am younger than you, so it was 90 to 94.

You suck. All right, get her off the show immediately.

Only did you not hook up?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, we totally hooked up. You might.

Anyway.

Okay. All right. So after Virginia Tech, you graduate, you move on through your business career and you become an author of this wildly popular book, become your own boss in 12 months. What inspired you to write this book?

You know, I wrote, what inspired me to write this book was actually in 2005, I got pregnant with my son and I got put on bed rest for six months. And I literally went from being like the worst workaholic you ever met in your life to not leaving my house and basically not being able to work. And Wi fi was not what it was. I mean, I literally had a Palm 3 cell phone trying to run my life, which wasn't really working. And in that time, my business started crumbling because I had built a business that could not run without me. And when you have six months to sit and think and that's all you're allowed to do, you start thinking about all the expensive mistakes you made in your business. And I literally started writing them down and start writing down what I learned from them. And eventually that turned into become your own boss in 12 months.

Well, we have a lot of listeners that are starting their business, aspiring to start a business, and their biggest fear is the profitability. Like, if I start a business, am I going to lose my shirt? Where do you get started with someone that wants to start a business?

Well, I think the first thing you've got to think about if you want to start your business is what you want and why you want it. Because it's really about your life plan first and then building a business that aligns with that. Because what you don't want to do is trade a soul sapping job for a business that becomes a noose around your neck. So you want to really be clear about what you want to, why you want it. Then the next thing you've got to look at is can you even afford to become an entrepreneur? Because if you have two brand new cars outside and a three or four thousand dollars a month mortgage and credit cards, bills up to the hilt. You can't quit your job and start a business because you got other problems. You got to get your spending under control. You've got to figure out how you're going to start this business, because the money to start this business is going to come from your right or your left pocket. And then you really need to look at what skills you have and then what skills you need to run your particular. Want to see you start a restaurant because you like to eat right. I want you to start a restaurant because you know what it is to run a restaurant. So you probably need to go work part time for a business like the one you want to start so you can get some real understanding around that type of business. And then I want you to figure out who that paying customer is. Because I see a lot of small business owners, they focus on their logo, their location, their invitations to their grand opening event, and if their life depended on it, they couldn't tell you who their niche target customer.

You know, I find a lot of people when I start a business, the logo is the big thing. Like they spend thousands or hundreds of dollars to get that killer logo.

Hours and hours on the logo, and then spend more time planning their vacation than they do writing a business plan. Yeah.

And not a single customer cares about that.

It's like, hello, how are you going to run this business? What is going to happen when the phone rings and there is a sale? How is your business actually going to operate? And how is it ever going to operate without you? And those are the things that you've got to think through. And I personally believe in people being side hustlers. I don't believe in people quitting jobs to start a business because it takes 12 to 18 months for a small business to break even, let alone replace your corporate salary. So you need to keep those paychecks rolling as long as you can.

Now I totally know why we hooked up in college. Because you get so fired up, I start falling in love with you again every time.

I was going to say, man, sounds like you've done this before and helped a few people do it, too.

A few.

Few thousands.

Tell me about the money side, Melinda. So many people want to start a business, but they literally don't have the money. Can they still do it?

You can do it, but you have to have some money. Because you and I both know, Mike, it could be a year or two before checks start coming back in. And you've got to be able to withstand that. You've got to still be able to maintain your household. You've got to have an emergency savings account. And you have to make sure that if your spouse is now carrying the load, you've got to give them a realistic timeline for how long you're going to chase this business. And you got to be careful with your timeline because your sweetie's going to hold you to it. Right? So you do have to have money because banks don't loan money to start up businesses. You know that they're not looking for you until you've been in business two years. You got, you know, positive cash flow and even if you get a line of credit, they're only going to give you 10% of your revenue. So if you've made $50,000 in your business, you can only get 5,000 in a line of credit. So be real clear about where the money's going to come from. You've got to protect your credit because your personal credit and credit cards might be how you end up financing this business in the days.

