The Seven Levers to Profitability with Pete Williams

Hi there, my friends. I'm speaking at the lifehack Summit, which is for entrepreneurs who want to upgrade their productivity, improve the company's systems, and just live life on your own terms. It's online and you can log in from anywhere. And for a limited time, you will get a free ticket from MUAH. All you need to do is go to lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. That was lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. This year, there's going to be coaching from JJ Virgin, Michael Gerber, Chris Ducker, my boy will be there. And of course, I'll be speaking along with dozens of others, bestselling authors and leaders. Grab your ticket today for free from me. Lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. All the dates, all the details are right there. Right now, strap on your sticky tighty whities. Cause we're about to discuss the seven levers to profitability. You're about to hear that and so much more on today's episode of Entrepreneurship Elevated. Oh, my God, you guys are. You are disgusting is what you are.

Sticky. That's a good one.

Yeah, that was good. Yeah, sticky's a good choice of words. My name is Mike Kalowitz. I'm on a mission to eradicate entrepreneurial poverty. Why don't I have some fun while we're doing it? That's why I joke around. Plus, quite frankly, I'm pretty moronic. And that's really why we do that. I'm joined in the studio by Kelsey Ayers.

Hello, friend. You can find us on itunes, Stitcher, tunein radio, Spotify, iheartradio or entrepreneurshipelevatedpodcast.com or any podcaster anywhere.

Also, join in studio. Studio by dear friend, Jeremy Smith.

Hello. Oh, you said my last name.

I know. Am I not last name? No, you're not supposed to not reveal.

We gotta beep that. We gotta beep that. There's so many things we gotta beep.

Yeah. Jeremy Smythe is with us today.

I'm going silent.

You know what Jeremy did for us, Kels?

What?

He came up with a hashtag entrepreneurshipelevated. Originally, we're gonna do, you know, hashtag entrepreneurship elevated podcast. And you're like, why is it called Eep?

Like, takes up the entire Twitter post.

It really does. Like, that actually is. It was becoming like a problem. Like, any summary description or anything. It's like, oh, you have to shorten it. Oh, you have to shorten it. So, yeah, so Eep.

Eep. I love it. I love it. This is the Eep show. So welcome to Eep. And I love that. Yeah, it shortened so much like you posted someone. It's like, you know, great show today. Interviewing so and so it just said great sh. And then it was cut off and then all it was was the hashtag. It's a great shh. And it was the hashtag, great sheep. Great sheep. So now, now we can actually fit things in. So if you're a listener of this show, because you're listening, you must be a listener and you want to like, you know, brag to your friends that you listen to the show, you can now do on Twitter with an Eep.

You can even add sh in front of it. Sheep.

Sheep. Yeah. You're one of the sheep of Eep. You're an Eep sheep. Kelsey. Oh, I had a question for you. By law.

What about Murderena?

Why'd you. Sheep. Yeah, exactly. Murderinos.

I have something I wanted to complain about.

Yeah, it's like an open.

What do you want to complain about? What do you want?

I was filing my taxes.

Yeah, that's.

I have to pay three states this year.

Oh, that stinks.

And New Jersey, I owe zero. They owe me zero.

Okay.

But it's like, well, you got to pay $50 so that we know that. It's like. Can we just call it even, dude? Like, really?

What three states? So Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Penny.

New Jersey, and Delaware.

Delaware. What's going on in Delaware?

Well, cuz the store that I worked at was in mother. Yeah.

So do you think file like each. It's one federal income tax, but each state gets it.

Yeah. So it's. It's federal and then three states. So it's gonna cost me like, and I do it through TurboTax. It's gonna cost me like $250 just for my taxes.

Dude, not to pick on New Jersey, but New Jersey sucks. The, the, this state. Do you have to pay taxes for both Pennsylvania and New Jersey?

Yeah.

My God, Kels. There was a guy, his name was David Tepper, the wealthiest person in New Jersey. Billionaire. Moved out of New Jersey specifically because the taxes were just ridiculous. Moved to Florida. New Jersey went after him. They sued him for leaving New Jersey.

Shut up.

Yeah. And got nothing for it.

So there used to be.

Jersey got nothing.

There used to be a reciprocity within New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Yeah.

Where you. You wouldn't have to file. And I think it was like three or four years ago. They ended that. And now there's. You can get a tax credit. But for the most part now every like both States. Every state wants their own money. So you have to go through this whole process and, like, it makes it so much harder, like, to not have to pay multiple states the same taxes, basically. It's awful.

Awful. Kelsey, where can people find us? What? What? Like, did you talk about iTunes and Stitcher yet? You did. I don't pay attention to the word you say.

I know.

Then let me. Let me say share one more icebreaker with us, and then we'll get into the show. Say a share. What's the weirdest thing you ever. Actually, Jeremy, can you pass me your nuts over there? Those were good. So these. And you got them. These are amazing because you. They're smoky. It's a smoky salt flavor.

It's like a smoky barbecue flavor.

Yeah.

You want some barbecue?

They're delicious.

I said it's nuts.

What's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? Cows.

I love. I love.

You have to chew.

He complains. Complains about gum.

No, that was disgusting when you were chewing on gum.

No, this is ten times worse.

This is delicious. What are you talking about? Wait. What's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? What's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? These are great nuts, dude. Thank you. Should I throw it over there?

I got it.

I had bull testicles.

Ooh.

Really?

No.

You're punching today.

