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What if you could get more of what you want in life? But not through pushing, forcing, or pressure.
You can.
When it comes to money, time, and energy, no one’s gonna turn away more.
And Kate Northrup, Bestselling Author of Money: A Love Story and Do Less and host of Plenty, is here to help you expand your capacity to receive all of the best.
As a Money Empowerment OG who’s been at it for nearly 2 decades, Kate’s the abundance-oriented best friend you may not even know you’ve always needed.
Pull up a chair every week with top thought leaders, luminaries, and adventurers to learn how to have more abundance with ease.
If I really wanna do this, I have to honor the struggle that I'm going through. I can't try to get somewhere without being where I am because it's like that paradox. The only way you go through it faster is, like, boy, going in it at least one day, this will make a good story for other people.
Speaker 2:This is an incredibly important episode with my dear friend, James Wedmore, who a couple of years ago took me and Mike under his wing and coached us to our first 7 figure launch and onwards to a few more multi 7 figure launches. And what I love about the way James teaches is he is incredibly spiritually aligned, deeply grounded, and unbelievably generous. He weaves in timeless wisdom, not only timeless marketing wisdom, but also timeless spiritual wisdom and universal principles into the way he runs his 8 figure online business. He is, I think, the best online business teacher that I know of, And I'm so excited for this episode because it's really timely in the age of rapid technology innovation and AI advancements to ground ourselves in the things that will be true five hundred years from now and that were true five hundred years ago. So we do get into what's working now in digital marketing and in online businesses for coaches and experts and course creators, but we also get into what's gonna work forever, whether we're selling face to face or we're selling via hologram.
Speaker 2:And James took his business. He's had many, many quantum leaps. One of them was from 2,000,000 one year to 10,000,000 the next, and he never looked back from 8 figures after that. And he is a man who prioritizes freedom and joy and fun, and I've had the absolute pleasure of getting to know his new wife, Jenny, incredibly well, as well. She's become a dear friend of mine, and I just am so deeply aligned with the way they live.
Speaker 2:I personally don't wanna learn anything about business from someone who doesn't have the kind of lifestyle that I want to live. And, these guys are deeply values aligned with us. So listen in to James Wedmore and my conversation. Enjoy. Welcome to Plenty, a weekly recalibration of power, money, and safety for high capacity humans.
Speaker 2:I'm Kate Northrup, best selling author and creator of Relaxed Money, and this is where neuroscience meets ancient wisdom meets real wealth strategy. This is the sacred conversation at the intersection of money, the body, and the life you're truly here to live. If you're ready to reimagine what's possible for yourself and for the world, you're in the right place. Let's go. Hi, James.
Speaker 2:Hi, Kate. Welcome to my show at your set.
Speaker 1:Thank you. This is great. I love what you've done with the place.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Do you really like this cassette tape here?
Speaker 1:Yeah. This is really great.
Speaker 2:For those on audio, James has a life size giant well, not life size. Enormous size
Speaker 1:This is beyond life size. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Cassette tape, for his show. James Yeah. We're gonna start here. K. You recently came and spoke at Relax Money Live, and our people loved you.
Speaker 2:And one of the things that you said is that folks with an online business of the nature that we have digital products, whatever, should have a where I'm just like starting we're just like going right in.
Speaker 1:I see that.
Speaker 2:She's Of a
Speaker 1:Not even ask how I'm how I'm doing. No.
Speaker 2:There's no warm up. So when Mike and I used to run our podcast together, it's called the Kate and Mike show, genius, he would always wanna just like start on the up the episode with like we would shoot the shit, and he wanted to like talk about all this random stuff, and I was always like, let's just get right to it.
Speaker 1:Skip the small
Speaker 2:And he would always be like, oh, that was abrupt and abrasive. So anyway
Speaker 1:No. I like that.
Speaker 2:I I'm just we're going right in.
Speaker 1:So Dive in. Deep end.
Speaker 2:You said Yes. For people who are making, what, 30 k or more in an online product business 40. Okay. 40. Thank you.
Speaker 2:40, k, we should be having a 50% profitability margin. Yeah. Now, I'm gonna explain all of that. We're gonna give a little context.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:One thing, when you said that on my stage, I felt I was like, because last year we came in at 38%, but then you clarified
Speaker 1:I did.
Speaker 2:And said, if you were to remove the expenses that you run through your business because they're tax deductions, but actually they're things that you would spend money on otherwise Yes. Then it's I at the 50
Speaker 1:said three things.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:So that's the first thing. Is I said, I would only calculate that on true operating expenses.
Speaker 2:Sure. Right. You must spend this money in order to make
Speaker 1:the money. So if I went and I wanted to hire you as my coach, I don't need you for my business to run, even though
Speaker 2:Are you sure?
Speaker 1:Well, I'm saying to run as is. No. I mean, but you could help me and that could be, oh, for my I did that for my business and that could help my business, but that's not an operating expense. Right. So what you and again, I'm not the CPA, so what a CPA would say you write off doesn't mean that means it is an operating expense.
Speaker 1:So what you tell the government your profit margin is, doesn't mean that is what your profit margin is. That's the first thing. The second thing I said is that we have to look at it, there's a variable in there which is, are you including what you pay yourself? And that can become the weird variable because people keep asking me, it's like, well how much do you pay yourself and why are you paying yourself that much or that little? And that's a piece of it and we can get into that if you want.
Speaker 1:Then the a third thing conversation. It's like
Speaker 2:But I I will give you
Speaker 1:because people are like, well, deserve 1,000,000 a year. That's my salary. I'm like, okay. But You should okay. Anyway.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So that's not an operating expense that you just decide to pay yourself a million dollars. Right? So it depends on, like you should bake in a healthy amount of paying yourself, but Yeah. What that number is matters.
Speaker 1:Number three, the moment you start changing the model, so that I'm talking purely digital, then you have to change the profit margin. So that profit margin is what I would advocate for, and can only advocate for for a digital product based business. Right. You do events. So when you do events, you have venues, you have the Food and beverage.
Speaker 1:Not just the food and beverage, the staff you have to bring in.
Speaker 2:Right, the tech.
Speaker 1:And then just paying for their food and food and beverage. Carceral room
Speaker 2:to be met through you.
Speaker 1:Exactly. So that all adds up. Someone cannot sit here and say I should have the same profit margins if I run an event business as if I sell a membership on the internet.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So those things have to be taken in account. Now why I said 40, is because and I broke it down, I created a little report on this.
Speaker 2:I downloaded it.
Speaker 1:Okay,
Speaker 2:great. I haven't watched or read the whole Read
Speaker 1:it, it's readable, not watchable.
Speaker 2:Well that's good, because I actually something about me is I will never watch a video, So if you send me Oh, a video, you'll never watch I'm a reader or I a
Speaker 1:love that. Anyway. But I broke down, was like, you know, it depends on how aggressive somebody wants to get. But you if someone says I wanna create a membership today, or I wanna, you know, an online coaching program, there's not many fixed expenses that you really need to make that happen.
Speaker 2:Right. Right.
Speaker 1:So
Speaker 2:And what I find Yeah. Is that so, you know, you work with entrepreneurs with businesses of all sizes, but you get in there with your people in the mastermind for sure. So you're you're privy up close and personal to quite a few businesses and then many in next level as well. Mhmm. So I find that maybe it's just the people I know, but I find that in general, massively overspend
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And have very little profit to show at the end of the year. Now I was super proud of our 38% profit margin that did include all the things. So I'm sure it's closer to 50 if we actually did a separate set of books. But I'm curious, what are some of the things you've literally just asked me this exact same question.
Speaker 1:I'm stealing my my interview questions.
Speaker 2:Wanna ask it anyway, and then you stole it from my head. So Oh my gosh. Okay.
Speaker 1:You stole it from my head. It was in the ethers.
Speaker 2:It was in the and you took it. There you go. Question is Yeah. When you get in there with people around the way they're operating their business, what do you see as the most like flagrantly obvious ways that entrepreneurs are overspending that are just not necessary?
Speaker 1:And and I wanna say this, first of all, not being the CPA at all. A CPA may encourage you for tax purposes Sure. To write off more stuff.
Speaker 2:That's a different
Speaker 1:a different conversation. If they're like, yo, you're gonna pay a ton of taxes. And then you're like, oh, so maybe I should join that mastermind and I
Speaker 2:We bought a whole house
Speaker 1:And can I
Speaker 2:to minimize our taxes?
Speaker 1:Right. And like, yeah, maybe I need a new drone. Maybe I need a new camera.
Speaker 2:A truck.
Speaker 1:Right. Exactly. And it's like that's but you need you need to just know that. You need to know what you're doing versus like where would
Speaker 2:it go? Is Tax a separate conversation for a separate
Speaker 1:is but people have collapsed it. And they go, well my CPA did my numbers and here's my profit. And it's like, that's after all your write offs. Not operating expenses, So what are the most flagrant expenses? This is interesting because I asked you this question because I stole it from your brain, and my answer is the exact same as yours.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:It really is.
Speaker 2:James?
Speaker 1:It James. I feel like I feel like this is about to be a really smart answer
Speaker 2:You for stole the question from my head, and I stole
Speaker 1:the answer from me. But I have the proof of this because it's in the report you didn't read. The number the number one thing is the and I'm gonna go ahead and say it in a derogatory, the over priced underwhelming freelancer or marketing agency. That's the first that's the first one. Yep.
Speaker 1:I could argue and argue and argue on this. I'll die on this hill because it happened to me, and I've I've seen it happen to so many other people. But here's the thing, If you are in the business that I'm helping people build, which is a business around you are a personal brand, and you're offering some sort of community coaching content expertise, what people don't understand is what will determine whether your business makes money or not. I'm not talking about the keeping it yet, but makes the money or not, all comes down to sales and marketing. This is 80% sales and marketing.
Speaker 1:Anyone who
Speaker 2:says if you're just good at your stuff, people will buy it.
Speaker 1:That is a lie. Those are broke
Speaker 2:they gonna know to
Speaker 1:buy it?
Speaker 2:How would
Speaker 1:they know? Part of what we need to do is show people the importance of of what we do. And that's our role is to communicate the value. So if you just wanna I'll just wait for people to figure that out on your own. You're gonna be waiting for another year before you hear this episode again, then maybe you'll click it.
Speaker 1:So 80% is the most conservative percentage I could give to the importance marketing needs to be given into our business. So your business will depend on that and you want to outsource that. You are a marketing business and you wanna outsource it to somebody. They will gladly take your money. The majority of people come to me with the horror stories of where someone promised a huge, you know, we'll we'll do all this for you, and it didn't happen.