Or fundera, just so you can get a plug. Yeah, all right.

Yes, fundera.

Yeah, we are fundera. Alright, so talking more about the money, is there a certain type of business that's less expensive to start than other businesses?

I mean, I definitely think Internet businesses and professional service businesses are less expensive because you're selling your intellectual capital, then you know that's what you're selling. But the average business takes about 25 grand to start. Because even if you're starting an Internet business, you got to have a great website, you got to have great photography of your products and services. Now you can't go cheap because the thing that you got to realize is that all of that speaks to the credibility of your business, right? So you've got to make sure that you look as professional as IBM or Coca Cola and you've got to spend money for that. You know, I don't believe in DIY websites and stuff like that. If building websites is not your business, hire somebody, please. You know, if accounting is not your business, please hire somebody to help you with your initial budgets and your, your pricing and your projections. Do not do this stuff. I mean, my biggest challenge with people, and I love your book so much and I tell people about your book Profit first all the time.

I so want to kiss you.

People let their fear of math be the reason why they don't know what the hell is going on financially in their business. And there is no excuse for that. By the 15th of the month you better know how well your business did last month so that you can make adjustments. You know, successful businesses are run based on up to date financial information. You can' wing it. And you can't just swipe money out of the cash register. When you need money, you need to pay yourself with an actual paycheck.

Now you got a new book coming out and we're going to dig into that a little bit. So I want that to be a cliffhanger for our listeners. But in becoming your own boss, you specified a 12 month plan. What are the major steps to starting up that business?

Well, first you've got to have that life plan that we talked about. You've got to have a financial plan. You've got to really have an honest skills assessment. You know what skills you got to go out here and get? You've got to have a marketing plan, you've got to have a business plan. And you should launch while working. That is really the Emerson planning system that walks you through the 12 months. And you know, the great thing about my book is that I actually walk you through month by month. What to do. The first chapter is like 12 months before you start. Next chapter, 11 months before you start. And then at the end of each chapter, I give an action step, a list that you should follow to make it not overwhelming. Because it's crazy, like to just be like, oh, I'm going to start a business. No. You know, be methodical about it. And I tried to break it down and think of everything you could possibly have to worry about. And I put it in this book and this is the second edition. So obviously there's a few people that thought it was good and helpful.

Yeah, no, and I'm one of them. No, I have it. I love the checklist and I love that Emerson. It's the Emerson plan. You got your own name in there. I tried it with Michalowitz.

If anything, as cool as the hedgehog concept. Right? So I just named it after myself.

Yeah, I love it. I love it. I tried to use it with Michalowitz and people are like, michala shits. Like, it just didn't work. All right, so we got a little surprise for you, Melinda. You are America's number one small business expert. But we wonder how you do in Canada, quite frankly. So we have prepared a trivia series for you around Canadian business questions and want to see how well you perform. Is that cool?

Okay.

Yeah. You didn't expect this one first. It's always proper to introduce the national anthem of Canada. So just hold on one real quick and let's get going. Open and the spons Canada, the sponsor of T Sheets, Wandera Nextiva. Oh, you're such a beautiful country. You have a small business expert, but we have a better one here in America named Melinda Emberson. Oh, Canada, the great 51st state of America. That was inappropriate. Inappropriate. Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah. Oh, Now I feel bad. Okay, that's basically it. Now I feel awkward.

Thanks for tuning in.

Thank you. All right, so that was the Canadian national anthem. Here's the trivia questions for you, Melinda.

Should we keep the music going?

No. Oh, yeah. Keep the music going in the background. I pissed off all of our Canadian listeners. Melinda.

Yes.

What was the average annual income of a full time self employed worker in Canada of last year? And the options are this. 25,000, 39,000, 41,000 or $56,000. All US based dollars, by the way. As opposed to the Canadian dollar last year?

39,000.

She nailed it. She nailed it. Holy cow. You're 25% of the way there.

