A three-level roadmap to build a $1 million business by 2026: start by picking a target market and creating a unique, expensive product; then acquire customers through four lead channels and increase their lifetime value; finally, stay focused on one channel and offer until you hit the goal.
If I woke up with $0 tomorrow and wanted to become a millionaire, here's what I would do in 2026. So step 1, I determine these 3 things. Number 1, knowledge, what you know. Number 2, skills, what you know how to do. And number 3, environment, which is the things that influence your behavior, which is who and what you surround yourself with. Step 2, decide who to sell. I like to choose one of the 3 Ps: something painful you came out of, something that you're passionate about, or some profession that you just got out of that you can do for yourself. Your target avatar should hit these 4 boxes. Step 3, choose what to sell. Make sure the product or service is what I call unique, expensive, sticky air. So you unique in that only you can do it, no one else can. Expensive in that you can charge way more than it costs you to deliver it. Sticky in that customers want to keep buying it again and again and again. And air in that it's infinitely scalable. Level 2: Scale. So step 1: Get them to buy. There's 4 core ways you can get people to find out about the stuff you sell. Choose one of them, and eventually in the future you could group these 4 types of people to get leads and customers for you. Step 2: Get them to give you money. Easiest way to start: help people for free, get them results, get testimonials, and then ask the next people to pay. To close any sale, use the Closer Framework. After you get paying customers, move to step 3, increase how much every customer is worth. These are the 8 main ways you can do this. Step 4, scale with people. At a certain point, you need to hire people outside of yourself who have experience in things you don't know how to do. Now, there are 5 main reasons people don't know how to do their job. Solve the how with the 3 Ds. Step 5, build on the 3 pillars of business: acquisition, so marketing and sales; delivery, fulfillment, customer service. That's all the front-facing stuff. And then you have the third pillar, back office, the operations, finance, legal, payroll, HR, recruiting, that kind of stuff. Level 3, keep your advantage. Step 1, understand leverage. Leverage is how much you get per unit of work or effort. So here's some different forms. Step 2: Don't interrupt compounding. Ignore shiny opportunities, what I call the woman in the red dress. Pick one channel, one offer, one avatar, and don't change anything until you get to $1 million. Ignore everything else. Step 3: Keep getting better. Do lots, get feedback, compare, find what winners have that losers don't, apply that across content, ads, sales calls, customers, everything. Step 4: Treat your goals like a relationship. How much do you love your goal? What are you willing to give up in order to keep it? Outlier outcomes often require outliers Was?