I don't think I really eaten anything that weird. I like fish scales and fishy things. In Ghana, I think in.

Yeah. In Asia, I think the Asian countries eat fish scale actually, like, almost like potato chips.

They put it in everything. It's like, really?

Yeah. Okay, so that's cool.

And they're just, like, sitting in the sun all day long. And then they scrape this, like, putrid fish scales.

Okay. I've actually seen that and tasted. They actually sell them in, like, Dorito bags. You can get. I've had them. Yeah. What? Jeremy, what about the weirdest thing you've ever eaten? Horse. You son of a. You can leave right now.

What? Isn't it, like, Australia or something? Where is it that they eat? Horses?

No. His farm. His parents?

Yeah. On the Christmas tree. Christmas tree.

Merry Christmas.

Yeah.

Pass over the mane. I want to gnaw on that. I want to eat the mane. You wouldn't eat the mane?

No.

Would you eat your own hair? Would you eat any hair?

Yes. There's people with an affliction that do that.

Oh, my God.

So the weirdest thing I ever ate was oyster. Rocky Mountain oysters.

Really?

Oh, is that.

That's testicles of cows or whatever calves we were. I did a cross country or. Yeah, I guess it's cross country cattle drive they call, you know, in Montana. And at the end, you were a city slicker. It was total. It was total cheesy. City slickers. It was so much fun. And the cowboys were throwing them back and you want one? I'm like, one just to say I did it. Never need to do it again. Yeah, it wasn't. Didn't taste.

What was the texture?

Oyster.

Like, really?

Uh, more like a scallop, actually. More like a scallop, but.

But they were, like, fried or.

They were fried. Yeah. I think a scallop is probably better.

Yeah. See, that's the thing. In my experience, it's not. It's not flavors. It's textures.

It's texture.

Yeah. Like, there's flavors I can deal with, but like, certain textures.

Like, you like scallops.

I love scallops.

Love scallops. Dude. Dude. That's probably. If that's prepared right, that's probably my favorite food.

Yeah, that's. My mom is the same exact way, but when it's not right, it is gross.

They get very rubbery.

Yeah.

And there's a little tendon on the side that you have to take.

Right.

And a lot of times people forget.

Yeah. The chef doesn't do it. And. Yeah. That's distraction.

Yeah.

Kelsey, we have a shout out.

Yes. This comes from Brad Hyatt. I thought I had a handle on my business finances, but after reading slash, listening to Profit first and listening to the podcast, I have some work to do. However, this podcast has given me the knowledge and confidence to make this change. Thank you for doing this podcast.

Nicely done. That's my kind of shout out.

Yeah.

His name is Pete Williams. Oh, wow, Pete. He's the author of Cadence. He is an entrepreneur advisor and marketer who Forbes recently called one called why is there a comma there? There's a superfluous comma called One entrepreneur today that every marketer should be modeling, but that should be around quotes. While Inc Describes him as a savvy marketing strategist, he started companies in varying industries, from telecommunications to E commerce. Even sold Australia's version of Yankee Stadium. Oh, we're gonna get juicy stuff about that. Called the MCG when he was 21 years old. And we'll find out exactly the price he sold it for. With no further ado, we're gonna talk about how do the seven levers of profit work in your business? His name is Pete Williams. Welcome to the Show Pete.

G' day, guys. I will put down my kangaroo steak and.

Is that. Yeah. What's the biggest thing you ever. You've ever eaten?

Kangaroo, I think that's what I reckon. That's probably the. The strangest one. Beautiful, though.

It was probably crazy strange up here, but in Australia it's probably popular, isn't it?

It's not overly common. You can get it in the supermarket, but it's not like the. The most popular meats. But it's beautiful. It's. It's really lean, it tastes really nice, but gotta. Gotta cook it really quick. If you overcook it, it's like eating tires.

You can get it in the States.

Yeah, you can get in the States.

Can you get a. Like, really seek it out?

Yeah, I wouldn't mind. I like ostrich. You ever have ostrich, Pete?

No. That's an interesting one.

Ostrich, shockingly, is a red meat.

It's really dark.

Really dark. Yeah. And it's. It's pretty good. It has a little bit of a gaminess flavor to me, but I love it, Love it. Very lean also.

Yeah. Yeah, Pete.

And then there's Vegemite. That's the other thing I've had.

Vegemite. Yeah, that's. That's like pure salt on your tongue.

I love.

It's awful.

Every day you eat every day? Pretty much, yeah.

I'm a legit Australian.

Yeah, we had one time and I was like, oh, my God, I don't know how people.

You can't spread it like peanut butter, though. You got to spread it real thin.

That's the key. The Americans came down, dude. I was down at an event in Perth and these people are slapping on Vegemite. Oh, we're gonna try this out. Like you said, like peanut butter. And one of. One of the Aussies comes to me, like, he goes, mate, just a little thin touch. I was like, this is actually pretty good.

Yeah, a caveat. Exactly. Yeah, you gotta be real thin and it's beautiful. If you whack it on like peanut butter and jelly, you are absolutely screwed.

So listen, you sold a. The equivalent of Yankee Stadium when you were 21 years old. What's the story around that?

Yeah, well, it's a story that I ripped off from a fellow New Jerseyan, I guess when I was 21, I was reading the story of Paul Hartunian who sold pieces of the Brooklyn Bridge.

Yes, that's a true story.

