How to make a living while you’re making a difference. A weekly show for independent professionals who want to go from six-figures to seven while increasing their impact on the world.
What Are The Odds Of Success As An Authority?
Why this is the wrong question to decide whether to enter the authority space—and what to ask instead.How your risk tolerance—and financial runway—impact your likelihood of achieving success in the short-term.Why an emotional connection to the revolution you’re leading gives you an authority advantage.How skills, timing and preparation (such as building an email list and/or a side hustle) will impact your success trajectory.The importance of maintaining your focus and discipline by consistently saying no to everything not in your zone.Quotables“I understand the desire for someone to want to know the percentage chance, but it just feels like the wrong question.”—JS“Your success definition is so pivotal to your odds—and there are so many possible ways to define success.”—RM“You try to decrease the odds of a loss and minimize the impact of a loss should that happen.”—JS“It makes sense to really think through your choices and the timeline because authority is a long game.”—RM“Be clear about who you want to help. That is really super useful and increases your odds of success.”—JS“You need to say no to a client who's not ideal, say no to working outside of your genius zone, say no to working crazy hours when your intention is to have a more manageable life.”—RM“I don't know how you could write a book (to build authority), if you weren't really into helping this audience or really into this particular rabbit hole.”—JS“Decide who you want to go after, decide what your revolution is and then you can figure out how to monetize it.”—RM
Why Editing = Thinking
How writing and speaking play different roles in crystalizing your thoughts.The role that consistently writing and editing plays in the evolution of your authority.Why (and how) editing allows you to deepen not only your market authority, but the impact of your work.What happens when you socialize your writing—and how to edit your way to the right audience.Quotables“The difference between writing and speaking is crystallizing your thoughts. I've never heard anybody say that speaking crystallizes their thoughts.”—JS“Writing is really a plus for introverts because you don't have to talk to a million people to do this.”—RM“Daily writing does something weird in your head where you start to see ideas everywhere.”—JS“You can't just try to put the work out there. You have to do it consistently because it's that consistency that really tests us: what do we have to say?”—RM“I did a sort of crowdsourced model where I offered a choose your own adventure discount structure. But (to get the book discount) I was gonna bug you relentlessly for questions, typos, any kind of feedback, comments...”—JS“I didn't know what else to write. I felt like I had bled out on the paper already.”—RM“I'll use examples from people who are in different places, probably almost never all in the same email, but I'll bring in examples or I'll ask for permission to reprint a question.”—JS“That preparation piece (for an interview) can give you those ideas—those unpolished gems—that you can then take and polish through editing.”—RM
You SHOULD Listen To This Episode
Why the word is both insidious and judgmental—and how it can easily become manipulative. What happens—especially to go-to, high visibility authorities—with those who consistently use ‘should’ in their client interactions (and what to say instead).How to use your point of view as an alternative to ‘should’ conversations or directives.Dealing with the most common ‘shoulds’ you’re likely to hear as you build your expertise business.The difference between saying ‘should’ to or about yourself and using it with other people.Quotables“Should is a radioactive word for me. It's usually a sign that I'm making massive assumptions about the other person.”—JS“It's way too easy to pontificate vs. actually help your client change whatever situation it is you've been hired to fix.”—RM“Stop should-ing on people.”—JS“We all know there's nuance—no two situations, no two people, no two clients are ever exactly the same.”—RM“Berklee teachers would never say that music has rules. They would say that different styles have different style practices.”—JS“If you're the type of person who responds to judgment and potential shaming…’should’ can make you start to question your own logic and thought process.”—RM“When someone gives you unsolicited ‘should’ advice, just nod and smile... and then ignore them.”—JS“The word ‘should’ is so insidious, cuz it's like you're trying to get into my brain and tell me what to do.”—RM
Working Out Your Business Model