Wow.

Next question is coming from Christina.

Okay, Melinda, what was the average week of full time self employed workers? 30 hours, 37 hours? 40 hours or 50 hours?

50 hours?

2 for 2.

Oh, God.

Is she cheating? Are you on the Internet, Melinda?

Okay, I am not.

I have stepped away from the computer.

All right, you are ready already the number one expert in Canada. Let's see if you can go even higher. Be the global expert, but we'll still stick with Canadian questions. Question number three. How many small businesses on the prairies are still in operation after five years? Quite frankly, I have no idea what the prairies are. It's a Canadian term.

Okay.

All right. Is it 33% A, B, 45% C, 51% or D 63%? A, 33%, 51%. The Canadians outperform the Americans here. Okay, last question. Here he comes.

Okay. How many micro businesses on the on the prairies are still in operation after five years?

Give her the options.

You guys just asked me that question, so I'm gonna say answer D51.

No, wait a minute. There's something wrong with our sheet. Over here.

No, here. How many micro businesses are on the prairies and stuff? Oh, yeah, it's the exact same question. And so congratulations. You got it right. Wow. All right. You're number expert in Canada now too. Add it to your resume. That was fun. Thank you, Melinda. Okay, that was horrible. I made fun of Canada. I asked the same question.

There was a difference. The first one was small businesses. The second one was micro businesses.

But the answer is exactly the same.

Difference between the two. No.

Whatever. We ruined it. Okay. All right, Melinda, the new book is. It's the second edition of of becoming your own boss in 12 months.

Yes, yes.

What are in the revisions? What did you find or what did you add that's new?

Well, the awesome thing is I wanted to really add all the social media stuff in this book now. So I have a chapter on how to develop a successful crowdfunding campaign. I have a chapter on how to develop a great website, because we know that your website is your number one sales tool. And this is the thing that most small businesses are struggling with, managing their brand online, whether it's social media or their website. I also have a great chapter on how to develop a content strategy, because you can't do social media if you're not developing your own original content. So I talk about all the different ways you can do that. And of course, Mike, you know, I added a chapter on how to become a social media ninja like me. So if you want to know how to build a brand that reaches over 3 million entrepreneurs a week online, you got to check out all my secrets about social media selling and everything that we have in the book. And I also have a great chapter at the end on the things you should be measuring in your business. So those are the things that are new. And I was really excited when I reread this book. Before I did the revisions, a lot of the original content was still completely relevant. So I was really, really excited that this book is now updated and complete and can really help people, from soup to nuts, everything they're dealing with in their business. Not just how to start, but how to stay in business.

You know, when it comes to gauging expertise, Chris of someone, whenever someone suggests you should do something, my question back to them is, well, how successful have you been doing it? Because people say, oh, you know what, Mike? Don't become an author. That's the dumbest thing you could ever do. I say, well, how successful have you been being an author? Like, I don't know. I've never done it. It's horrible advice. But Melinda dominates in social media, Twitter in particular. She's all over, and she understands the nuances and she understands the strategy better than anyone I know. So her advice is the best. My question, though, to you. Melinda is around crowdfunding. It's becoming the new source for money. And we were talking $25,000 to start a business on average, you got to get money from somewhere. It seems like crowdfunding might be a good source.

I mean, it is, Mike, but it's hard. A lot of people way underestimate the level of marketing that has to be done long before their crowdfunding campaign even goes. I mean, I honestly think the average crowdfunding campaign in the US raises $10,000. That's it.

Wow.

That's a whole lot of work for $10,000. So I think that people, if you don't have a network that's already not supporting you in your business, they're not going to support you on your crowdfunding campaign, you know, because 30% of your first investors are going to be people that know you. So if people that know you are not going to invest in you, please don't believe strangers are going to.

That's a great point. Hey, just fast forwarding. You said the most important advertising medium is your own website. What do you do to make a powerful, good website when you're starting up a business?