He grabbed that inch by inch timber from the walkway. And you know, word around the Campfire was He made about $2 million selling these little certificates on Johnny Carson's Late show and a whole bunch of stuff. So I started thinking how I could, you know, basically rip that idea off and do it back down under. And the Melbourne Cricket ground, which is 100,000 seat stadium, it's sort of, I guess as iconic as Yankee Stadium is here. It's where Australian football's played and cricket and, and all that sort of stuff. And one of the parts of the stadium had just been demolished for a redevelopment. So I was ringing around, found the wrecking company that was doing that and bought a whole bunch of timber that was the seats with the idea to do exactly what Paul did with those little certificates. But the guy in the phone says to me, oh, we've also got some carpet. And I know that sounds even weirder, but the carpet is really quite famous. It's dog ugly, but it's got the actual crest, like the logo of the stadium on it. So I was like, oh yeah, I'll take some of that. So I bought all of that on a friend's credit card because I was 21 and had no money and then wrote a press release, 21 year old, sells the MCG for 500 bucks and made frames of memorabilia up with a photo of the mcg, a piece of this carpet, a plaque, and went absolutely bananas down here. All the media loved it. Still selling 10 or 15 years now on, still selling a frame every now and again.

Wow.

Pretty crazy.

That's amazing.

Mmm.

I like that was a really cool.

Little, little venture that kind of my first sort of foray into quote, unquote entrepreneurship.

Well, and you discovered as a entrepreneur, levers for profit. So I want to understand what are you said there's seven levers for profitability. Can you dig right into it with us?

Yeah, sure. Basically, you know, from the MCG venture, I ended up stumbling into telecommunications of all areas and started a little telco business selling, installing phone systems all Australia. And we grew pretty fast, but then we kind of hit a glass ceiling and couldn't figure out how to grow any further. And we started looking at, well, what's driving profit in our business? What drives profit in every business? To cut a long story short, effectively we kind of just stumbled across these seven areas that apply to any business. Whether you're an accountant, you're a lawn mower, or you're a telco business or anything in between. So these seven things, it's what drives profit. And it sounds kind of basic when you go through it. But I think for so many business owners, they don't take the time to actually identify what these are in their business and actually spend time working on them. So first thing is the suspects. How many people are actually walking into your door? If you look at a footwear store, for example, how many people actually walk into your footwear store, they're your suspects. Then how many of those people actually put up their hand and say, yes, I'm qualified to be sold to. I'm a serious prospect. Right, so that's your prospects. Then you've got your conversions, obviously. How many of those open up their wallet, give you the credit card and transact with you? Pretty straightforward. Then you've got your average item price and your average items per sale. Does the people buy the most expensive shoe and do they also buy a pair of socks and a shoe cleaner and would you like fries with that?

Gotcha.

Then you've got transactions per customer. How often do they come back and buy from you again? And then the good old profit first mantra is, what's your margins? What is your problem? How do you operate there? So for us they're the seven things and they don't sound that amazing. But from our perspective, when we sat down and went, okay, let's identify what these seven things are. For us, a couple of massive things change. One is that just identifying the difference between a suspect and a prospect is a massive shift for so many businesses. Because I think everyone sort of treats everyone before they become a customer, as in this one bucket of leads. And it's like, well, you've actually got two different groups. You've got suspects and prospects. And the conversation between the two changes actually.

Yeah, so tell me a little bit about that. So a suspect is someone that just has inquired or there's some potential. How do you define suspect?

So the way I look at it is if we use that shoe store analogy, I think that's a beautiful one. I worked at Athlete's Foot, the shoe where the footwear chain during university and actually worked in Florida for a while with athlete's foot as well. And one of the beautiful things they taught us was these things called the greet and seat rules. And it was process about if someone walks into the store, you're not trying to sell them a pair of shoes and you go, hang on, we're a shoe store. What the hell are you talking about?

You're already confusing me.

Yeah, what they say is the first thing you're trying to do is sell the person on sitting down and trying a pair of Shoes on.

Okay. And that is what differentiates the first.

Step of the funnel prospect. Yeah, because, you know, trying to get someone to sit down and try on a pair of shoes is a very different conversation than trying to actually get someone to actually buy the pair of shoes that's actually on their feet. So the idea is trying to differentiate your tire kickers, if you will, the suspects versus prospects. There is a process in every business where someone puts up their hand and says, I'm a qualified prospect. Trying on a pair of shoes. Actually spending half an hour on the phone with your sales team to get a proposal. Downloading your free report off your website, your suspect might be your web visitor. Once they actually are on your email list, for example, then they're a prospect.

Okay, so I'm here suspect until they commit to the process that approaches a sale. Right?

Yeah, okay, exactly. And I think so many business owners don't take the time to actually clearly identify that in their business because once they do, they can see the two different conversations that happen. That's the big one. And the second thing is, I think if you look at the math, this is the crazy thing about it, which blew my mind when we kind of stumbled across it, is that these seven areas, they all drive profit. And if you increase each of them by just 10%, so you go from 1000 visitors this week to 1100, and then you go from a conversion rate of 24% just to 26.4%, you're seeing 10% wins. You're not trying to double anything, just small. 10% wins across all seven areas. The compounded effect is actually a 2x to your bottom line, a doubling of your profit. And for our business and other businesses I've seen sort of apply this methodology is it's just so much easier to achieve. If I said to you, you got to double your web traffic next month. Yeah, absolutely. Trying to be Babe Ruth and hit it out of the park, it's just so hard. Whereas to go, oh, hang on, let's just get a 10% incremental win in each of these areas, let's just tweak the headline on your opt in form on your website. That might give you a 10% boost. The Times of London, for example, which is a newspaper in the uk, they applied a variation of this model and they increased their subscription sign ups by 11% in an hour and a half. And all they did was isolate. Okay, we're trying to increase our conversion lever. These are people on our order form. All they did was put on trust Logos like secure shopping logos. Bang. Instant increase of 10% or 11% in their conversion rate.