Speaker 1:And then you still got to pay them because they did work. And it's like, well, we did the work. It didn't work, but we did the work. And that's what they're stuck with. So I always tell people like, if you're gonna be in this industry, you better and by the way, noticed the correlation and you're on this vein too, whether you agree with it or not, you are, is the people that I can always tell are gonna be successful, they love marketing.
Speaker 2:I'm obsessed.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I'm obsessed. I can tell.
Speaker 2:Eat, breathe Yes. Sleep.
Speaker 1:What is your definition of marketing, by the way, that would have you Like love it so what is it to you?
Speaker 2:Well, it's human psychology.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:I love people I love figuring out what makes people do things. So to me that's marketing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. To me marketing is using not just words, but primarily words to connect with other people. Yeah. When you can connect with it's so fun.
Speaker 2:Well, it's also and then you get the direct result.
Speaker 1:Exactly. You can see it every day.
Speaker 2:Deeply satisfying. You can
Speaker 1:do 10 posts on Instagram today, and you can figure out which one of those posts based on the hook and the content people are interested in. Which one has them watch? Which one has them engage? Which one has them leave, etcetera? And I'll tell you right now, anybody who's in this space where they say they they hate marketing, don't wanna do marketing, I don't wanna figure out messaging, I don't wanna do all this stuff, you will fail.
Speaker 1:I would bet against you. That's how how clear I am that you will fail. And then those people will double down and say, no, I'm gonna hire the marketing agency. And I'm like, I just doubled down on my bet against you. Now you will fail even faster because they just took the money that you barely had because you haven't done the marketing yourself, and they're gonna leave you high and dry.
Speaker 1:And that happens, I would say eighty to ninety percent of the cases is that's the situation. So that's the that's the biggest thing. Now the next thing that comes up is what is always the biggest expense in a business, which is a derivative of what I just brought up, but it's still worth noting as something different. And that is humans. Team.
Speaker 1:Team, payroll, whatever. So I I do count that as something different because Yes. It is. You could hire a freelancer to create a marketing campaign versus you could hire a full time employee, and those are just they're different. So payroll will always be our biggest expense in our business.
Speaker 1:You know, there's caveats. Obviously, if you're spending a ton of ads on marketing, Facebook ads or something like that for your marketing, okay, that's great. That's a good thing. But it's other than
Speaker 2:As long as they're converting.
Speaker 1:As long as they're converting. But other than that, like an ad the way I look at ads, by the way, and I and I categorize this in the report of like, we need to understand that there's different types of expenses. And the quicker you understand those different types of expenses, like, the quicker you can get on spending money. So spending money is a skill. Right?
Speaker 1:But if I'm spending money on ads, what I'm buying is a in this example is a lead or a visitor or a customer. So on a per unit basis, it can be really cheap. I could be buying a lead. I might have spent a thousand dollars last week, but maybe I bought a lead for just $5. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:I just bought a 100 of them or whatever the math is on that. Right? So I'm just buying it for $5. I just bought it multiple times versus a person, you're all of a sudden, you're buying an hour of their time, and I hear the time, the rate that people are giving to people, and I like my jaw hits the floor. So I get a lot of flack on the internet for years, people have just called me the worst things and just said the nasty stuff to me because I've always supported getting a virtual assistant and getting a VA.
Speaker 1:I've used a website called onlinejobs.ph, they're Filipino VAs, for fifteen years now. We're still with those original VAs. They're like family to us. They're incredible. They're like just, they were integral to my startup and my success.
Speaker 1:And people have all their noise and stuff. I if that's you, that's great. Hold on to it. And then you can go do what I see other people do, which is hire the $75 an hour part time assistant down the street or in the next state over to check your email. And in six months you can send me a DM crying because your VA makes more money than you and now you're going under.
Speaker 1:So I don't make the rules. I don't pretend to, but I know how the rules are, and I play by the rules of the game. Yeah. And people are hiring the wrong people at the wrong rates in the wrong roles at the wrong times. And I have watched people see what I've done.
Speaker 1:Because I say building a team is the most powerful thing you can do for business. Because great businesses are built by great teams, but a great team needs a great leader. But when I tell people, go, until you're at 500,000 in annual revenue in a digital product based business, I don't want you to have a single person beyond a VA from The Philippines because they're gonna be because of the exchange rate and the the US dollar apparently still has some weight in the world. It is the, you know, the global reserve currency that the US dollar goes further there. And it's, you know, takes a lot of Filipino pesos to make a dollar.
Speaker 1:So we're talking 3 to $6 an hour. Anybody can afford that. Yeah. And if you say, I can't afford 3 to $6 an hour, it's no shade, no disrespect. You should not be starting a business right now.
Speaker 1:I think there's a thing that people don't understand about business, and I I hate to be the bearer of bad news. I feel like that's who I always am to your community. It's like you're like you're like regulating your nervous system and then I go take a shit all over it for a moment. But it's because like sometimes I you have to like shake the truth into people. Yes.
Speaker 1:And today, everybody wants a business. And if you ask people, do you want a business? They all say yes. But if you ask the more important question, but do you want to be a business owner? It's like, oh.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And, that's a different question. Right? And the very nature of of like an employee and the luxury of being an employee is if I go work for you today and you hire me, I doubt you would. But if I did get the job, even if I have no training, first day on the job, I am paid right there.
Speaker 1:Right then and there. Right. Probably not in Kate's world, but in someone else's world, I'd be like, I wouldn't get the raise. I'd be at the same rate maybe two or three years down the road. Even as I've gotten better, maybe I get a little promotion raise over time.
Speaker 1:But that's cool. In business, people wanna just start business today and expect that they get paid today too. And it's like, if you want a mechanism or vehicle that has infinite earning potential, then you have to get the inverse of that, which is when you start,
Speaker 2:you have to be willing
Speaker 1:to do it for nothing. Yeah. And so that's like understanding that you're building something that starts at zero so that it gets to something. And I think there's people and it's definitely a certain brain type that they get so fixated on the here and now that they're in the like growing phase of a business that they're like, this is must be how it's always gonna be. It's like, it's hard so that means it always is gonna be hard.
Speaker 1:And we have a lot of people that are like, I have a business and it doesn't pay for my lifestyle. It's making good money but it's not enough for me. I'm like, well, the metaphor I use is if you grew up on a farm and you had kids and you had a three year old, if the three year old isn't gonna be able to contribute back to the farm very much, maybe she can feed the chickens in the morning, but she can't do much else than that. One day in the future when she's old enough, she will be able to contribute far more to the farm than she can right now. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And you have to give that time. And that's the same with your business. So the the 40 k, 50% profit margin is to really encourage people to say, look at the health of your business, not from a number that you get to take home, but from a percentage.
Speaker 2:It's so important for us to train Yes. Brain to see percentages underneath the numbers.
Speaker 1:Because if you, if someone came to me and they said, problem is James, I only made $10,000 in my business last year. I don't know if that's good or bad. Right. Because if you only did 20,000 in sales and it was your first year see context matters. It's a So you didn't give me any context.
Speaker 1:I go, you just had a 50% profit margin on a business that you went from zero to 20 k in your first year. It's one years old. A year ago you had zero, and now you have 20,000, which is 200000000% increase from zero. Yeah. And you're at 50% profit.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And they go, yeah, but I can't live off of 10,000. It's like, yeah. No shit. No one can Right.
Speaker 1:In this country, but you're building something. And what if next year you maintain that 50% profit margin and you double the business? I still can't live off of that. And I go, so you can't think three to five years out? I've been doing this for twenty years.
Speaker 1:Give it five.
Speaker 2:Well, we know the whole famous marshmallow experiment back to
Speaker 1:Oh, psychology, right? Kids who
Speaker 2:could not resist the marshmallow, and who knows the But validity of it and the instant gratification. And so I'm curious, you were talking about earlier when we were on your podcast about, which I didn't know. I knew that like the beginning years were rough and took a while. I didn't know specifically that you did five years launching nine different things
Speaker 1:And made nothing.
Speaker 2:None of
Speaker 1:which weren't Less I would make less than 20 k a year, and that was doing side jobs, like bartending gigs.
Speaker 2:So how did you what do you think it was about you that had you I mean, you're stubborn, so we know that part. Yeah. But, like, how did you keep going when the vast majority of people would have just been like, well, this doesn't work? So And if someone's listening who's in that place,
Speaker 1:what do you wanna say to them? Yeah. So it's a couple things. It's three things happen. Number one, when I found that this world existed, I was like, it was synonymous to that moment when pure imagination plays in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and the doors open
Speaker 2:Come with me.
Speaker 1:And you'll be in a state of pure imagination.
Speaker 2:And you're like, I'm in this world.
Speaker 1:I and like first of all, that's my favorite song. It's so you
Speaker 2:are Willy Wonka.
Speaker 1:Yes, I am. And I'm the kids. I am both. You just it depends on the day. I really wanted a chocolate factory.
Speaker 1:No, really. Like my real dream is to create like my own like kids toys line. Like I want I've always wanted to do something for kids. I I have a
Speaker 2:Which is fine.
Speaker 1:I love kids. Like, I don't know if I'd wanna kids books. I wanna do like a lot. Like, I wanna have my own Pokemon and like Ninja Turtles. That was my dream as a kid.
Speaker 1:Like, wanna create I would play with Ninja Turtles. I'm like, I want to make my own world of Ninja Turtles. I just thought something like that was so cool. Anyways, this is a close second, you know, digital It's digital like same z, it's the How same
Speaker 2:did you find out that this world exists?
Speaker 1:So I started a bartending business and I gotta still answer that question.
Speaker 2:I know. I'm coming back.
Speaker 1:No no no, it's okay. Okay. Don't let me forget. But I started a bartending business because I looked for a job, became a bartender because I was like, I should get a job. So I became a bartender.
Speaker 1:And the only reason I became a bartender because I was because I liked the idea that if I worked harder, I could make more. I was always like, I liked I was like, I'm not I don't want a job because I don't want my income capped.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So I become a bartender, was like, this sucks. And so I just had this idea of like, what if I just did this for people so I could get more gigs? And I started building this bartending business, and I went and I was like, wow, all of a sudden I'm a business, and I went to Barnes and Noble one night with $80 in my bank account, and I sat down in the business section for hours and just read the business books. And I've I bought one of them because I didn't have the money. So I bought one, and it was Dan Kennedy's No BS Business Success.
Speaker 1:That book changed my life. Chapter one, he describes the difference between a business owner and entrepreneur, and it was like, it it spoke to my soul and it stirred something awake in me, I go, I'm an entrepreneur. So I kept reading his stuff. And I went to my first business event, Nashville, Tennessee Uh-huh. At the Gaylord whatever hotel Yes.
Speaker 1:Opera House, whatever.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Or whatever it's called. Opera Land. There it is. There it is. With my father, it makes me emotional every time I say it.