Well, the first thing you've got to do is make sure that it's not hard for people to figure out why they're there. You should have a branded header with a great tagline that tells people who you are and how you can fix their problem. You also need to have at least three ways to engage people to give you their email address. Because social media is great, but email is still king. So you've got to figure out, can you offer them to sign up for your newsletter? Can you offer them a free download or a free ebook? My book Become youe own boss in 12 months, you can get two free chapters of it if you go to my website, succeedisyourownboss.com but let's say you're a business that does professional services where you can go and offer a free quote or a free product sample, anything. You've got to figure out what you can do to engage your people because once you get their email address, that's how you can nurture that relationship. Because most people aren't going to buy from you the minute they meet you. You. It's going to take at least seven quality interactions before they're ready to whip out their credit card. So you've got to figure out what you can do to keep yourself in front of them. So your website is your best way possible to capture them.

You know, our mutual friend Barry Moltz calls that the ethical bribe, where you have something up there that other people want for free, but it's valuable to them. In exchange they give you their email address. What about you mentioned credit cards are more and more businesses doing transactions online, setting up stores for themselves. Do you have it? Do you recommend that? How do you get started taking credit cards?

Well, I think you've got to figure out it used to be a lot harder to take credit cards than it is now. You used to go through this big old hassle with getting a merchant account, you don't have to do that now. If you got Square, you got PayPal. Listen, you can transact business from your cell phone, from your computer online, and you definitely should be figuring out how to sell something. If you are just a retail online storefront, you might want to at a partner like BigCommerce or Shopify that they have great templates that you can customize to get an online shopping cart going. I use infusionsoft, and infusionsoft has a great shopping cart function to it, along with their email marketing products that they have. So there's lots of options out there. You don't have to reinvent the wheel. You don't have to be a coder to set up your own shopping cart online. So you definitely should do it.

One last question about profitability. As you work with these thousands of clients that you've coached and did lectures to and so forth forth, what's the one strategy, the first thing that comes to mind that they can use to start boosting their bottom line?

Niche to get rich. The more of.

I thought you're gonna call me bitch. I thought you'd throw bitch in there, too. Niche to get rich. Bitch. I thought that's what you're gonna say.

I mean, it's serious. The more of a specialist you can become, the more money you can charge if you own. I mean, you should not get on a highway you can't own. I mean, when it comes to Twitter, I am America's number one small business expert. Because of Twitter, I have 300,000 followers.

300,000. Oh, my God.

That's what I'm saying. Like you and. But that's where I focus my energy. I wasn't doing LinkedIn, Facebook, Google plus, you know, Instagram, all this crap. No, I was doing Twitter, and I was working Twitter like a job because my goal was to own that space, and I do. And so that's why you have to think about what is it that you could do to become the cardiologist of your. Of your industry. You don't want to be the primary care physician. You want to be the cardiologist. So you have to figure out how you can be the specialist for what people need. Because when you are the specialist, you don't have conversations with people about whether or not you can solve their problem. You have conversations about availability and price. And that is what it is about.

All right, I got one last trivia question for you, and we'll wrap up the show. It is about Virginia Tech. Here's the question who. What's the name of the student who lived in Miles dormitory in 1989 and had a tour de fair with a girl on the sixth floor of Lee.

Mike McCallowitz.

That's right. I just wanted to hear you say my name. Melinda, it's been a joy having you. Thank you so much for being on our show. It was a joy.

Thank you so much for having me.

Thanks, Melinda.

Congratulations on the new book, everyone. It came out on June. I'm sorry, January 2nd. Just came out out recently. Download the free chapters. If you're a sissy, buy the book. If you're a tough guy.

I've been staring at it in Amazon this whole show.

Yeah, well, buy it, man. Click on the buy button. Yeah. And Melinda, if you want to find out more about you, where should they go?