What exactly is a business model (and how to think about yours)?The difference between your business model and how—and what—you charge.The four most common business models we see in the expertise space and how to make each one work for you.Considering hiring employees? How to think about growing with—and without—employees.Sidestepping the slippery slope that is hiring specialized help—from mini-me’s to social VAs—to grow your business.Quotables“How are you going to create, deliver and capture value?”—JS“If we're not creating value, we're not going to make money for very long.”—RM“You could use value pricing to increase the amount that you can charge and increase your profit margin.”—JS“If you do want to scale with employees…you have to create a job—actually define very specifically what this person will do.”—RM“’I'll just hire someone good and throw them to the wolves.’ That's what happens.”—JS“Membership models have some very specific operational kinds of things that impact how you market, how you sell, whether you do ads, whether you don't. ”—RM“A product line could take off and cause you to make a decision to say ‘oh, you know what? I would rather have customers than clients’ .”—JS“You think when you build a business (at least in the U.S.) that you have to have employees, but it's about thinking past what we're “supposed” to do and getting clear on what it is we want to build.”—RM
Your Summer 20
When doing more isn’t the right move—and how it can actually prove counter-productive.How to apply 20% thinking to your business growth moves.Using consistency in making outbound development calls (to prospects, media and your Authority Circle) to avoid the desperation zone.Becoming aware of where you’re getting your dopamine hits—and managing them.Why strategy trumps all (and what to do if you don’t have one).Quotables“You've done your 20% for the day that produces 80% of the result. So why are you sitting in front of your computer, fiddling with a hundred things that don't need to be done?”—RM“Watering your garden in the summer twice a day is a good thing. So watering it 20 times a day is even better, right?...it's worse than counterproductive—it'll actually wreck what you're doing.”—“The easiest way to get frustrated is to do more outbound sales calls when you don't have enough work…that translates into a little bit of desperation.”—RM“I care what those people (in my slack community) think much more than I care what some anonymous coward on Twitter thinks.”—JS“I try to be very careful of where I'm getting my dopamine hits.”—RM“You can slowly—not overnight probably—but you can make it so that client stuff is not 40 hours a week of billing hourly.”—JS“There's a signal that consistency gives—it doesn't mean that it has to be every Monday at 8:00 AM—but there is some expectation that you're going to show up…on a regular basis. It’s how we build trust.”—RM“I think some people put a level of effort into social media that probably doesn't produce much.”—JS“The prescription, if you don't have a strategy, is to get one right now.”—RM
When Your Partner Is Not On The Same Page
Why having partners with different risk tolerances can actually be helpful.Engaging the status quo person—who is usually happy—in a change that will work for both parties.The role of identity in business conflicts and how to understand yours and your partner’s.Why resolving even minor conflict often means revisiting your joint objectives and strategy.How to be brave and address potential conflicts early so they don’t fester or run you off the rails.Quotables“Plenty of soloists have a spouse that has a dramatically different risk tolerance than they do.”—JS“(Being different), you keep each other from going too far off the rails, but it does mean that there's the potential for disagreement, for conflict.”—RM“The status quo person is usually happy as a clam, and thinking... ‘if my partner would just stop bugging me about posting on social media every day everything would be fine.’”—JS“It's also about how we feel individually. Who we are and what we want to have happen in the world. When you have two business partners, your personal identity may get attached to different things in different ways.”—RM“You'll see conflict over a proposal crop up because, let's say, one person is more revenue driven and the other person is more mission driven. In a case like this, you're never gonna be able to agree how to price it.”—JS“There's a lot of those strategic and foundational identity things that happen (between partners) and the tactical issues are just how they manifest.”—RM“You might both be aligned on the objective, but you still have to agree on the strategy. There are probably multiple strategies that could work, but you gotta make sure you're both using the same one.”—JS“It's important to go back and look at the strategy, the glue that holds this partnership together. We have to be able to talk about that and be brave.”—RM