Speaker 1:Sat in the back of the room with my dad. I had no idea this world I was entering, and he just nudges me and he goes points on the stage, goes one day that's gonna meet you up there. And I I like I freaked out. I was like, it better not be. I'm I I don't want to be in front of people.
Speaker 1:I don't want to be seen like I it's I got a panic attack from him saying that'll be you on a stage one day. Wow. So that's where I started. And by November 2000 and so that was that same year. And in November 2007, I had an idea.
Speaker 1:And the idea was this simple thought and it's like one thought can change your life. And usually it's when those thoughts have this like what if in front of it, right? And I said, what if I could make more money teaching people to bartend than actually bartending? And about an hour later, I registered the domain bartendforprofit.com and that was the DVD I just showed you. I was like, look at this.
Speaker 1:That was that's how it started.
Speaker 2:So 2007.
Speaker 1:2007, I made my
Speaker 2:Major early adopter.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah. I was in it. I was at the beginning. So 04/18/2008, I made my very first sale. It was very funny too because it said new order place, and I freaked the out because I didn't have any money and I'm like someone stole my credit card and bought something because it just said new order place.
Speaker 1:I thought someone bought something with my credit card and it's sending me because I've never seen a sale before. And then I look and I'm
Speaker 2:show up?
Speaker 1:Because it's showing
Speaker 2:wrong column credits for Devin.
Speaker 1:Yes. I'm so confused and it's showing like Susie Jenkins in San Antonio, Texas. It's like, did she and then it says bartend for profit $1.97. I was like,
Speaker 2:yeah.
Speaker 1:It's still one of the greatest days of my life next to marrying my my twin flame. Mhmm. And that that moment forever changed my life. Now I kept trying to sell that, but now we're in 2008. And I couldn't do more than like a sale every ten days.
Speaker 1:It So was enough to this is getting back to your question. It was enough to keep me going, but it wasn't working. And I had this moment where I had two moments that were really pivotal, where I went to an event, I would go to these mark I went to 15 marketing events over that next year. By 2009, I'd gone to 15 in one year. I remember meeting this guy, couldn't tell you his name.
Speaker 1:I wanna say it starts with a c like Corey or something like that. I remember he lived in Oregon, and I saw him at another marketing event about ninety days later. And everyone when they'd meet up at these events, you see the same people and they go, what's new? And everyone had something new to share. And this guy from the time I'd seen him till now had sold his truck, took the money, built a piece of software and made like a $100,000.
Speaker 1:And then he asked me, what have you been up to? And I had no answer. I went home and I called my girlfriend at the time and I said, I'm done. I give up. That was Jen.
Speaker 1:And she somehow, which when I make my mind up, it's very hard to change it. Somehow, she's the only person that can get me to change my mind. She convinced me to keep trying. And I did, but I it wasn't gonna pop anytime soon. And I was met with more and more struggles and frustrations.
Speaker 1:Here's the turning point. Because the turning point which people just don't understand yet, is the turning point happens within first. So the lowest of low for me was when I had been doing all this work. I mean, I I got I got addicted to Adderall. Just just like a legal form of speed.
Speaker 1:I dropped down to a 145. So right now I'm like one seventy eight. So if you can see me at one forty, one forty two, I looked like a skeleton. I didn't eat. I didn't leave my house.
Speaker 1:I would work fourteen hours a day and I had nothing to show for. I was still making less than 20,000 a year, but I, and then I did that for years. So 02/2010 comes by and into 2011 and I'm working and I'm working and work. I'm trying to get something to work and my computer crashes. Like just breaks.
Speaker 1:Like I overworked my computer and it was just gone. Like it just shut off wouldn't turn on. It was done. I was so angry. I was so livid.
Speaker 1:I was so, like, at my wits end. I was like, the only thing that's, like, I have that is gonna give me access to all this, and it's gone. I don't have the money for a computer. I'm toast. I go outside like I wanna scream, and I didn't just because I'm like, the neighbors are gonna call the
Speaker 2:cops.
Speaker 1:Because like the anger inside of me, the frustration, this is four years of trying to do this was so intense. And I said one thought to myself and it's again, it's one of these little things. This is one thought. And it was so weird because when the thought comes from with you within you, it's like you give it more credence. And I give my younger self so much credit here because I was I was young, I was naive, I was impatient.
Speaker 1:I had way too much of the male ego energy, but I had this one thought and it said at least one day this will make a good story for other people. And as soon as I heard myself say that I said, wait, one day? Does that mean one day this will be different? And it gave me enough hope to just keep going. And I would just latch onto that and going like, and what I would starting to learn was I was saying, if I really wanna do this, I have to honor the struggle that I'm going through.
Speaker 1:I can't try to get somewhere without being where I am because this too will be something I can help others with. Now today, Kate, there hasn't been a single thing that someone brings to me that I don't pull from a Rolodex of the personal lived experiences in my life. In fact, even when I went through, like I've been sued and extorted by nasty person, and then I went through a divorce. So I've had these big, unique, uncomfortable experiences in my life. I went back to that same thing.
Speaker 1:I said, someday I'll be able to help somebody with this. This is no joke. It happened with both of these. The day after the, lawsuit thing ended, someone in my community, in my mastermind goes, someone's trying to sue me. I'm freaking out.
Speaker 1:What do I do? I said, I got you. You know? And then since then I've had people go through nasty divorces and stuff like that. And it's like, I gotcha.
Speaker 1:Not from a legal standpoint, but from the emotional like
Speaker 2:Of course.
Speaker 1:How to guide this, where to keep your attention and stuff like that. And I got to like see that we all have to go on the hero's journey to come back and you just have to see. And now today I teach that as I I say, if you understand the hero's journey, then you just have to understand where you are on that journey. And if we're trying to like circumvent it, skip it, or bypass it, then you're just gonna learn a single lesson, which is that you have to go through it. And that's just it.
Speaker 1:And the only way it's it is the Chinese finger trap because it's like that paradox. The only way you go through it faster is like boy going in it and like deal with it faster. Let it like what prolongs our growth is our unwillingness to It's the avoidance. Surrender, to let go, and to learn the lesson. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So you avoid it, you're holding on to it. Right. You know, you're resisting the lesson that's in front of you. You're resisting the battle. You're resisting looking at your your expenses, right?
Speaker 1:And it's like you don't get to pass go or collect $200. I look at business like a game. It is a game, but it's like a video game with levels. And it's like you don't get to get to the final boss or beat the game until you can beat the level that you're at. And we're all facing a battle right now.
Speaker 1:Every single person listening has a battle. Now you might not be facing it, you might be turning your back to it. You might be ignoring it, but you still have that next battle. And one of the things that my spiritual mentor said, which I think is the most like beautiful profound things, is one of the things he said. I'll say two things that he said that are connected.
Speaker 1:He said, what a pity. What a pity that most people will only face one battle their entire lives. And that really changes the frame of saying like, well you chose business. So you chose a it's like choosing an AP class in school. It's like, why'd you do that?
Speaker 1:It's like, well, it's harder, but it's gonna give it's gonna open more doors of opportunity. So it's like, that's why you chose business. It's harder but it opens more doors of opportunity. So you wanna play in the big leagues or you wanna play flag football on the weekend. That's your choice.
Speaker 1:But if you choose, if you choose that stop resisting what you remember that you chose that. The other thing he said is he goes everything that's still is a chinga for us. You can Google what that means. A problem or a challenge, you know, anything is a problem is something that is a place in which we are still not free. We're still hooked by that and the goal in life is to become free.
Speaker 1:And so each one of those problems or battles is a blessing. It's a gift to say, look, this is where I'm still hooked by this. This is where I'm still giving my power away. This is where I'm still affected by this. And this, what a beautiful blessing to look at this, learn from this, and and let this go.
Speaker 1:I notice, as you've noticed, when we learn those lessons, that's when we get to the next level.
Speaker 2:Yeah. A 100%. And they're uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:Do require
Speaker 2:feeling things that we didn't prefer to feel. And there's actually tremendous freedom in that. Like seeing what you're made of and going
Speaker 1:Because when you see what you're made
Speaker 2:of as opposed to trying to run away from it.
Speaker 1:Yes. When you see what you're made of, you're discovering more of who you truly are. And I believe that's a huge piece of what we're here to do is learn more about who we are. Like wake up the dormant potential within us. Totally.
Speaker 1:You don't do that. Like, the metaphors of, like, the boat that never leaves the dock, you know? Right. It's like, you don't do that at shore. You do that out at sea.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Right.
Speaker 1:And that's
Speaker 2:There's like another quote that I'm totally gonna butcher, but it's something about, like, staying, you know, at the dock, but boats aren't made.
Speaker 1:They're made for out of sea. Yeah. It's that one. That one. Chat GPT.
Speaker 1:I'll
Speaker 2:find out what it is later.
Speaker 1:Help us.
Speaker 2:Okay. I'm I'm taking a hard left. Sort of. But it's, you know, it's we were talking about how you got like, how you stayed for five years when it wasn't working. You know, I have a friend who I actually met for breakfast the morning of your wedding, and he has a brand new his debut novel out.
Speaker 2:It's called How the Story Goes. His name is Andrew Forrester.
Speaker 1:I'm plugging his novel because How the story goes.
Speaker 2:I'm obsessed with it. Right? It's a really good novel. It's a
Speaker 1:good title.
Speaker 2:Andrew wrote and sat with me the morning of your wedding over breakfast and told me the story of writing like 14 or 15 manuscripts.
Speaker 1:Different manuscripts.
Speaker 2:Completely different books. Completely different books. None of which got published, and now he's got his first book out. Yep. And I'm just, like, feeling the parallels in that and the inspiration of when you have this dream, when you know, like, knew.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Your dad knew. Yeah. Which is a really beautiful story. I've never heard that story before. I love that story so much.
Speaker 2:You know, your dad saw something in you, and there was a part of you that knew that this was your path, and so you were able to stick with it. And I think that that's the difference between doing the thing that we think we should do or doing the thing that somebody else wants us to do and doing the thing that we were born to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay. You clearly are doing what you were born to do. And I'm curious, as someone who's been around
Speaker 1:I'm not making toys, so I'm not. Okay. The next best thing. Okay. You know, could still do it in my lifetime.
Speaker 1:I'm I'm I mean like I'm young.
Speaker 2:Oh, 100%. You're not even halfway done.
Speaker 1:No. No. I'm not.
Speaker 2:You were young. Yeah. Okay. I wanna know, you've been at this since 2007. You made your first 400 k in 2011, right, with Video Traffic Academy.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay? So I would say that was the year, like, things got traction, significant traction. Yeah. And actually, thanks to Video Traffic Academy, that's how we know you.
Speaker 1:That's right. That's right.
Speaker 2:And so now here we are. It's 2026. And, you know, people were making a big hullabaloo about our mutual friend, Amy Porterfield, shutting down her program, Digital Course Academy, and, like, saying, oh, digital courses are dead. Whatever. I'm like, oh my god.