I love it. So let's take a business through this. Like, let's.

Perfect.

Kelsey, do you have any. Maintain your property? Do you have a lawnmower?

I do.

What do you mean you do? She doesn't. That's why she's lying. But let's take a lawn mower, some of the most lawns through this process. All right, suspects. How do I start here? How do I bump my number of prospects for my lawnmower?

Well, look for a lot of businesses who are just in that sort of space. Even just a local Google Ads listing could be a massive shift from what he's doing right now. If your local lawnmower is just doing letterbox drops right now to get work, putting a Google local listing, small business listing up online is a great place to get a 10% boost.

Okay, so I want 10 more calls coming in to my business. Is that what you're saying?

10%. So if you're getting 100 people hearing about you this month, all we're trying to get to is 110.

Okay. And what you want to read between the lines, Pete, too, is you got to know where you stand today to know the progress you made.

Absolutely. The first thing you got to do. Yeah, I think the first thing is to clarify what each of these levers are for your business, capture what you're currently doing, and then calculate your starting figures. That's kind of a good sort of way to look at it. So first thing first is exactly. Just get that. Just get people seeing more about your business from suspects.

Okay, great. So I'm a lawnmower. I got 10% more people calling. Now what do I do?

So prospects that could be from a lawnmower perspective, let you come and get a free quote. So getting more people to actually see your listing on Google or read your letterbox flyers, they're your suspects. How do you get more people to actually engage with you? Change your copy, change your headline? Just some basic stuff to say, hey, we can do free quotes. We'll come out and give you a free quote. Really simple stuff. It's all relative. Obviously, that's a very simple step that they can do just to tweak that and get a 10% boost of inquiries.

Okay, got it. So now the next step is I want to increase the average item price. Did I get that right?

Conversions.

I'm sorry, I missed conversions. Yeah. So how do I get more lawnmowering business or whatever it is for a lawnmower.

I think it is very simple. Rather than sort of scribbling your quote on the back of an envelope and going, here's the envelope for the price I'm going to give you, just go to local officeworks or Office Max or Staples and print out just a nice looking kind of before and after photos on a pricing sheet or give some examples of photos of what you've done before. And on the back of that, just where you can professionally write your quote. It's only a small thing, costs you 10 cents to produce and print, but it makes you look more professional than the other lawnmowers.

Yeah. Okay.

So when you're giving a quote, you're showing some before and afters, you're giving some testimonials from some past clients. That sort of stuff makes you look more professional in your prospect's eyes. So they're probably going to buy from you more. So it's those sort of things. What actually happens at the point of decision that you can influence. So proposals is definitely a way you can tweak and improve that by 10%.

Interesting. And it also sounds like a little bit of a snowball effect happens. I don't know if Australia get much of a snowball effect, but I was, I just bought mosquito control services and tick services because we have a lot where we live. And I called this company, they had a really nice truck parked at my neighbors down the street and I was like, wow. And when it came to the conversion, my mind reflected back on this truck. I'm like, oh, they must be professional because the way they present their truck does that. Is that true? This kind of snowbally. Okay.

Yeah. The compounding thing always works through. Absolutely. Because how you start is how you finish.

Yeah.

Context is massively important in marketing and sales. That's a whole nother conversation about context that, you know, if the experience is congruent all the way through, makes a massive shift in everything. You do a whole nother well to dig.

Yeah. No, I love it. Okay, so are we. We're still talking about a lawnmower, not a well digger.

Yeah.

So let's go now. Let's go to the average item price.

So that is about, you know, this is. You've just basically let us there beautifully, Mike, in that if you look professional, if you show beautiful before and after photos, if you have a nice presented, clean truck, you can boost Your prices by 10% tomorrow and you're fine.

No brainer.

Like that's a very simple one. It's Just if that congruency you can justify, maybe you can say, look, not only do I will I mow your lawn. Oh, do something else that's very cost effective to do. That doesn't really cost a lawnmower much to do, but actually has more impact and more value with the job you do. Like, you know, if you're selling information or if you're selling products, you can give some information to the. To the person. Doesn't cost you anything, but adds value. That's one way to do it. Maybe a bit harder in the lawnmower.

Kelsey, what's your lawnmower done like? Kelsey, she's not even participating anymore. Pete, what would be an example of a lawnmower doing something else, something additional?

So it could be as simple as giving some free fertilizer, saying, look, when I mow your lawn, I'll also fertilize the garden for you as well.

Okay.

Doesn't cost a lot more. But you buy your fertilizer in bulk. You just throw it on the lawn as you walk away. It just helps the grass look better and grow quicker, which means you have to come back and service it more anyway.

Gotcha. All right. Which kind of points to the items per sale. Right? So now you're starting to introduce variability. So you've increased the average price, but you're also saying, add more services within your suite of.

