Your Sales Pipeline Starts With This Framework

Something happened on a call today that made me realize that I needed to make this video immediately. I was talking to a group of potential partners through a business development strategy that I've used for years now. I've been walking them through it and I shared this. I've shared this many times on summits, on stages, on workshops over the years and with hundreds of clients all over the world. And someone said to me, "Hey, I've never heard that before. That's genius." And I thought, "Oh, if someone at that level of business hadn't encountered this yet or hadn't heard me speak on stage about it, well then, needs to be on YouTube immediately, like today. So that's what we're doing today. I'm going to walk you through my 3P monetization strategy, the framework that completely changed how I think about every single conversation that I have in business. And by the end of this video, I think it's going to change how you see yours as well. So here's what I see constantly in the world of expert entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants, and service professionals. They're building complex funnels. They're designing elaborate ascension ladders. They're automating, or at least trying to automate everything, optimizing everything, trying to engineer that perfect system to attract clients on autopilot. And look, I'm not against systems. Systems are essential. But here's what often gets lost in all of that complexity. The most powerful business development tool you have is a conversation, not a funnel. Not a lead magnet, not a perfectly optimized ad campaign. A conversation. And most entrepreneurs are walking into conversations completely blind with no lens, no framework, no idea how to recognize the opportunity that's sitting right in front of them. They walk in thinking about what they can sell, and that's the first mistake because the entrepreneurs who are consistently building high trust High-value businesses, the ones who seem to always be in the right rooms, on the right stages, with the right partners. They're not selling, they're serving first, and they're seeing every conversation through a specific lens. And that lens is the 3P framework. The 3P monetization strategy is built on a simple but powerful premise. Every conversation you have whether it's at a networking event, on a business cruise, which we're big fans of here, through a podcast interview, on a Zoom call, or even a casual coffee chat, has the potential to lead to one of three outcomes. And those three outcomes are patrons, partners, platforms. Let me break each one down. Patrons. These are your clients, the people who will ultimately invest in your products, your programs, your services. A patron conversation is one where you sense, and it could even be early on, that this person has a problem that solve, and the relationship has the potential to move in that direction. Partners— this is where it gets really interesting. A partner conversation is one that has the potential to lead to a strategic alliance, a referral partnership, a content collaboration, a joint venture, a business partnership. The range here is enormous. Some of my most valuable business relationships started as what appeared to be a casual conversation, but through the 3P lens, I recognized the partnership potential immediately. Platforms. These are your stages. A platform conversation is one that could lead to a speaking opportunity. Could be on a podcast, at a live event, on an online summit, at a conference, in a mastermind. If you're an expert who wants to build visibility and authority, platforms are gold and they're everywhere if you know how to spot them. Now here's the important nuance. One conversation can lead to more than one P over the course of time. Someone who starts as a partner might eventually become a patron. A podcast host who gives you a platform might become a strategic partner. The categories are not rigid. They're a starting lens, not necessarily the final verdict. Now, before I go any further, I wanna talk about the mindset that makes this whole framework actually work, because without it, the 3P strategy is just a categorization exercise. The mindset is this: service first. Always. When I walk into any conversation, regardless of which P I think it might be, I'm not thinking about what I can get. I'm thinking about what I can give. What insight can I offer this person who's taken time out to speak with me? What introduction could I make that would genuinely help them? What opportunity could I open up for them? How can I edify them, make them feel seen, valued, and understood? Because the 3P strategy is not a sales strategy. This is a relationship strategy. And the reason it works so powerfully for business development is that people can feel the difference. They can feel that energy between someone who's trying to push and sell something to them to someone who's genuinely there because they want to help them. When you lead with service, trust builds faster, doors open more readily, and the right opportunities—whether patrons, partners, or platforms—they emerge naturally from the quality of the relationship that you've built. The 3P Framework gives you the awareness. The service-first mindset gives you the energy that makes people want to lean in, want to say yes. Now, I want to layer this in with something that pairs beautifully with the 3P Framework, and that's the concept I call conversations as currency. Not all conversations are the same. In my world, there are 5 types of conversations that drive business development. Now, I just happen to have done a full video on this, which I'll link around this video. But when you map those 5 conversation types onto the 3P framework, something really powerful happens. You stop treating every conversation the same way. You start showing up differently depending on the context, and you start recognizing which conversations deserve more of your attention and energy. Now, here's where the 3P strategy gets even more powerful when you pair it with what I call the 3 Question Framework. So see, we're layering on here. I learned this from my business partner Tom Mattson, who learned it from Jared Yellen, and it's elegantly simple. I love it. I use it all the time. In any conversation, you move through 3 types of questions. Again, I've produced a video on it, which I'll link around this video. But this framework does 2 things simultaneously. First, it gives you everything you need to understand who this person is and what they need. Secondly, and this is really the key, it gives you the information to identify which P this conversation is most likely to lead to. If someone's future is aligned with what you offer, they might be a patron. If someone's future involves building something complementary to what you do, they might be a partner. If someone's future involves building an audience or community, they might be a platform. And when you combine it with the 3P strategy, you go from just having random conversations to having intentional business development conversations every single time. And it's a game changer. The whole system links together like this. The 3 Question Framework helps you listen better. Conversations as Currency helps you show up appropriately. And the 3P Lens helps you recognize and act on the opportunity in front of you. Now, once you start seeing conversations through the 3P Lens, you're, you're going to have a lot of them, right? And you're going to need somewhere to track them. And now this is where technology comes in. GoHighLevel becomes an incredibly powerful tool in this system. Or the CRM that you use. For us, it's JHL, and you can build out what's called an opportunities pipeline. I'd encourage you to build 3 of them, one for patrons, one for partners, and yes, you guessed it, one for platforms. Every person you have a meaningful conversation with gets added to the appropriate pipeline. You track where the relationship is, what the next step is, and what follow-up is needed. Plus, you can make notes on your calls there too. And here's where it gets really smart. You can set up automations inside GHL so that when someone books on your calendar, a workflow automatically triggers on their contact record. A follow-up sequence starts, a task gets created, the relationship gets managed even when you're not actively even thinking about it. That's the system working for you, and that's what leverage looks like. Now, if you want to try GoHighLevel, if you don't already have a CRM and you build out— you want to build out a 3P pipeline, my link to the 30-day trial is in the description below, and you can take advantage of that. So now I want to zoom out for a moment because this is really bigger than a framework. What the 3P Monetization Strategy really does is this: it trains you to see opportunity everywhere. Most entrepreneurs are just walking past patrons, partners, and platforms every single day without even knowing it because they haven't been given a lens to see them through. The person you sat next to at that conference last year could have been a platform. The podcast host who interviewed you 6 months ago Could have been a partner. Maybe the person who's been following your content for 2 years now could be your next patron. Opportunities, they're not scarce, they're abundant. You've just been looking for them likely in the wrong places, or worse yet, not looking at all. Start looking at every conversation through the 3P lens. Lead with service, ask the right questions, and then do something with what you learn. That's how you build a business on relationships. I'd encourage you to book a 7-figure diagnostic call with me if this resonated with you at all. It's a working session where we identify the specific points where your business is still dependent on you and map out your exact path to a scalable, system-driven model. The link is in the description below. And be sure to check out my videos I mentioned earlier on Conversations as Currency and the 3 Question Framework. Both of those videos are linked below this one. Together with the 3P Strategy, they form a complete business development system that you can start using immediately. And drop a comment below. Which P do you think most of your current conversations are leading to? Patron, partner, or platform?