Go to succeedisyourownboss.com or you can follow me at smallbizlady on Twitter and Facebook. And please join me every Wednesday night on Twitter from 8 to 9pm Eastern for SmallBizChat, where I answer people's small business questions live on the Internet every single week.

The number one small business expert in America and Canada. Thank you very much, Melinda.

This has been awesome.

All right, thank you.

Thanks, Melinda.

So. So now with those goodbyes, I got lost here. Was that intense?

Yeah, I did. I need a br. I need to take a breath and I need to listen to this episode like three more times myself.

Yeah, we're back on track.

Holy.

On episode 15 last week. I think we're all out of sorts. It was all out of sorts. This was clicking. Melinda just freaking. Just ran.

She romped.

She romped. Chris.

Is that accurate, Christina?

Sure.

She's a romper. Well, I want to do the recap of what we learned from this episode and I want to also share a profit secret. Before we do that, we gotta thank our sponsors. They fund all of this for us now we plugged the crap out of Fundera, so I think we're good with them, right? I mean, we did. Melinda's talking about. We're talking about. They're the one stop shop for any money needs you have even when you're starting a business. Still. I would check out Fundera, the other company, TSheets. TSheets provides time tracking software for your part time employees and all these different purposes. And then our number one sponsor, I mean my number one is they came on first, they've been our founding sponsor and they said they want to retain that title as long as they can. They're 16 episodes in Nextiva.

Nextiva.

Nextiva. I love Nextiva. Nextiva is a voiceover IP phone system. And when you're starting up a business, this is a phone system that can scale with you. So you can just have the phone system for yourself. And you hire employees, you expand, you can plug in more if you contract, because whatever reason you need to contract, you can. You can take phone systems off. It's a very scalable system. It's an awesome system. I use it myself. Dude. Chris, what'd you learn this episode?

Oh, this is great. This is like my list here is endless almost.

I'm looking at your list.

Become your own boss in 12 months. That's the name of her book. And it's funny, she. We didn't talk a lot about literally, specifically about profitability, but literally, I think everything she said applies to profitability. She was talking about knowing the what and the why of your business when you're starting it, Figuring out what skills you have if it applies to your business, knowing who your paying customer is. I mean, these are all little things, but think about. You need them before you can make profit, right?

Yeah, no, totally. Christina, what did you learn?

The main thing that stuck out for me was she said the more of a specialist you become, the more money you can charge, which is so true. People would rather pay more money to go to someone who can specifically help them with their needs than go to a no all, serve all company.

What's the world's most popular opera singer make? Do you have any idea?

Oh, gosh, no.

Was that Pavarotti or something like that?

I would imagine, Yeah.

I mean, millions, I assume, right?

You so much money. Because, I mean, in the opera world, you're not mic'd. You're not. It's all you up there. You gotta hold your own.

Oh, I had no idea. They're not. They're not mic'd.

Nope. Well, they're probably Mike for recording, but not for performance.

They are not mike.

But I'm just saying that the world's best opera singer or the world's best of any category gets a ridiculous premium. The riches are in the niches, bitches. And what I learned was 25,000 on average to start a business. I never thought about that. But what I heard embedded in that story is you can't forget about your lifestyle. You start a business, and maybe it costs very little to start your business, but since you're not making money, you got to support the lifestyle you've defined for yourself. Are you willing to ratchet back on your lifestyle a lot so that you can get by, or are you going to find money elsewhere to keep living in that house that you live in?

And she also said when you. When you really niche down and own that niche, she said you're not having. You're not talking to prospects, trying to convince them to buy your stuff. What you're talking about is your availability and the price. Yeah, right? Yeah, I like that.

I love that.

I'd love to get calls all day long like that.

Oh, my God. That's kind of cool. I like. Coming up, next week's episode, we're going to talk with John Thomas. He prefers to go by JT about deductions. So when you do your taxes and listen, I know tax. Even tax season just ends, Just starts. Listen, taxes are always happening, right? April 15th is a big tax day. But you should be preparing for this year round. Here we're gonna talk about things that you can deduct to reduce your tax consequences legally. So that's coming up next. Hey, what's that in your hand, Chris? Is that a fortune cookie?