Yeah, well, this is exactly right. This is the perfect example. And it's something that's frustrated me just this week at home in that we have a lawnmower that comes and mows our lawn every week. And he does a good job. He comes, mows a lawn, and leaves. But at no point recently has he ever suggested, hey, your gutters are getting full. It's getting close to winter in Australia. You probably want to clean your gutters. If he said to me, hey, next time I come, I'm going to clean you gutters an extra 50 bucks, 20 bucks, I would just say, yeah, go for it.

Yeah, yeah. So. So he's got what's called a captive audience. But I got to give you a little pushback on this one, Pete. Could he. He could say, listen, your. Your driveway needs to be refinished. I could do that too. And he has a captive audience. But the challenge, of course, is he needs the equipment to do it. And now there's. There's inherent cost to that. So is there a point where you can go too diverse?

Yeah, I think so. There's this. This, you know, this people I've seen where they're getting really eclectic with it and go, well, look, all I do is mow lawns. All I have is a lawnmower. But Billy Bob, my brother in law, has a ladder so he can do the gutters and we split that.

Oh, there you go. Collaborative.

You can get creative, like that sort of stuff. Yeah, but you know, like from a lawnmower, it's like, okay, I mow your lawns. How about I fix your gutters? Or at least, you know, so you.

Have the lawn mower and the gutterer teaming up together.

Yeah. Or, you know, like, for example, like our pool on the weekend was just full of leaves. We had a bit of a windstorm here. Like if he actually suggested the previous time, let me weed around the pool and get rid of some of the, you know, the palm trees and the palm leaves and stuff. It's a very simple upsell for him to get extra items. You know, it's the most overused cliche in marketing. But where are your clients asking, would you like fries?

Okay, now, transactions per customer. So what I'm hearing is items per sale translates into more transactions per customer too.

But potentially to me, the way I look at it is transactions is another visit, another actual transaction. So adding more items to your shopping basket at the time of the first transaction is obviously items per sale. Getting people to come back and transact with you again is your transactions lever. For example, my old gardener at the old house we used to live at, I used to have to call him. The grass is past my knees. I can't see my son in the backyard anymore. When he goes out to play, I'd call him and get him to come back. Whereas the new gardener, he SMS me every three weeks saying, hey, you're probably due for lawn next week. Can I come on Tuesday? I reckon he does this. It always seems to be during the Bachelor, Married at First Sight or some other cheesy reality TV show. So I'm convinced it's his wife who sits on the couch during the ad breaks and SMS is on his behalf.

That's funny. The fact that you know that you're watching them too. Exactly. You're like, every time I'm watching the Bachelor, I'm getting sms. All right, we figured you out.

But that's the thing. It's like, how many businesses do that? I heard this crazy story recently where someone was going through this sort of model for the very first time and kind of measuring what they're currently doing and getting that pulse check like you mentioned before, and they realized like, yeah, we have this autoresponder in place that when someone buys from us, they get these emails over a 90 day period to come back and buy again. What they realize is their credit card actually had expired and that had been off for about six months.

Oh my gosh, are you kidding me?

Because they thought they were doing it, but because they weren't managing it regularly. That's the scenario. Another example is a retail store who did this, a bike store that I know. And it's actually also the example in the book Cadence in that he has email sequences based on whether you buy a bike for your kid, a triathlon racing bike, a commuting bike. And basically when someone comes to buy, he says to them, hey, I've got this little email sequence of tips of how to sort of get the most out of your racing bike or how to train your kid to get off the. What are they called? The balance bikes and the training wheels. That's the word. Yeah. And so people are like, yeah, great. And he puts them into an email sequence that's relevant to the product they buy. So that way they come back and go, oh, you know, you're a triathlon racer, you probably want to come and get some replacement tires or some racing slicks or whatever it might be. So it's educating people, but also at the same time giving a subtle sale.

Gotcha.

So that can work really, really well.

All right, take us on to the last and final margins. What do I do here as a lawnmower?

Well, from a margin perspective, it is about obviously just keeping your costs as low as possible and just living that profit first life. So that's kind of what I generally preach around your margins, is just negotiating stuff down really, really well and profit first.

You're the man. I serve profit first. This is amazing.

No, I think that's the sort of stuff you need to think about is how do you look after your margins? And the crazy thing is that if you actually look at all those random examples we gave each of those things, the lawnmower could probably do one of those a day for the next, let's say one a week for the next seven weeks. Let's say he's really lazy or really busy. One a week for the next seven weeks, he could implement. He can go down one afternoon, grab his nephew and sit in front of a MacBook for half an and print up a nice little flyer which can become his quote with some before and after photos, go down to Office Max or Staples and print out 100 of those next Week he could sit down with his niece and put in a very basic calendar system for SMS's. He could do a Google Ads ad listing the following week. Like some of these things can be done in a couple of hours and effectively, once they're in place and have given that 10% win and it's sustainable, he's doubled his business in seven weeks. Yeah.

I love it, Pete. I love it.

Doubled his profit in seven weeks in just like fundamentally, maybe 14 hours, two weeks per lever.

I love it, Pete. We got a roll. But where can people get your book? Learn more about seven levers, all that stuff.

Yeah. Cadence book dot com. It's available. Good books are sold. It's on audible, all that sort of good stuff. Kadencebook.com is probably the best place to start.

Okay, so we'll have that in the show notes. And Pete, hang tight because we're going to do some stuff. I want to have you back in just a few seconds when we do a little game together.

Sounds good.

You know what we did a long time ago, Kelsey? We did a game with Australian words.

I know.

Oh, you do that with us, right, Chuck?

And then Sparky nose was like mozzies, right?