Speaker 2:Leave Amy alone. Let her just, like, live. And then just different you know, people love to say, you know, digital programs are done. Things are changing in the industry. I just wanna know.
Speaker 2:What do you see right now in 2026 in terms of our industry, the trends, what we should be paying attention to, how we might wanna adjust our offerings or our marketing to timely and current Yeah. And on track for the world as it is today and where we're going.
Speaker 1:So I'm gonna start by saying I'm not as nice and sweet as Kate, so if people just want nice and sweet they should skip this episode. Because people are stupid and they say stupid. You put them in a group on social media and they say the stupidest of Okay? So here's the first thing because I'm not a trans person. Right.
Speaker 1:However, I am a futurist. I do see where things are going. I've been saying this and it's on record. I said it in 2018 And people are maybe starting to listen now. So I'm gonna say a couple things.
Speaker 1:The first thing is I say, if you are trying to sell courses or whatever, and you wanna have your opinion about courses, you're already dead. You're failed. Because we are not in the course business. We are in the transformation producing result getting problem removal business. Period.
Speaker 1:That's the business I've always been in. Now, if I look into my sea of audience and they're all floating three feet off the ground and glowing beautiful golden light, then I can smile and say, there's no more work to be done.
Speaker 2:Now I'm gonna start a garden.
Speaker 1:And now I'm gonna learn to garden or make toys for kids. Action figures. My own Star Wars. Okay? Until then Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like here's the here's like so people need to pull their heads out their cabezas out of their patookies. And that's my new version of it. Cabezas out of your patookie. And you need to see if you look out in your audience, are people hurting? Yes.
Speaker 1:Are people struggling? Yes. So what are you gonna do about it? Are you gonna complain and go something's dead? No.
Speaker 1:People are hurting. And I talk to people all the time. And I made a post about this. People are struggling more so than ever right now in all the ways. There's reasons behind all that.
Speaker 1:So the future belongs to those that see that clearly. And my father always said, I don't think he coined this, he would just always say it to me. He goes, James, this is probably like Pythagoras or something like this. The shortest distance between two points is always a straight line. So our role is to be the straight line for an individual.
Speaker 1:The shortest distance between where they are and where they need to be, let's give them the line. I don't care what the line is. Is the line gonna be maybe one day it's a hologram video of me. Maybe it's me talking to them on the phone. Maybe it's giving them a pep talk.
Speaker 1:Maybe it is online video. It does not matter. It's what is the shortest distance, the most efficient, effective, and powerful way that I can help that person. And as long as people have problems, they will always be in need for a solution. Period.
Speaker 1:So people are too fixating and attached on something versus understanding
Speaker 2:Right. They're fixated and attached on the medium that the transformation is happening through, not the transformation. The transformation business will never die. Yep. Has been going Yep.
Speaker 2:Since ancient times. Yep. Right? I don't know exactly what form it took at that time, but it for sure existed.
Speaker 1:And the reality is is that a lot of people do not have results, and someone listening, if you're in this business that I that I teach, being a coach, a course creator, a membership site in a group, whatever it is, what I'd say today is I go, look, you're not building a course business, you're building a brand, and you monetize that brand through one of many channels by selling an offer. Here's the thing, and this is what makes me nervous for humanity. They're losing day by day, they're losing or blinding themselves or forgetting the importance of learning. And more and more people just want the end result without education, without learning, without practice, without the experience, the consistency they want. It's the instant gratification nation and with nothing in between.
Speaker 1:And those five years of struggle, we can go back to that and say, I saw that's why I'm so good at what I do today because I logged the hours. I did the reps, I got the ten thousand hours and I saw myself getting better. I was like, this is getting better. I'm improving. People today don't even wanna do a rep.
Speaker 1:Yeah. They don't even wanna practice, let alone learn. So I will always take a stand to say people need education and they need to be learning if they want to produce a new set of actions or results. So there will also always be a massive need for education. The problem we're in with AI, and this is what I said in 2018, I said content itself is becoming a commodity.
Speaker 1:Now what is a commodity? It's very simple. A commodity is any item that exists where if two or more of them exist, there is very little differentiation between the two. If you sell gold and I sell gold, which of our gold is better? It's the same.
Speaker 1:Right? So why And what would make yours better? Because it's like got a picture of Kate on it or something. Right?
Speaker 2:Because it's been blessed.
Speaker 1:It's been blessed. So now she's taking the commodity and she's like, I'm gonna make this like unique. Right? But if it didn't if it wasn't blessed, it would just be commodity. Now I'm not saying it's just gold.
Speaker 1:It's like gold's awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Gold's awesome.
Speaker 1:You should have bought it five years ago, guys. I told you. But well, told some people. So not in my show.
Speaker 2:You weren't on this show.
Speaker 1:Not on this show. Just realized. I'm in my studio, would say, come on, oh wait. Confusing.
Speaker 2:It is confusing.
Speaker 1:Never mind. But that so bananas. You go to two banana stands at the farmer's market, and if both bananas are ripe and they're don't panic, they're both organic. Which
Speaker 2:Don't panic, they're both organic.
Speaker 1:Which banana do you buy?
Speaker 2:The one from the person I like better.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Exactly. Because the bananas are the same. Right?
Speaker 2:Is that not where you were going?
Speaker 1:It's not where I'm going. Oh, okay. No no no. But it's true. It's true.
Speaker 1:But so what I'm getting at is a commodity is anything where like I can't tell the difference between the two. And so when people created a business where they go, my business is gatekeeping a commodity, the perception of the public is saying, can just get this content elsewhere. All AI has done is two things. Number one, it's accelerated the commoditization of content.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And number two, by doing that, it's given people this falsehood of saying, I no longer need to educate myself. The point of any type of content is education. Yeah. And education is so that people think the right way and do the right things. Because what we're stuck in is a lot of people that don't have results.
Speaker 1:And people, if you don't have the results you want, it's for two it's one of two reasons, misconceptions and mistakes. A misconception is a mistake of the mind, a mistake is a mistake of action. It's a mistaking. So the reason you're taking mistakes, misconceptions is because you don't have the right knowledge, education, or tools. So that'll always exist, but the perception of it may change.
Speaker 1:Right? Now people then freaked out about things like ChatGPT and stuff. ChatGPT is in the information business. And if you're trying to be in the information business, yeah, you are like in trouble when you are in the transformation, which ChatGPT is not. Mm-mm.
Speaker 1:Okay? It's not in the it does not sit in there going like, I actually want you to learn this and get this and master this and I want you to see change in your life. It's just gonna give you information. Right. So that's what I've been saying since 2018 is content is quickly becoming a commodity.
Speaker 1:What you wanna look at is all the ways in which we transcend content. The straight line is what is the fastest, quickest, most efficient ways in all the ways that I can be of value and assistance to solve problems for other people. And if you remain in that business, you don't have to be flighty. That's why I say everyone's all stupid because they all freak out every six months, something's different, and they freak out and they flip their business over. I've never done that.
Speaker 1:I've never had to do that because I'm very clear on the North Star. The North Star is who are you here to help and what are they struggling with. And how you help them a little bit or how you communicate out of you might change a little. Yeah. But that's the 5%.
Speaker 1:Right. Right? And that's where I'm always gonna see it going. And I've talked to people constantly and ironically over the past eighteen months, and I said this in a post, people are more lost, more confused today as business new entrepreneurs and business owners I ever have. So they're actually being misled in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1:And I'm like, more people for me to help. Yeah. That's all I see. And obviously, what what people didn't said is like a lot of people have just gotten a lot of fear. Fear is a frequency.
Speaker 1:It's just gonna it's your worst adviser. It's gonna take you down, and it's gonna repel people. So don't do that.
Speaker 2:Amazing. Okay. So when you were at my event and you were talking about profit margins
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I started I just was like, wait. I really wanna work on my profit margins. And then I was like, how are we gonna do that? I will say we've increased them every year, you know, like, consecutively, which is great. And you said something to me, and it was great.
Speaker 2:And you were like, don't get mad at me for what I'm about to say. And I was like, okay. Probably won't. Probably won't. I have yet to I have yet to get mad at you in our friendship, so we'll see.
Speaker 2:But you said, you know, your so we did it was a record launch for us last year. So the two last well, actually, every launch has gotten better and better, which is great. So whatever record meets our own record. Right? Like, we're always just like, I'm racing myself.
Speaker 2:And so it was great. We did multiple seven figures in the launch. Phenomenal. So excited. And you pointed out, you were like, and also, the truth is, Kate, like that launch, while the numbers were very impressive because we did have huge success and a lot of leads and
Speaker 1:a lot I of enrollments remember this.
Speaker 2:You said, and also it did convert at sub industry standards. So this was the perfect example of, like, I was the opposite of some of your students. So some of your students are like, I only made $10, da da da, but you look behind the scenes, and their launch was freaking like, you know
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:A $150 earnings per lead or something. It converted at, like, 10%. Like, that's incredible.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And if you're if you're new to the online business space, I promise you these numbers will start to make sense. So please don't get too caught up in, like, the the jargon. But mine performed well, but it wasn't, like, record breaking in terms of conversion rates. Yeah. And you said, and this is why you're so good at what you do.
Speaker 2:You were like, if you had the same amount of leads Mhmm. You did all the same things next year with your with your promotion, which at the time of this recording, we have not done the promotion. By the time this recording is live, it will have finished. So I'm just putting into the field today
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:That I am so excited to increase those conversion rates because we've we've done really well. Yeah. And I know that we can squeeze more juice
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Out of the lemon without working harder. So doing the same amount of things. Right? Yeah. The same number of things, putting in the same effort, more juice.
Speaker 2:So I'm curious when someone's looking to improve the so they're doing the same promotion. Right? It's like a webinar or it's a three day workshop or it's a challenge or it's a whatever. What are some of the levers levers levers, if you're British, it's levers.
Speaker 1:Let's leave that behind.
Speaker 2:If you're I rode up here with a British friend, and we were talking about
Speaker 1:Yeah. What are levers?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Levers. So what are my levers for improving my British people don't wear pantaloons. It's 2026. Anyway, what are some of the levers that people
Speaker 1:can Cancel pull by all the To British contingencies.
Speaker 2:To increase your conversion rate so that Yeah. You can get more juice.
Speaker 1:And it's funny that you said the word levers. Because I was gonna say that's the most important thing is understanding. I think people don't get that because they still have this employee mindset. Where like, employee mindset is like, do you even have any levers? It's like, work, don't work.
Speaker 1:Get paid. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Unless you're on some sort of commission structure. Right.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Like the traditional like salaried employee. So there is like so many different level levers. Gosh. Now I'm on it.