Clients Are Not Your Boss
Rethinking any outmoded belief systems we carry over from our jobs—for example that the “boss” is always right.Where we owe our obligation and allegiance when it comes to dealing with client requests and direction changes.Why collaborative relationships reinforce the value of your expertise and contribute to outcomes that stick.How you can determine—as early as a sales conversation—whether your potential client will be your dream (or your nightmare).Setting boundaries to avoid becoming a martyr to the project (or your client).Quotables“You are there to fiercely defend the outcome of the project.”—JS“The way that a client feels when they own this thing that you've created together, it creates a bond between you. They're gonna want to talk about you. They're gonna wanna bring you in again…it's really powerful collaboration.”—RM“It happens from the very beginning—setting up the expectation that they're not your boss, that it's a collaboration.”—JS“A client can be the nightmare or the dream. It's not about the person—it's about the match between you and the outcome you want to create together.”—RM“When you have them share with you how this will fit into the overall business and you pivot into The Why Conversation, bad clients will hate it and good clients will love it.”—JS“You only want to work with people for whom you can create these transformational outcomes together.”—RM“Just imagine what your business would look like if you were producing a trail of smiling clients.”—JS“Start with believing that you have something valuable to offer and setting the boundaries you need so you don't become a martyr to the project.”—RM
How To Conference
The role of live speaking in building authority and how it fits into your business model.How to decide which conferences are worth your time, energy (and cash) to attend.An array of tactics to leverage your conference attendance.Using media intentionally to engage conference attendees and make your new relationships more sticky.Picking the right conferences as a new(ish) speaker and how to ensure your investment will pay off.Quotables“I did a conference in 2015 that was exactly my target market for Hourly Billing Is Nuts, and I still keep in touch with people I met there.”—JS“If you're doing conferences—whether you're speaking or attending—there's a certain amount of energy you have to put into it to be good, much less to be great and to reap something from your investment.”—RM“Meeting people in person creates a deeper connection faster.”—JS“If you travel 1,000 miles and then sit in your hotel room for most of the conference that's not gonna work.”—RM“Let's say there's a big conference coming up and your ideal buyers are going to be there. You can piggyback a workshop on the day before. You don't even need a ticket to the conference—you can just get a room in the hotel.”—JS“When you're a speaker at a conference, you know what your job is…When you're an attendee, you still have a job, but not everybody recognizes that.”—RM“Speaking at a conference is great for your street cred. It's social proof aka third party endorsement from the conference organizers, implicity saying that you know what you're talking about.”—JS“If you're just getting started (speaking), pick a conference that is big enough so that you feel like it's worth your time, but small enough so that you have a good chance of getting in.”—RM
The Economy: What To Do Now
Why it’s always a good idea to keep evaluating your client base and your product/service ladder—and what to consider now.How to think about economy-fueled pivots to ensure you don’t make fear-based moves.Managing your mindset (and your nerves) through economic change—and why staying closely connected to clients helps all of you.One hidden opportunity to grow your authority (and potentially your business) during economic uncertainty.Quotables“The kind of—almost advantage—of news about a recession or whatever is that you've got months potentially to plan for it.”—JS“The strategic part of this is to really think about your client base and start to imagine what might happen to them in the future.”—RM“If you're experiencing any kind of like trepidation or nerves around the economy right now, guess what? Your clients probably are too.”—JS“There sometimes needs to be a little air between checking in on clients to see how they're doing and offering them a new product.”—RM“I think that the key here is resisting the urge to go into your shell and batten down the hatches.”—JS“If your client base is all saying the same thing (when you check in with them), you're getting some themes to write about and speak about.”—RM“It's okay to be nervous, just don't act on the nerves.”—JS“It’s really important to manage your own mindset vs. letting the media do it for you.”—RM
How To Conduct A “Listening Tour”