Oh, what's it. What's the Australian term for mosquito, Pete?

Mozzie.

Mozzie. Good memory. It was mozzie.

Okay. Yeah. What about if I'm rooting for you?

If you're rooting for me like you're a fan of mine?

Yeah. That's not what happens in Australia.

No. Oh, God. What would be the word, Jeremy?

Cheerleader?

Cheery. Maybe a cheery.

Cheery. No, I'm saying the other way. What's. If I'm rooting for you in Australia, what am I doing for you? If you're rooting for me or doing to you.

You're usually beating me up because you guys are very physical.

It's more something you're doing in private.

Rutting root.

Nah, it's intimate times.

Intimate times.

Yeah, that's what rooting is.

Are you kidding me? Kelsey, you go right there. Kelsey. Oh, it's definitely rooting because I've been with a lot of Australians and it's always rooting. What's the word? We can't figure it out. They were famous.

Well, sex.

Sex. No, but if you're rooting for.

If you're rooting in Australia.

Oh, I understand what you're saying. It means you're having sex. And that's why Kelsey was so into. I get it all now. Okay, well, there you learn some Australian There, my friends.

Stress. Guys, come on.

We're pathetic. All right, in a second, we're gonna recap what we learned while Kelsey goes to some rooting, and then we're going to. What else are we gonna do?

Kelsey, we have listener mail and you have a tip.

And we're gonna thank our corporate partners. That's what you say. Okay. I just want to thank nextiva because I don't even know if Receipt Pank's a supporter for that anymore. We gotta look into that. Could you look into that, please? Okay. I just want to know. So I want to support nextiva. I want you to support nextiva. I just love nextiva. They're a voice over IP phone system, arguably the best in the west, if you consider the entire world the West. And Receipt bank is a efficiency tool. It's all about scanning in your receipts. We don't even know they're a sponsor of ours, but we still love them that much. I gotta interrupt the show just real quick. I mean, for something real special, because I'm telling you, you gotta be at the lifehack Summit this year. I wanna let you know about this amazing productivity event that I'm speaking at. It's all about driving your business forward and your lifestyle forward. 25 of the best thought leaders and me. So 25 of the best thought leaders and Mike and others are going to be speaking at this event. You can hear from all of them for free. I have a free ticket for you, and it's virtual, so you can listen in from your own home or workplace. Grab your free ticket now@lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. That was lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. The event's hosted by my friends Demir and Cary Bentley. And their speakers will provide so much value about increasing productivity, building systems for both your business and your life. Just optimizing your life overall. This year's coaches include experts like JJ Virgin, Michael Gerber, Chris Ducker. So many great people. And I snuck in there somehow too. So get your ticket for free on me. Go to lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. That's lifehackbootcamp.com Mike. All the dates, all the details are right there. I'll see you online. All right. Kels.

Yeah.

What are we doing now? Oh, what we learned today, right? What did you learn?

So I love when he said that context is super important, that the experience is congruent all throughout the customer's experience. Right. Like, I feel like that's so important. And I think when he said, like, use the opportunity to educate people, and it's like a subtle sell. I feel like that goes hand in hand. Right. It's again, you're creating that experience for them, and it's congruent and integral to you as a company. Right.

I like that. I like the subtle sale. I'm gonna go with Jeremy, and then you're gonna go, Jeremy. I like the 10% kind of rule that he had, like, everywhere. Just jumping up 10% because that seems so easy. Right. Then I also like the how you start is how you finish. I thought that was a great term. Like, you know, we talked about the mosquito truck down the driveway, down the road from my driveway, and they have, like, this beautiful truck, and it just set the stage for a great experience. So far, so good. But what was your takeaways?

Yeah.

Jeremy Smith.

You stole mine.

Jeremy Smythe.

It was. It so increased by 10. So what I took from that is you want to double your business. Break it into pieces. Don't. Don't, like, try and, you know, climb this giant mountain. Climb. Climb a couple hills.

Yeah. Don't climb a mountain. Climb and climb a couple hills.

Yeah.

I love it. You climb and climb. You climb and climb. What else you got there, Jeremy? Anything else?

No.

All right. Yeah. You messed up one word here, and Kelsey just jumps on you. The funny thing was, I thought was Kelsey's reaction to lawnmower. Hear that?

It's not funny. I don't.

You couldn't do it.

It was stupid enough.

No, because it was the con. It was the context.

Oh, I know. I know.

Yeah.

No, because when he's saying a lawnmower, he's saying a person that mows lawns, and she's thinking of the machine, and so she starts losing her mind. That's why I kept on bringing it up. Pete, Lawnmower. Because Kelsey could not stop laughing.

Sorry.

It's so dumb, you know, it's not dumb. It's just funny. You were making Pete last episode. I actually off air, I said instead of hoity toity, I said heidi tighty. She lost her mind so much. She was laughing so hard, her foot started kicking up in the air like she was in the rockettes or something. All right, here's the game we're gonna play. It's called name Pete. You're part of this too. Name the fake product. I'm gonna rattle off three products in no particular order. All of you are gonna get to vote individually on what the fake product is. Two of these are real products. One's a fake. Now just Be clear. I wrote the copy for each one. And I may have taken some poetic license, but the core product is the same. I've done this. So it's very hard to differentiate between the real and the fake. Does everyone understand the rules?

20 bucks he laughs at his own coffee within the first 30 seconds.

All right.

He's not going to.

No, he will.