Speaker 1:Confusing. The levers. Levels have different levers.
Speaker 2:Levels of levers.
Speaker 1:There's levels of levers. And and yeah, you over time, like and I think something I'm really proud of for myself number one before I answer that is I know my business inside and out. You have to get to that place. And then because I know my business inside and out, I'm really good at like getting into somebody else's business and intimately knowing it as well pretty quickly and be like, what I'm looking at is the the real phenomenon of law of diminishing returns, which is like you are reaching a point of law of diminishing returns if you only have so much effort and energy that you decide to put in your business until 02:30 every day. I listen.
Speaker 2:Until 02:30 when I go pick up my children at school. Yep.
Speaker 1:So that you're like, okay. So you could like increase a few percentage points, but there's gonna be a point in time with like, but what you're doing is like, maybe you're cutting an expense now that you shouldn't be. You know what I mean? And that's why I said spending is a skill. So like, if you saw my Facebook ads and you're like, James, you spent a million dollars on ads, would you be like,
Speaker 2:you gotta cut that expense down. I would wanna see the ad performance.
Speaker 1:You'd wanna see how many leads did you get at what cost and how many leads of those converted into what type of revenue. Yeah. And that's like the ROAS as the cool kids say. And then if you saw that number, you'd be like, how come you didn't spend more?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right? And then you might be like, oh gosh, this videographer, you know, we could just we could just have Mike film the videos. And it's like, that's true. We'll save $1,200, you know, in a in a But multi seven it's like, now Mike's running around with the camera and he's not doing as good of job. So it's like, at a certain point in it's like, what's the point?
Speaker 1:That's why I was like, once we're at that margin, it's like, you just wanna do like, schedule like one, maybe two, I really think only one, expense audit, like a year. Just check-in because you will you will just naturally start to be like, yeah, think we need that tool and you're on on this And like
Speaker 2:also, like, I think if it's possible, if you have a mastermind or if you you do have a mentor or if you have a CFO, whatever
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Just like possibly to get somebody else's eyes on it as well because I think we can get a little immune to our own numbers.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah.
Speaker 2:And like you said, we can justify and be like, no no no, I have to have that because and then maybe we're, you know, have some codependency laced in there with Who some of our even knows? But I know. So it is healthy to get a second opinion.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely. Because otherwise, like, when you don't know this stuff, like, what do you you can't see So, what you can't in the launch, I've just been a part of so many launches myself that I know where something could be when it's really good. Doesn't I'm not talking like, again, I also have to be really careful because everyone wants, Tell me the guidelines. Tell me the guidelines. And I'm like,
Speaker 2:Oh, like the industry
Speaker 1:guy What's the standard? What's good? What's bad? And I'm like, well first of all, the moment I tell you it, you're gonna do more harm than good with it. Which is so true.
Speaker 1:It's what happens. And there's too many variables, but I can sit there. You you know, if someone if you tell me that you converted 1%, is that good? I go, I don't know. Was it a 100 k offer?
Speaker 1:That's that's phenomenal.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Right? If it was a $10 offer, I'd be like, that's pretty bad. So, there's so many variables. So but when you tell me the type of launch that you did for the type of offer that you that you did and the percentage, what I'm looking to is I go, if Kate only had so many so much time in a day, she could spend it trying to save a thousand dollars a month, or an extra percentage point Right. Could add 600,000 plus And in
Speaker 2:when you described when you did that percentage point, or whatever you said. Anyway, I did the math, and I was like, oh, woah. Yep. Think. You better believe I'm gonna be asking you
Speaker 1:about So the reason we gotta know these levers is because there's more than one. And so what a lot of people do is they say I wanna grow my business and so they just pull one lever. We're gonna the word lever is dead to me from now on for the rest of world.
Speaker 2:We're British now.
Speaker 1:It's a lever. It's in the boot of the garage. There's a lever.
Speaker 2:Take the the lift on My the
Speaker 1:like three British friends are gonna kill me for this. They always say I have the worst
Speaker 2:Oh really?
Speaker 1:Accent. They hate me for it. Well you met Ryan at my Yeah.
Speaker 2:I really like him.
Speaker 1:Well, he's he's sweetie to you.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Not to me. Especially after he hears this. But so like, I'll just do more. I'll do more launches. Right.
Speaker 1:Or I'll get more people. I'll get more sales. And it's like
Speaker 2:I'll like launch again this Yeah. Or I'll add more days to the work shop. Right. Or I'll do 35 Instagram lives instead
Speaker 1:of And so they just go back to employee mindset, I'll just I do more
Speaker 2:can't do that because I gotta pick the kids up at 02:30.
Speaker 1:I gotta be done by 02:30 if I want, you know, the kids to get home on time. Yeah. So, that's where I look to. I go, what's the low hanging fruit? What is the thing that is the lowest on on performing the lowest that if we changed it even just a little bit would have the highest impact?
Speaker 1:Mhmm. And that is it right there. Now, if that's the target, you go, well, Kate, you've already demonstrated to yourself and the world that you can produce 40,000 leads in a week and a half or two weeks. So, even if that stayed the same and we added one percentage point, wouldn't that be worth it? And that's when you're doing the math and you're like, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Now if you wanna go if I'm anticipating the next question is how do we do that?
Speaker 2:Yes. That's my question.
Speaker 1:Better logo and a freelance It's my And it's hiring a freelance agency.
Speaker 2:Yeah and it's my blouse.
Speaker 1:It's what you wear. So when I see that number
Speaker 2:By the way
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Speaking of better logo, I just wanna like dispel a myth right now because it's like we're in the process of redoing my website and because it just, like, needs a refresh, whatever. So I went to your website, and I was like, I wonder what James has going on on his website. I was like, this is sucks. No. It is such a good example of, like, people get so obsessed
Speaker 1:Yes, so stupid.
Speaker 2:With like editorial, and it has to look like a fancy magazine, and whatever. Know for sure your website converts, because I know you wouldn't put something up there that does not, and it is so straightforward, and it is like, it it has a very powerful headline that meets people where they need, and then it tells them exactly what to do, and I was just like, yeah. Because I can get distracted by like making things look fancy. So okay, so it's not the logo.
Speaker 1:Know you can. Mike tells me all the time. I'm just kidding. I'm kidding. So in twenty years
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:How many iterations of jameswedmore.com do you think there's been? Twenty years. Three? Three.
Speaker 2:Oh, I guessed right.
Speaker 1:Three.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Three. Right. Because it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:I mean, does matter. People are gonna Google you,
Speaker 1:but then like matter enough to make it matter Right. More than Exactly. Things that
Speaker 2:So let's talk about the things that do matter.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Not your logo. So if if someone were to give me their launch and we go, okay, it's converted. I wanna see this at 3% minimum and it's at like one, one point five. I'm like, there's room for growth.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Okay. So I already know what it is. But all the other numbers start to tell a story. But I already know what it is.
Speaker 1:And the thing I I I always say and hang my hat on is like, I'm not a marketing coach, although I'm really good at teaching marketing because I think you have to in a 80% marketing business. It's I'm I'm a business coach first, and if there was like one skill that I think is the most important business skill that anyone could ever learn, hands down, and I and I just think it's the most important thing, is the ability to diagnose any and every single problem breakdown or ineffective producing thing that you and know why. I'm seeing so much, this is the death of businesses. You do something and it doesn't work. That's pretty common.
Speaker 1:That's gonna be most people like haven't there's no one on this call that like, no. It's never been me before. Like never had that. What's that like? Okay.
Speaker 1:Well for the rest of us, we do things and they don't work. Yeah. And then what your brain does is the same thing it's been doing since you could talk. Which is it's like, why? And you answer.
Speaker 1:And when clients come to me, they have answered the why five times and spent five months fixing the wrong why. So like maybe it's this, maybe it's that, maybe it's this, maybe it's that. And it's like nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. So it's like you could do that but you have the luxury to spend a year looking in the dark guessing at what caused the problem? The number one thing people think it is, and I'm here to say it's not, and it's so sad how pervasive this is.
Speaker 1:It's one of the most toxic things in this industry is the strategy. So the strategies that have been used for like a hundred years are still the same strategies today, even before the Internet. It's the same strategy. And the strategy I I tell people has a 10% max impact on the outcome. 10%.
Speaker 1:It will have an impact Yeah. But less than you think. So I watch people go, I'm gonna do a webinar. No. I'm gonna do a challenge.
Speaker 1:Now I'm gonna do live ones.
Speaker 2:And so by strategy, you mean like
Speaker 1:Like the sales strategy itself.
Speaker 2:Mode of whether it's a webinar, whether it's challenge Yeah. Whether it's a three part workshop. Okay. Great.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Now if you wanted a drink, like you wanted water, how to wouldn't you also say that like the container that it's in plays a role but a small role. Like whether it's in a plastic cup, a paper cup, or glass. It's like, yeah, I can it feels different when it's in a glass cup. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Alright. I got it. I got it. Yeah. Is it like
Speaker 2:But if I'm thirsty, I don't care.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Yes. Exactly. You'll drink it.
Speaker 2:Yes, will.
Speaker 1:You know? Obviously if it's a dirty cup, that's not what we're talking about guys. There's always the polarity response. Yeah, but what if it's a trash bag you put the water in? Okay.
Speaker 1:See, twenty years I've heard it all. I've heard it all. So that but that's what people would all thing is is like, so you give your customer some water and they spit it out. And you go, oh maybe I should put a paper cup. So you build the paper cup.
Speaker 1:And then you do the plastic cup and the glass cup. And you've tried every type of cup and they keep spitting out the water. It's a good metaphor. And you still think it's the cup. So the strategy is just the container that holds the thing that matters.
Speaker 1:The water is what mattered in this metaphor and what matters. The only thing that will ever matter is three things. It's the offer, the message and the messenger.
Speaker 2:Yep. That's all that matters.
Speaker 1:Okay? And if the market is a match with those, you get your result. So if my offer is off, my message is off, and I'm off, what is changing from a challenge to a webinar gonna do? Nothing. Nothing.
Speaker 1:If I don't change those two. Now some people do change those two, and they didn't realize that they changed those two. And they're like, yeah. When I did webinars, it worked. And they're like, I also changed the price and the best.
Speaker 1:You know, it's like, okay. This is what I'm trying to get people to see. So then when we dive into that, I can say you have a great offer and you are a one of the best messengers. Now what I mean by this, and this is really important because this is where I'm at today and this is gonna risk losing a lot of future customers. And I'm like, great.
Speaker 1:I don't care. Because this age that we're in, when you wanna talk about like where are things going in trends, I'll tell you the trend. This is not just the age of authenticity. I think that is a under, what's I'm looking I'm looking for a word. It's not enough.