Why—and under what circumstances—you might want to consider a listening tour.How to choose who to interview and increase your chances for getting a yes.Uncovering specific belief systems and comments that you can incorporate into your sales copy.The one question that will get your interviewees to go deeper in sharing their experiences.Why avoiding any sort of persuasion is critical (and how to stay in listening mode).Quotables“It’s an ideal gig when you can basically package and sell your expertise.”—RM“There's something about writing, actual writing, not typing, that focuses me more on the conversation.”—JS“My marketing copy came out of the mouths of the women that I interviewed.”—RM“There's just something magical about unfiltered input from the buyers’ side of the table.”—JS“You really have to look at this as a listening tour—not a selling tour, not even a warm-up-to-buy tour.”—RM“Obviously this whole episode is to encourage listeners to do this…but it's also about how you're going to communicate the offer in a way that the right people will recognize that it's for them.”—JS“I looked at my job (on the listening tour) as “tell me more”. How do you think about that? What made you think that way?”—RM“You don't want to be too rigid in your thinking and then go out and try and validate that, because it'll turn persuasive and that'll just be gross.”—JS
Dealing With Critics
The difference between getting critiqued by your email list, social media types and your intimates.How to think about criticism from your circle and use it to benefit the revolution you’re leading.When to unplug or take steps to protect your mental health.Deciding whether your critics are coming for you (to be helpful) or at you (to tear you down a peg).When receiving criticism can be a form of deep care (and how to keep the right kind coming).Quotables“I think people (critics), are a little bit more thoughtful in email than social media.”—JS“Just breathe. Walk away from the keyboard...”—RM“When somebody on my list sends me one of these sort of polite pushback kinds of things, they're usually right.”—JS“I have unfollowed and blocked (social media critics) for my mental health because I don't need somebody who's just gonna go around trolling.”—RM“Where do you get your canary in the coal mine when you actually are wrong, or you actually have too shallow of an understanding of something that's much deeper?”—JS“I can feel if they (critics) are coming for me or at me—and I take critical feedback really well from the people that I know are for me.”—RM“You have to consider the messenger. When someone on my list pushes back, I'm like ‘this feedback is totally valid because you are the person I made it for.’” —JS“It's so valuable to have somebody tell you when you're doing something that they perceive differently than you do.”—RM
How We Roll
Just as we have each built our own systems to produce our desired outcomes, there is no one perfect model of working.Conscious experimenting—with your ultimate vision firmly in mind—will help you master how to best invest your business building time.Why when you find your sweet-spot, “work” doesn’t have to feel like work.How pivoting from serving clients day-to-day to high-level advisory or teaching (books, courses, speaking) shifts how you spend your time.Quotables“I don't think about it consciously on a weekly basis. It's something I think about at the beginning of the year..what's going to be my strategy for the coming year?”—JS“What happens for a lot of people is we get caught in the weeds. Like how am I going to get through this week with client deliverable X?”—RM“Did you hear what my schedule looks like? I don't need a vacation.”—JS“I want work to be fun.”—RM“Slack is my social media…I know that it's not going to be a cesspool of doom scrolling.”—JS“When you're doing what you love, you can do it for as long as you want to.”—RM“Podcasting became much more important because it serves a similar purpose to speaking at conferences. They're not exactly the same of course, but bang for the buck wise, podcasting is a lot more my speed these days.”—JS“Who do you want to give pride of place in your head to…what is it that you want to write about and talk about and teach them?”—RM
Why You Want To Create First