No, I will. I will. Because it's so funny. Potato. See? Potato greeting. Spuds. That's the product. It's called Potato greeting Spuds. Let's be honest, cards are boring. Same old sayings chucked around. Same old cards thrown into the garbage. Want to stand out and send a card that will remember? Send a spud. Your potato greeting will be mailed with your saying hand painted onto the spud. You say it, we send it. Potatoes are not. This is funny. Potatoes are not suggested for consumption. Not suggested for consumption. We are limited to 50 characters. All right, that's. That's item number one. Item number two. Is the stash sealed? You know I need one of these. Sporting a 70s porn stache. Is that a great opening line? Sporting a 70s porn stache. Sick of getting food and other messes all over your mustache? Worry no more. The stache shield protects your upper lip with its stainless steel protector. Backed by science. No, Backed by science. You will collect less bacteria right below your schnoz. Plus your friends will never need to embarrass you by pointing to food stuck into. Stuck to your face. Caterpillar.

I feel like the stainless steel element can be used as a mirror just to clean your mustache at the end of it.

I know. Yeah, right. So you can build a mirror. Handcrafted In Sweden, over 130 backed this product on Kickstarter. And the last product, the last product is the Shock Smock. Nothing ruins a meal like dropping food on your clothing. Splatters of lasagna ruin your white shirt. Coffee drip on your new khaki pants, ruining your trousers forever. The solution isn't more and more napkins and running to the bathroom to desperately get out. That stain simply doesn't work. The shock smock trains you to eat properly. Anytime a food item drips.

Stop it.

Anytime a food item drips, drops or slops on your shock smock, a small pulse of electricity is applied to your neck, immediately correcting your behavior automatically, making you more care, a more careful eater. Finally, the problem is fixed at the source. With the shock smock, you will be eating properly and never again make a mess within just a few meals. Shockingly, we Guarantee it.

You're telling me two of these are real?

Yeah, two are real. So it's the potato greeting spuds, the stache shield, and. Or the shock smock. So, Pete, you're up first. Wayne, which one's the fake product? Two of these are truly real. No, Google.

I reckon I've heard of number one before. The potato thing. Okay, I reckon I've heard of that. I do know of a product called Pavlok, which is meant to be like a little wristwatch you wear that shocks you into good habits. But I'm not sure about a full smock, though. That's just a bit extreme.

He takes artistic license too.

Yeah, yeah, everyone has a little bit of artistic license. But. But the. The. The authentic. The product. The core product is there. Relax. The core process.

And I reckon. And I reckon the. The mustache thing. The. The saying, only 130 people. Saying 130 people back this on Kickstarter. Yeah, there's 130 idiots who just do it for a laugh. So I'm gonna go with number three. I'm gonna go with the shock.

I love your logic. I love your logic. Okay, so we got Pete for the shocks. Mock. He says it's the fake product. Kelsey, what do you think's the fake product?

I'm gonna go with the stash seal. I just.

Stash what seal?

Whatever it was.

Shield.

Shield.

Okay, okay. The stash shield.

It's hard to say logistically, I feel like I don't know how that works.

Doesn't your dad have a stash?

Yeah.

So how's he.

What does he do not have a stainless steel shield?

Does he put duct tape over it? Like, how's he maintained? Do you. No, I use a stash shield. Have you ever seen that? Your father.

But I have seen pieces of food, articles of food on your face.

On my face? You just did the one eye closed puke. Look, it's disgusting, right? I think there's nothing worse than food stuck in your beard or mustache. Right? Kelsey's chewing gum's flat. That's pretty disgusting. Kelsey has gum coming out of her face.

That gum's three hours old. I don't know how she's still chewing it.

Oh, my God.

I would say I think the mustache thing is fake because I actually think that the smock thing would be kind of fun for, like, college kids. Like, you know, like, pledging. Like, they put it on and then.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like that.

So then you have each other just throwing food at each other. Just the food fights.

Exactly. Yeah, exactly. And you'd be defending with your stash sealed. I wonder if you, like. If a food fight broke out, like someone's winging food at someone else and you have your stash shield on. If you dive across the room trying to block the food for someone else, I wonder. I wonder if that can happen.

That's the first thought that I had.

When you said that. Have you clowns ever watched Wonder Woman, how she, like, throws her wrist out and protects other people? You ever see that?

Yeah. Clown.

Yeah. Well, you clowns better learn from that. I want to see you in here tomorrow, Kelsey, with your stach shield on. You know, the real product is a potatoes greeting. Spuds. Both of you guys identified that, all three of you. It's. It is limited to 50 characters, but you can mail a potato and it. By the way, they put the stamp on the potato. Like, there's no box or anything. It's natural potato. The stash shield is a real product, clowns. Real product. It was on Kickstarter. It did get 130 people backing. And sells it. Yeah, go Google it. Yeah, yeah, go on there.

I just can't imagine how does it actually.

Stainless steel.

Yeah. S T A C H E S H I E L D. Google it. Google it. The fake product is a shock shmock. Say that sometimes. The shock smock. I invented that. And, Pete, you nailed it. So you win absolutely nothing. But at least you win.

Okay, well, if I was giving out the prize, I would be sending you a congratulatory kangaroo scrotum money pouch.

Oh, my God. That's awesome.

That's so perfect.

That is a real product.

You just pulled up this product, this real entrepreneurial product. Why don't you explain what you're looking at right now?