Yeah. You want to crack it, Christina Rhythm.

That was a good crack.

That was like.

Well, could you sing a crack? Sing a crack.

That was no sing.

I want to hear you sing a crack.

Sounds like a mouse.

Wow.

You can't sing a crack.

Yeah. How you gonna sing a crack?

I don't know.

She just crazy crackas.

Yeah, Cracker. She first day. Her first day on job. This is true story. First day she comes on board, I'm like, how's it going? She's like, she's dressed appropriately, very nicely and doing stuff. And she goes, I got a question for you, cracker. And I'm like. I go, what? She called me cracker.

Wow.

And now we're calling each other cracker.

It's stuck.

It's stuck. We call each other crackers.

You do have the aura of a rap star, Mike.

I do.

You do, right?

I do, yeah.

Like, you can picture him with all the gold on coming up in a car, right?

Oh, totally. The big rings and stuff.

What a douche.

Oh, my lord. All right, so here's the tip. The profit tip is get into a rhythm. And what I mean by this is most businesses are periodically paying. Not periodically paying impromptu. Lee. Heat of the moment, paying bills. Money comes in, then I'll pay bills. It's very sporadic. That's the word I looking for sporadically. Sporadically paying bills. You actually want to get into a rhythm. And I have a specific strategy. We'll go into detail in another episode, but basically let your money accumulate for a period of time and then pay your bills and then let it accumulate for a period of time again. I recommend every two weeks, and you'll start seeing what I call cash flow waves. Money comes in and then disperses out. Money comes in, it disperses out. It'll give you a sense for the rhythm of your money. It's that simple. That's it, bro.

The motion of the ocean.

Yeah, the motion of the lotion. The money lotion.

So tell us about profit first.

Professionals. Professionals. Yeah. So we started an organization. We have a growing number of accountants and bookkeepers on board. By the way, if you're an accountant or bookkeeper and you want to maybe add this to your resume, give us a call. We are qualifying folks. It doesn't mean you'll get in, but we're trying to find some experts, some additional experts throughout the nation and through Canada, which, by the way, I apologize to my Canadian compadres. I thought that was funny, but as I'm saying, I'm like, this is not funny whatsoever.

Oh, Canada.

Oh, Canada.

That's part of living on the edge.

Could you imagine if the national anthem was more like, oh, Canada. But throughout the country. We have folks in Canada, in the U.S. and Mexico and throughout the country that are certified in profit first and are helping entrepreneurial businesses become more profitable. That's what profit first. Professionals. Tell me about Fractal Studio. Recording Studio.

Yes, Fractal Recording. I produce podcast shows for businesses. Is. It's a great way to get.

And you just brought a new podcast on recently, right?

Yeah.

Can you share their name?

It's called Growth Igniters Radio.

Growth Igniters Radio. Yeah. Now, this is about, like, warts and corns, Mike. Like a gross, really, isn't it? Don't you burn them off.

Their podcast is about igniting the growth.

Their growths. I can imagine a car. I have this horrible growth on my foot, and I. And then your. Your podcast body's like, oh, just burn it. Just ignite it. Ignite that growth. Okay, thank you. Yeah, that's the show. Okay. There had. There had to be a show about.

It every week, so. Yeah, so podcast shows are great. That's what we produce here at Fractal Recording, and we love it.

This was a joy. You know, we hit our time marks, actually. It's 35 minutes going in. I. We finally got this thing down to science. Oh. Oh, God. There they are. Play that music.

Love it. Thank you, Mike. Thank you. It's been great. Check out all our previous episodes. Well, this is episode 16, so we've had 15 other beautiful rock stars on there. It's hard to talk when he's singing. Anyway, let's listen to Mike. Thanks again, everybody. See you next time.

Play that funky. Yeah. Play the funky music like you never have before.