Why the intersection of idle time, an outlet and a deadline is exactly what you need to build content for your expertise business (and authority for you).The importance of mindset and how to keep yours working FOR you as you go about growing your business.Giving yourself some guardrails to develop great content efficiently—without putting a damper on your creativity.How to get out of your own way so you can release your personal genius for other people to benefit from.Quotables“It's pretty common for non-business things to creep in to business coaching and become obstacles. And a lot of them have to do with internal monologue stories.”—JS“We all have our own internal hurdles to leap over. And you have to understand what those are.”—RM“I feel a lot worse after I've been exposed to a TV for 90 minutes.”—JS“When you have a deadline and some idle time or some free space in your brain, things happen.”—RM“If you want to be recognized as the go-to person, as the expert for your area of expertise, then you need to be producing content. It’s probably a great rule of thumb to be producing content regularly.”—JS“You're not just writing to write or have a podcast to hear yourself talk. It's about figuring out what you want to share. How are you going to get your audience to the transformations that you promise?”—RM“The best thing about daily writing is it makes you better. It makes you smarter. It makes your insights deeper. It differentiates you because you have new ideas or old ideas framed in radically new ways.“— JS“The important thing is that we get out of our own way as much as we can and put that genius that each of us have out in the world for other people to benefit from.”—RM
Using Today’s Profits For Tomorrow’s Legacy with Erica Goode
The big money decisions you’ll want to make early and how to decide between setting up a sole proprietorship, an LLC or a Sub S.When does it make sense to build processes to handle things like paying yourself and funding and paying taxes?What to ask your CPA and why you don’t want to wait till year-end to get advice.When to look for longer-term, perhaps tax-advantaged opportunities for savings.How to think of and use your business profits now to build your desired legacy later on.Quotables“Usually the starting point is a sole proprietorship and you don't want to hang out there too long.”—EG“If you can't pay yourself what the IRS calls “reasonable compensation”…it's not time for you to be an S-corp yet.”—EG“I'm really big on paying yourself a consistent salary—not necessarily varying with your revenue stream—because with consultants, expertise businesses, coaching businesses, you get these roller coaster spikes of revenue.”—EG“Get a small refund or maybe owe a little bit…but we try to always avoid these four or five figure surprises that you're writing a check for in April.”—EG“There's a lot of relationships with CPAs where you're just sending them a packet of documents in February, and they're sending you back something in April, and you're either happy about it or sad about it.”—EG“My preference, especially for somebody in an expertise business where they're a soloist, would be to look at a solo 401k. You can only have a solo 401k if you and or your spouse are the only employees or owners of the business.”—EG“You say: ‘I can use this to change my trajectory or my lifestyle or my retirement plan. I could use this money I'm making in this business. And the more profit I make means that I could pay off my mortgage sooner.’”—EG“It's always good to have an out of tax season conversation with a CPA… And have somebody respond with ideas that you would have never thought of (or would have taken a lot of hours of research for you to get).”—EG“If you've noticed that you've acquired two more cars, a four Wheeler, three campers and a boat, it's probably time to start thinking about some tax advantageous ways that you can spend your money.”—EGLINKSErica Goode, CPA Erica’s Newsletter sign-up
Is Hourly Billing Really Nuts?
When you’re working like a dog (earning maybe $100-$250K billing hourly on a site like Upwork or from an agency or two) without real positioning—and you’re ready for a more livable alternative.When you’ve just left corporate life and are first hanging out your shingle as a freelancer or consultant.When you’re so new at your craft that you’re actually not that good yet.And even where we could make an edge case for hourly billing, we get hyper-specific on when/how to gracefully transition out.Quotables“They like the promise of not feeling like they're losing $200 an hour when they're on vacation.”—JS“Just go back to your source of leads…and significantly increase your hourly rate.”—RM “Why would anyone feel obligated to pay you some amount of money per hour because you decided to have a really expensive lifestyle?”—JS“It's a very rare person who comes right out of corporate and says ‘I'm going to do productized services. Here's what they are. Boom. Let's go’.”—RM“I don't think it never makes sense to think about how many hours something's going to take you to do, just don't base your prices on it.”—JS“Hourly rates just exacerbate that inner discussion about whether or not you're worth it.”—RM“Productized services make it easier for you to hit a home run, to deliver positive ROI, to get a great testimonial.”—JS“Offering productized services gets rid of a lot of extraneous BS because you are hyper-focused on delivering only the things that you are really good at delivering.”—RM