This is the most ridiculous thing. It looks like a strap that goes above the ears around the back of the head, and it's a piece of foam that contours under the nose and covers it. Seriously. Is the most ridiculous thing. Who backs this stuff?

How many backers?

130 people.

I don't know how many backers.

The stash sealed.

That's awful.

Dude. That's the definition of entrepreneurship. They can sell stuff. It's not even metal.

It looks like it's.

Well, there's a stainless steel version, too. The. The advanced version, I guess. All right, Kels, what do we got next?

Elevation Listener mail. Okay, so this comes from Brett. This comes from Brett Narloch. When I'm figuring out my real revenue, do I subtract my Debt service, principal and interest from the top line revenue or do I add that to my operating exp expense sale in the assessment?

Mr. Narloch, it's all about servicing that debt through the OPEX so you do not deduct out of your income. You have to realize that debt is an expense you incurred in the past but couldn't afford it, so you borrowed money. The only way to get out of debt is to make more money than you're spending, AKA be profitable. So service it out of your OPEX as best you can. When you take profit distributions, take 95 to 99% of that money to crush that debt. And the remaining 5 to 1% you take out as a profit distribution for yourself. So you serve it, service it out of the opex and you crush it with the profit. And then once it's all gone, then you got permanent profitability. Cool. What kind of. Does he have a lawnmower business? Okay. All right, Kelsey, we got one more thing. Yeah, My elevation point. We should get different music for that.

Like, I don't know, something elevating.

Yeah, yeah. Let's see if we can find something. Who do you surround yourself with? That's the big question. That's what I wanted to challenge you today. You know, I'm in that group called the 40 Year Forum. You probably know about it. Every Friday. Every Friday, Jeremy. I have a call with 10 other entrepreneurs and let me give you a sense of these people. One guy, one Iron Chef. Actually. You want to google him. Mark Tarbell, he won. He's one of like three or four people during that season of like 70 episodes ever to win Iron Chef stuff. Mark. He owns Tarbells in. In Phoenix or Scottsdale. The third partner in Burt's Bees name is Rob French. He was the investor into IT out of Canada, helped grow Burt's Bees, along with Roxanne and Bert, the founder of IT and other notable names that actually the guy who came in runner up as mayor for Vancouver, Ken Sim, just ran for. He's in my group. So it's this group of people that are really performing at the highest levels in their business and in their lives. And I'm in an accountability group with them. Did you look him up? Marcus Harbel?

Yeah. He's got a nice quaff of hair.

Oh, yeah, he's got real nice coif of hair, dude. He's got his own TV show. It's like a PBS show. It's his start broadcasting.

Yeah, I have to read about him.

He's amazing. That's where I found Caymus, the best wine ever. I gotta bring it in. Anyway. My question for you is, who are you surrounding yourself with every Friday when I have to report my accountability of what I've done for that week? In my business, and also for health, we have always different accountability metrics. If I don't deliver, I feel so inadequate. You know, this group is like, everyone gets the stuff done. So tonight, I'm gonna get home at seven. It's my last call. I have to go. I don't. I do not want to go for a run. I do not want to do it. I have to, because I know Friday the call's gonna come, and I'll be like, guys, I didn't do it. And the funny thing is, no one's like, oh, you didn't do it. You're a weakling. You're a sissy. It's not that. They're like, why didn't you do it? And they keep asking simply why? They start learning your story. And like, Mike, you know, it's the fourth time you had an excuse not to do it. You're just making excuses or you're. You're playing the role of a martyr or something like that. So it's the ultimate accountability. My challenge to you, my dear listening friends, is surround yourself with five other people that are playing at a higher level than you. And then the key, of course, the question is, why would they want you in the group? Start the freaking group. That's what I do. I just run the group. I'm trying to start a new group called the goodness group.

Oh, cool.

Yeah. I want to get Brene Brown. Yeah, Right. So I have big goals. Don Miller, who. Like, that guy's a lovely human being. Actually, the whole organization is. Bernay has no idea. I want to reach out to her. I have no idea how to contact her. But Brene, if you're listening, she's gonna.

Have a show on Netflix. Did you see that?

Did she?

Yeah, we're gonna have a show on.

Netflix because she has to invite me on that. She's my goodness group. And I'm trying to get more people of her and Don's caliber in the group. Don already committed. He's in talking more. Who's really successful.

Taki, you know, talking more. Yeah, he's Australian, of course.

Of course. Yeah. He may be joining in. So he really.

Well, super guy.

Yeah, he's a good. Yeah, he used to be a lawnmower.

Let it go.

That's when the joke dies right there. I I take jokes all the way to the death. All right, I think that's all we got, right?

Yeah, that's all we got.

Let's get the hell out of here, then. Kelsey, take us out.

Thanks, everybody. Don't forget to subscribe.

Is that it?

That's it.

Don't forget to subscribe, Rate and review. You can do it right now. You have your iPhone or smartphone. Go right to it. Give us a rating. Give us a comment, because obviously, we'll shout you out on air. And we want to hear your stories, too. Sometimes we bring on entrepreneurs that are, you know, struggling or successful. We want to hear their story. Oh, and we want you to visit mikemotorbike.com Jeremy's done a lot to really elevate our game on social media. But you guys sign up@mikemotorbike.com sign up, and we'll get you some great materials. Right, J Ball?

Yeah. If you got any business questions, send them to ask mikemcalowitz.com and we might feature them on the air.

Wonderful. All right, guys, let's get out of here.

Bye. Bye.

I love the guitar at the end.