Speaker 1:It's not enough. That doesn't fully encapsulate what we're in. It's required. That's like the prerequisite. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:This is the age of embodied leadership that when I started, if you just had a website, you were a miracle worker. Like, holy you got something on the Internet, you must be amazing.
Speaker 2:Right? Those were different times.
Speaker 1:Those were very different times. If you if you could even collect payments on the Internet, it was like, you are a wizard. I don't know how you do this. Right? So today, the people that have problems also have options.
Speaker 1:And they are looking for someone that has the most modules or the biggest promise. They're looking they are stress testing their mentor every day and you guys are failing those tests and you don't even know it. They're in a dance with you. They're they're they are the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park and they're testing the fence for weaknesses. They're seeing who you really are.
Speaker 1:They're watching you. It's not just authenticity. Authenticity is a prerequisite because authenticity is about an unfiltered who I am and who I present is an unfiltered expression of who I am at my core. I'm not hiding anything from you and I'm not protecting myself from you. So that's great.
Speaker 1:And we have embodied the qualities of characteristic, the ways of beings of a coach, of a leader, of a guide, of a teacher, of a mentor so that we are in enough of our own personal power that we can handle whatever someone throws at us. You have that. Okay? I know you have that. You know you have that.
Speaker 1:That's not to compliment you or anything like that. I just it's just a fact. You have that. There's no way you could command a room of 200 and something people for two days and move them in two days if you didn't have that. You know, you'd be like faking it, passing the baton to somebody else and say, you you guys talk about it and I gotta I got something to do here.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean? It's like, boom, you did it. Right? So that's always in short supply. And the reason that pisses people off or or would have someone leave is they're like, yeah, maybe you're not ready.
Speaker 1:You know, maybe maybe you're not ready. So like get ready. Just like, I wasn't ready when I started and I got better.
Speaker 2:Said that you your dad said that's gonna be you, and
Speaker 1:that freaked you out of legitimately panic attack. Like, I was so scared. Was like, I know if if being in this business means I have be in front of people, hell no.
Speaker 2:Okay. Will just say, side note, same. When I was growing up and we had to give a presentation in class, every single time Same? I would manifest sickness.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I I wasn't gonna say sickness. I would freak out. I would I would like
Speaker 2:Every single I mean, terrifying.
Speaker 1:So Terrifying. I couldn't do the thing on the first day of class where they're like, introduce your name, where you're from, and like something about you. Couldn't do couldn't do it. I had to like memorize it and write it down, and then like try I was like, okay.
Speaker 2:My name is James. I'm from looking at people.
Speaker 1:And it was so embarrassing. So Yeah. Anyway. So So that's that's gonna become more important for people as it should. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:So that leaves one more thing. And then the message. Now, people don't understand messaging. They just want ChatGPT to write their messaging. And they're like, don't get it.
Speaker 1:I told ChatGPT write me punchy copy. It's supposed to be punchy, is it? Like, stop treating this thing like it's gospel. Like, if you say make it punchy
Speaker 2:What is even punch I wouldn't
Speaker 1:I don't know. That's what people use. Like, it's gonna hit people where it hurts. Right? Use that word.
Speaker 1:And then do you then look at it and say, so is it? I don't know. I asked for to be punchy. It must be. Right?
Speaker 1:Like, that's what you're doing. That's called the blind leading the blind. And AI currently, don't know if that's how it's gonna be when we get to like actual AI because we're not in actual AI yet. It's just going to the most common average denominator. Right?
Speaker 1:So it's just it's just going to like the leave no student behind average level of what you want there. So if you're below average in your messaging ability, this is it's gonna work great for you. You're gonna go from below average to average. If you want something extraordinary and if that's what it needs to be in order to sell, then you're you gotta be careful with how you use it. And if you don't know messaging and you're just like, it's gonna do it for me, you're toast.
Speaker 1:I can guarantee that right now. Like, people can lie to you all day long, but no one who doesn't knows nothing is just like, yeah. I just said I wanna sell this thing, tell me what to say and and it just spits it out and I just read it. I don't say that for any other reason than I don't want people misguided by that. And that's what's happening a lot right now.
Speaker 1:Especially because, like, if you have to rely on that so much, like, what are you supposed to do when you're live? What are you supposed to do when someone asks you a question? What are you supposed to do in, like, the real moments that matter where you don't get a script or a prompt? Yeah. Like, do you do then?
Speaker 1:You've you've built something. It's like that's that's where the moments are made. So there's a whole world to unpack with messaging, and it goes back to our love of human psychology and words and stuff like this. But messaging is there's a big piece of it for me that I love. And it's understanding that the the energy that people are gonna have is there's gonna be this energy of resistance.
Speaker 1:So I say we're working with two forces, which is desire and doubt. Now, most people that are in your stuff, they have the desire. That's why they're there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:If you're struggling with this, you want this, I'm gonna help you. And they're like, great. So no one would do that if they didn't already want it. So you're not convincing them of something. You're tapping into something that, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:Yes. That's what I've been looking for. So that's desire. And then the the world we work from is when you know the guideline, that amount of people to, like, let's say 3% of 40,000 are meant to be in your stuff. That's a fact.
Speaker 1:I live by that law. They're meant to be in. So if if even one of them of that percentage didn't join, that can only mean one thing. Something was still in the way for them. That's the doubt.
Speaker 1:And what 90% of my messaging today is, is removing the doubt. So there's something still in the way for somebody somebody that I didn't address that didn't move them. And that's so beautiful because what met so our offer exists like a flower. I love that. Beautiful metaphor.
Speaker 1:And the messaging is the environment. And if it's great messaging, it allows the flower to thrive. Yeah. It's like, this is why this flower exists. This is why this thing exists.
Speaker 1:And the messaging is the environment. And the our word literally creates our world, so messaging is words that create the possibility world for someone else to pick that flower. And the only reason they wouldn't is because that it that it's someone that's meant to be in there. Not everyone's meant to be in your stuff. So the only reason someone who's meant to be would not is because there's still something that is occurring for them.
Speaker 1:Something that is occurring for them that we will always have the opportunity to address, dismantle or remove. And I believe that is our true job. I love the idea of my job is not to get people to ever say yes. My job is to remove anything and everything that would be disempowering for them. A lie, a distortion, doubt, fear.
Speaker 1:I don't have to have the time not read all that. I don't settle for that in my life, so I want that gone, and I want you to make a decision. So I will stand from it, you making a decision. This doesn't have to be a decision to work with me. In fact, I like to say that.
Speaker 1:I'm like, if you've come this far, maybe you don't like me. It's great. Maybe I'm not your cup of tea. But if you've come this far, there's something about this this is important to you, this is what you wanna learn, like, go find your person then. Yep.
Speaker 1:Maybe it's not me, so go find that person. But if you just say no completely here, you're saying no. So when someone comes into your stuff, for example, this is there's a theme and a message of, like, we are going to transform your world of money to transform your quality of life from the inside out. It's gonna it's gonna heal your marriage, your relationships. It's gonna it's gonna help heal your business or your employment.
Speaker 1:It's gonna like improve your health, just everything. And maybe they go, I don't really like Kate, but this is still I know that would never happen, but in a weird world, in a bizarre world, I might go, you know what, Kate's not really resonating with me, but I know I need to do this. I wouldn't just say no and I'm gonna go back to the world of ordinary and mediocrity where I don't deal with this. Right. You would want people to still trek forward on a journey of healing this work.
Speaker 1:Right? And that's that's the stance I take. It's like, I'm like, it's not me, then it's somebody else. Great. Don't care.
Speaker 1:Do not care. But I did my work. Yep. Right? And so the worst thing we would ever want as true thought leaders is somebody to say no, not because they're saying no to you, but because they're actually saying no to themselves.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, if And
Speaker 2:I you think most of the time that's what happens.
Speaker 1:Of course it is. Yeah. That is exactly what is happening. Bingo. So like, it's not to like and you know, we don't have to go here if you want, and it's not to pick apart your lunch, but like if you had to guess and tune into some of the there's a there's a segment that you have the ability to tune into that they still had something present within them that informed a decision that said, I can't.
Speaker 1:I can't join this program. What was that?
Speaker 2:That's such a good question.
Speaker 1:So you're going to tune in. I want you to imagine that there really was a segment of the audience that was meant to be in this program last year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which I'm sure there is.
Speaker 1:There is. There was. There absolutely was. Something was still present for them.
Speaker 2:What was I said I am not I can't do this. Yeah. What comes up for me, and I, you know, I could be wrong, but what comes up for me is a sense of like, I don't know if it'll, like, I don't believe Yeah. Fully that it'll work for Yeah.
Speaker 1:Any form of doubt in my ability or even the process or or whatever, right? Yeah. Okay. So every single time, for about eight years I've done that exercise with I've people call me in their launch freak outs. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And I take them through that simple process. Right. And you did this launch almost a year ago. And we you get an answer every time. There's like no one's never got an answer.
Speaker 1:So, the thing is sometimes people are just not doing So I'm always tuning and connecting to my audience and seeing what's occurring for them. And that's really, that's where messaging and marketing and human psychology gets so fun because I'm just dealing with with what's so for them. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Versus just, I'm just gonna say a bunch of stuff and
Speaker 1:hopefully something sticks. Hopefully they hear something I say. And it's like, well let's deal with that. So this is where I'll just go deeper with this and have fun with this. If somebody truly believed this won't work for me or I don't have what it takes to do this, would they ever buy?
Speaker 1:No. No. It makes sense, right? Now the next question is, is that and this will be hard for you to answer because you're gonna wanna stay humble, I understand that, but let's just throw that away. Is that really true that there are people that this wouldn't work for?
Speaker 2:No. Not if
Speaker 1:they
Speaker 2:actually
Speaker 1:did If
Speaker 2:they do it, it
Speaker 1:will work. If they do it, it will work. A 100%. So then what we're saying is is there are people that has what's called a distortion of thought. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:It's not true. So it's a form of fear.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:It's not true that it won't work, but they had the thought and they believe it to be true and then action behavior follows thought which is don't buy.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Right? And so then my work, your work becomes in what ways can I offer an experience that shows them more evidence that they too can do
Speaker 2:this? Right.
Speaker 1:And the bad marketers messenger just be like, hey, you can do this. Oh, she said I could do it. I guess Right. I Yeah. Right?
Speaker 1:Instead, this is where the work really becomes really fun which is, let's go deeper. Why would someone say they can't do this? What would be one example of like a thousand?
Speaker 2:Because they've signed up for things before and they didn't follow through.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So they have past evidence of it not working, And what would be another thing?
Speaker 2:Because they come from a family history where there's not money in their background.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it could be like, no, don't understand. This is just who we are. The Wedmore's are just this. Right.
Speaker 2:Or people like me don't act
Speaker 1:Or people I see. So now it is like a belief linked to my identity. And the moment you do that, like because that's they're so fixed in that Right. In that identity. So when we even go deeper with this, we can start to go, wow, that's what's really occurring for people.
Speaker 1:How do I begin to shift that for those people? Now, we can go there if you want. We can come up with stuff. But that's like the process. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm like, I'm looking at how do I shift the message and the experience for somebody. Not because I want them to buy my stuff. Like that's what people don't get. I don't want someone being a part of this just to say I can't do this.
Speaker 2:No. Because I want them to walk away no matter what. I mean this is why you say the transformation comes through. Like, Because you would have had to the transaction because
Speaker 1:you do it.
Speaker 2:You have to believe in yourself in order to do it, which means you've already walked through so many gates that were previously locked.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right? Like, you've already gotten that to that point where you are already transformed. And obviously, then, of course, you know, whatever pathway you've laid out or I've laid out
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Is going to work because it was gonna work anyway. But like it won't it will never work if the person even doesn't even come up to the door. Right. Yeah. I think that's really helpful.
Speaker 2:That's gonna be fun to play around
Speaker 1:with. It it is fun to play around with, and this is
Speaker 2:And I already was, but it was more from the like, I just appreciate the depth that you're you bring to these things because what you're talking about is in super oversimplified, it's like handling objections. Right? Right. This is I don't get excited about that. Quite frankly, it sounds like a boring Sure.
Speaker 2:But like what would get getting underneath the surface in people's soul. I'm like, yes.
Speaker 1:What Let's do do you think the average person's definition of the word objection is?
Speaker 2:A reason that they don't think something will work, or a reason that they're not going to purchase.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. That's good. So I'll tell you why this is more fun for you the way I'm doing it in a moment. But my definition of an objection is a belief that only someone who is meant to be in your stuff could hold that would prevent them from buying. That's all it is.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's interesting.
Speaker 1:It's a belief that only someone that is meant to be in your stuff could hold, that the belief would cause a behavior in not buying.
Speaker 2:That's it. So Wait. I have a follow-up question. Please. And we're gonna come back to Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Why I like what you're doing better. And and my question is so, you know, of course, we've run, like, exit surveys of of the launch. Like, why you know, we ask why we noticed you did that. And money.
Speaker 2:Right? But people don't tell you what's actually true. And so, yes, I can tune in energetically to my people and intuitively because I can just do that. Yeah. But is there a methodology that you use or teach to actually find out exactly what the thing was for people?
Speaker 2:Or is it more just like kind of tuning into the
Speaker 1:So I'm always tuning in, of course. And surveys, you're right. They're not gonna tell you for two reasons. Number one, because they have a hard time actually articulating it. Right.
Speaker 1:And number two, it's a survey. Right. So, like the average person experiences a survey is like, you want me to make it easier to give you money? I don't think so. I'm not gonna make it easy for you.
Speaker 1:Like you gotta work for this. Like like you wouldn't you know go on a first date with Mike and be like, before we go out can I get a survey on like all the ways that like, what would make me you fall in love with me? You'd be like, you gotta figure that out on your own bud. Yeah. Right?
Speaker 1:And he did. He had to. So I I just that's that's not gonna work. So Right. Both people don't truly know in a fully articulated way.
Speaker 1:And, and they're not gonna help you out either. So the greatest messaging in marketers is when you can actually articulate it better than they could.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:That's when it's like the most beautiful thing.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So when you say like, I'm that's exactly what I've been feeling and no one has said it like that before.
Speaker 2:Right. Now I understand myself better because you So just articulated
Speaker 1:it comes down to one sentence that I think is like one of the most powerful sentences. It's just I say it as much as I can. I don't think people give it enough weight, but it's like everything. And it's this sentence that says how you see anything determines what's possible. So when you unpack that, the cognitive lens, which is the the goggles, so people don't see life through the unfiltered actual scene of life.
Speaker 1:They see it through their distorted lens. Everyone has a distorted lens based on so many things. Right? Our past, our experiences, our culture, our upbringing, our beliefs, everything. Right?
Speaker 1:So they're seeing it through a particular lens. Even people listening to this are seeing everything or hearing everything through a lens and you are then judging me and what I'm saying through that lens. So you're not judging the lens, you're judging me Or rather that judgy lens is judging me, and you don't even know it. You're like, that's not true. That's just this.
Speaker 1:Or I've heard like I've talked about objections. It'd be like, a no is a no, James. So you heard that an objection is a no. No. An objection is a but.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Yes, but. Yeah. Like that's what people don't understand. Like, it's not a no.
Speaker 1:Right. A no is a no. So, if I say, Kate, I'm thinking about your program but I've just got so much in my past family history that you don't even know about. That's a I want it,
Speaker 2:but Right.
Speaker 1:I'm afraid. Yeah. So that's not a no. Right. And that's the person that needs you the most.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In fact, sometimes the people are just like, yeah, whatever. Another yeah. Kate Tossums, I'll just buy it.
Speaker 2:Totally.
Speaker 1:Are like not where the huge transformation is.
Speaker 2:Right. It's just
Speaker 1:the person who's like, I don't know what it is, but I've opened every email, I've bitten on every live, and it's like it stirred something in me. But like, but but but but but but but and then you can work through that with them, you've just changed that person's life. Even if they don't buy. Correct. That's so cool.
Speaker 1:That's so badass. So how you see anything determines what's possible. So what I was really playing with you in is how are they seeing themselves? How are they seeing money? And how are they seeing your program?
Speaker 1:And how they see it through that lens is gonna determine what they do. Our job is to transform the way or invite people to transform the way that they see or in your case, money Yeah. And themselves. Yep. And if you in if all of us in our messaging can change the way that people see the topic that we teach on Mhmm.
Speaker 1:You've already offered the greatest first step in transformation. That's why the transformation begins with a transaction. Because to get to that sale for that person to buy, that's called a action. Right? They took an action, but it's not just any action.
Speaker 1:Because like grabbing a sip of water is an action but there's nothing at stake with that. Right. So, there's money, there's skin in the game. So, I took an aligned action from a new perspective, a new belief in myself, a new possibility and I took that action that integrates the new perspective.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That goes, woah, not only do I see this, I know this now because I'm willing to do this. Mhmm. And that's so freaking beautiful and powerful. And this is what we owe people to. So how you see anything.
Speaker 1:So I'm I'm always looking at how would someone see this or see themselves or see the problem they're in that would have them be frozen or stuck or go backwards. What do I have in my power to just say, I get that that's how you see it. I'm not invalidating how you see it, but I also go, there's another way to look at this.
Speaker 2:Yes. And what when you have people coming into your sphere and they are aspiring or existing, course creators, coaches, digital product business owners
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:What is that first step that you take with them to help them see business or the online business world in a new way? Like, what how are you inviting them to see it in a new way?
Speaker 1:Would you say, like, when I teach, like, in BBD or
Speaker 2:Before that. Like, in the warm up. Right? So so in your in your workshop Yeah. In your podcast content
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Leading up, in that, like, two month period.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So, I'm I'm sorry to say What Because is the first what the dance that I'm that I'm in, which is fun because it is challenging, is that when people come into my stuff, I get people at every level. Like, I've had people join my program that are already multi seven figures.
Speaker 2:Well, I have gotten a ton out of BPD already of types of seven figures.
Speaker 1:I wanted it to be that.
Speaker 2:I'm like, damn, this is really helpful. This is not big I mean, would have been really helpful when I was a beginner, I'm
Speaker 1:But it's not still.
Speaker 2:And I find it hugely Because
Speaker 1:I don't I didn't want it to be this like, this it's this is a complete operating system all businesses Yes. No matter the level. So it does depend on where someone's coming in, but I would say one of the first places that I want people to see is this idea or notion that learning how to actually build a business the right way, not just like, let me do a webinar funnel or an Instagram hack is what's gonna have you have a long term successful business. That I I have this concept called people don't like it and I that's what I am. I'm gonna give you your veggies and vitamins like I'm not gonna give you the what if I told you that you could turn your phone into an ATM that would quite literally spit money out at you every day with a click of a button, you know, like that nonsense.
Speaker 1:But that, this idea of the death of the entrepreneur Mhmm. And I actually think, like, that's the biggest problem is, like, the the entrepreneur approach. So people up either approaching their business as an employee which is a problem or an entrepreneur is the problem. Entrepreneurs are capitalistic inventors. That's all an entrepreneur is.
Speaker 2:Like always messing with stuff?
Speaker 1:Well, they're always trying to come up with something new. Which means they have to break something so that they can get validation for the new thing. Let me see if I can do it better. Yep. It's like I have this funny quote that says, my whole life I always saw myself as an entrepreneur, but it wasn't until I saw myself as a business owner that I started making money.
Speaker 1:And that has been the truth. And so, you know, you've seen that as you're like, oh, I'm gonna temper a bit the like, let me create the new thing, let me create the new Oh
Speaker 2:my gosh. I mean, beyond.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And And that
Speaker 2:love that maturation, I mean, just messaged a girlfriend about something recently, and I was like, I'm going deeper in this way, this way, and this way. I'm tempering all this default programming, which I have, so like go make something new. And I said, it feels really adult.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And that's what I would call Kate, even at this level, is killing off a bit of the entrepreneurial tendency. Yeah. And so, I think that's the biggest thing. So, I say things like, you know, the more structure you have in your business, the more freedom you get in your life because the more we build a business properly.
Speaker 1:So like one way I say it is I go, we all have goals and a goal is something you want. So you have a goal for your business. So it's like, this is
Speaker 2:what I want, this is what I want. But it's
Speaker 1:that same energetic exchange we talked about when I was interviewing you. No one really asks, well what does your business want? Or rather what does it need? Mhmm. And it's like, you have to be able to give it what it needs for you to get what
Speaker 2:you You are not your business.
Speaker 1:Are not
Speaker 2:your Let's start there.
Speaker 1:No. You are gosh. And you're not your accomplishments, your worth, your identities net worth. It you have to see it as this separate thing that you're building and and it you know, that's why the profitability percentage is such a huge thing is like, that's showing how healthy it is Mhmm. At what age it's at.
Speaker 1:And if it's like it's young and small, great. It's it's healthy and it's growing. Give it some freaking time, patience. So that's why we we called everything around the anchoring of the digital CEO is because I wanted people to be less entrepreneurial and more the steward and owner of a business. And that's where I've seen all the success in my life is when I said, I'm gonna treat this like a I
Speaker 2:love that. So it's really that initial, regardless of the size of your business how long you've been at it, in the examples I gave, certainly, we can see that there's always room for growth no matter what stage. So what you're doing is helping people to see through the lens and to relate to themselves in a new way around business. And so that in and of itself so you're doing that in this workshop experience, and that is helping with that piece that we talked about around any doubt that they might even have around business. They've already experienced this massive shift.
Speaker 2:And when you begin to relate to yourself differently, you begin to relate to your business differently. And new possibilities arise instantly.
Speaker 1:Let me give you a quick example of that. How do you think most people or most entrepreneurs relate to business? Business is what do they say?
Speaker 2:Hard?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Business is hard, right? Yeah. So anything can be hard if we do it the wrong way. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Solving a puzzle without looking at the picture of the box with all the pieces upside down is really hard. Right? So a lot of people are trying to build a business without the instruction manual, without the picture on the box. They're trying to do it like an employee and they're trying to it on their own. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So that's why business is hard. So if I can show people, here's the picture on the box, that's what we do. And here's here's the pieces you do need at this level. Because I also say business growth happens in stages. And I think that's a really profound way in in showing people a new perspective that business growth happens in stages is this truth, this phenomenon, that there is a stage you're in right now and all we need to do is know what stage you're in and just focus on that.
Speaker 1:And when you can do that piece, you graduate to the next phase. So when I show people that there is a certain there's certain things you need to be doing at each stage once you know what stage you're in, then all of a sudden it's like, it's not it doesn't seem as hard to me anymore. Seems this seems doable. This seems possible. Like it seems like I can do it.
Speaker 2:You're breaking it down.
Speaker 1:I've changed, I've assisted, they had to do it, in changing the way they see business. Exactly. It anything is gonna be harder when you don't know how to do it, when you don't have the right approach or the right strategy. Just like Tony Robbins says, not only is it hard to to see a sunset running east, it's impossible. So the reason it's so hard is you're doing it wrong.
Speaker 1:So if I do things wrong, it's gonna be hard for me too.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Let me
Speaker 1:show you how to do it right. Yeah. So if we can look not just to like, you know, I'm gonna teach you a bunch of things, but how start first with how is someone seeing this? Yeah. How does someone see money?
Speaker 1:How does someone see their relationship with
Speaker 2:not just money, their relationship with money.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Their habits with money. Their their bank account. Right. Their family history with money.
Speaker 1:Then I go, how do I without it's you don't disrespect that. It's like, hey, if I had those experiences I had to start there, that's how I'd see it too. It's yes and. Here's here's a more empowering way to look at it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You know? Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And it and it is it's like, it's basically another way to say it. I'm just gonna say the same thing over and over again. It's assisting inviting people to tell a new story about the thing that matters to them.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You
Speaker 2:know? So at Relaxed Money Live, you gave a great talk about the thing.
Speaker 1:I don't think a lot of people liked it, but Really? Well, I just think it was like
Speaker 2:Okay, he did.
Speaker 1:Like, oh, I thought we'd He's dysregulating my nervous system.
Speaker 2:You were not dysregulating.
Speaker 1:I was a little like
Speaker 2:were not.
Speaker 1:In people's
Speaker 2:faces. Thought you were great. People need to be shaken up.
Speaker 1:I did do that.
Speaker 2:And we
Speaker 1:can Some people didn't like that I was doing that. Really? Well, could just sense No. I don't know specific. That's okay.
Speaker 1:I love giving people what they need.
Speaker 2:It was great. And based on the number of people who wanted to talk to you afterwards, I know they got a ton out of it. So Yep. You talked about the three skills of making money. I mean, no.
Speaker 1:The three money skills. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:One Yeah.
Speaker 1:Making money. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Two is managing it. Yeah. Three is it. Isn't that good?
Speaker 1:I made them three m's.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Was real gag, I I caught it. The three m's. I I saw what you were doing and I liked it. You're, you know, you're good at all of them, but let's talk about the making one.
Speaker 1:Let's do it.
Speaker 2:And we already have been, but I just wanna identify that
Speaker 1:A little bit. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So when I talk to people, I'm just gonna be really transparent right now. When I talk to people and I'm coaching them
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Who are in a job scenario
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I first of all, I have never worked in corporate. I had a regular job
Speaker 1:for Same. We have so much in common.
Speaker 2:Four months, I worked in an event planning company. Yeah. I was in this funny little office in Chelsea. It was me and three gay guys, and we were sending out essentially models for cater for like full service Sure. Catering.
Speaker 1:Because you know I was in the catering industry.
Speaker 2:Right. Okay. You're right.
Speaker 1:That's like the only Yes. Job.
Speaker 2:That's the only job. Yeah. Right. So I learned what ramekins are. I mean, there was
Speaker 1:You know what a ramekin is.
Speaker 2:Know what a ramekin is.
Speaker 1:Do you have ramekins?
Speaker 2:I
Speaker 1:They are so great to have.
Speaker 2:Well, I actually do. And do you wanna know why it was so sweet? I have a girlfriend who is also a student of yours, Jennifer Rasiope, and she sent me this is really apropos of nothing. I'm just gonna tell the story.
Speaker 1:It's great.
Speaker 2:It is a podcast. Sent me. Was so sweet. She came on my podcast because she wanted to tell her relaxed money story, and her story is really powerful about the the impact she had from the program. And then as a thank you for her coming on my podcast, sharing her case study to thank me, she sent me lobster mac and cheese from a really amazing
Speaker 1:place Okay. I'm in gonna get her on my
Speaker 2:podcast. Yeah. Uh-huh. You should have her on your podcast. And and it came it was gluten free from a place in Maine called Hancock's Lumber.
Speaker 2:She sent it via Goldbelly, and it came in ramekins that are nailed wonderful. It. Why am I telling you this? Well, here's what's most important.
Speaker 1:We'll
Speaker 2:go This is the end of the day and I'm sliding off.
Speaker 1:I asked about the ramekins. I said, do you own them? And you said I got some.
Speaker 2:Oh, I know.
Speaker 1:But but do you also have this was an Instagram hack. It's the baskets for, like, the burgers or, like, the grilled cheese, and then you get the, like, wax paper to put in it for the kids. Do you have this
Speaker 2:hack? To make it like a restaurant?
Speaker 1:Yeah. But then you don't even need to, you just throw the paper away. Oh. So it's like it's like a little basket.
Speaker 2:Oh, and it looks so chic.
Speaker 1:Yes. And then you put the plastic wax paper in
Speaker 2:The parchment paper.
Speaker 1:The parchment paper, and then you put the yeah. I have Jen, like, make me
Speaker 2:Follow us Little more home Yeah.
Speaker 1:Tips. It's like my favorite thing.
Speaker 2:Okay. That's fun. Okay. I'm gonna definitely get So that for the the reason I was bringing it
Speaker 1:up You were in Soho. Ramekins.
Speaker 2:My four month job. I don't know as well how to help people make more money when they're in a job situation because the world I know is our world Yeah. Which is like you can make more anytime you want.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I'd love to hear what like, if someone is in a
Speaker 1:job Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Wanting to transition, or maybe their business right now is something that they're doing on the side. What are some of those, like, important elements, sub elements of the make money Yeah.
Speaker 1:Love this.
Speaker 2:We've been talking It's about some
Speaker 1:truly
Speaker 2:but anything we didn't cover.
Speaker 1:It's truly my I I think, like, what I'm I'm here to do Yeah. Is there are people that are beautiful souls you know people like to call them the light workers and the old souls and they are. And I love giving them the skills that this it's not about making the millions although that's possible. It's about this gets to be a full time gig for you, not, oh, I have to fit this in because I still need to worry about money and get a job. Like, that to me is like the coolest thing.
Speaker 1:So I love geeking out on how anybody who's in the world of helping other people, we're gonna we're gonna make sure that this funds a life and a business for you. So there's a lot of pieces in store, and I will also say for our employees, I've changed my stance recently, especially in the times that we're in. I used to say a very safe way of just like, business isn't for everybody. And I'm like, fuck that. I think everybody today needs to have a business.
Speaker 1:And I just think the times we're in financially speaking, like the things that I see that are happening, to be able to have something that can allow you to increase income, you're not like limited by that. What's happening with the dollar and the co like, a lot of this has to do with, you know, massive inflation. There's a lot of people saying that that that that can get higher, you know. And when your salary is the same two years from now, but something costs three times as much, those people are gonna be really struggling even if we have healed our relationship with money. Like, if it if it takes three times as much of our five times as much of our dollars to buy the same amount of groceries, like, that's gonna be a burden for everybody.
Speaker 1:And so when we can take control of our finances and say, I can generate more. Yes. I can attract more of that by pulling these levers, then that's gonna be amazing. That's just beautiful to me. That's like, it's just wonderful.
Speaker 1:So when I talked about the skills of this, I I said, well there's some like prerequisites here. The first thing is that we should always be centered and focused. The North Star is the person we wanna help. And so that person needs to need help. That person has to already want help.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:They have to be in a problem, and we have to know that person. So I said the first skill of making money is the skill of listening. To know. That's kinda what we've just demonstrated. You gotta know your people.
Speaker 1:Kate knows her people. So I knew I could put you on the spot and you would have a beautiful answer because you know how to know your people. Yeah. So that's a skill. To care and to be curious about who you help and what's going on with is the first thing.
Speaker 1:Now number two is the skill of being a being able to create something of value for that person. That is a skill. Okay. A lot of people create things that are like, no one wants that. Right?
Speaker 1:But of course, there's a caveat that just sends people down this rabbit hole of self discovery and why it's why I struggle for five years is, how do you create something of value if you don't see the value inherent within yourself? Mhmm. Right? Because anything you create is your art. So it's an expression or byproduct of you, so it came from you.
Speaker 1:And if you don't see your value, then something created from you, you're gonna have a hard time seeing that value too. Then there is an actual skill of selling. Yes. And you you have to learn that skill.
Speaker 2:We're listening, we're creating something of value for people, and we're and we're selling.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And you have to sell. Now, sales is really scary for people and all their stuff comes up. Like part of the skill of selling, exactly, is to learn to be regulated, present Yeah. As you make the sale.
Speaker 1:Now for me, selling is as simple as this. Selling is just the invitation. So this really helps people. Anytime you've ever had a party, you had to invite people to get them there. That same energy and the fact that you got people to that party means you already know how to sell.
Speaker 1:It's like, hey, I'm doing this thing. This is why you should be here. This is what it's gonna do for you and it's really great. Here's how you get it and here's the next step. And you're gonna love it.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean? Like obviously that's overly simplified but that's what you would do in an invitation. So if you don't ask, which is the masculine thing is you have to ask in order to receive, then you're not gonna make sales. And when we're talking about 3%, that means 38,000 people said no. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1:When I do my launch 70 something thousand people Right. Say
Speaker 2:And it's not like at the end of the launch I'm crying about that at all. So psyched about the people who said I've never once worried about those 38,000 people who said no to me. In fact, it had never really occurred to me that 38,000 people did say no until this very moment. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, we take people through a whole really cool messaging thing. Yeah. And then I basically say
Speaker 2:In VBT.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I basically say, because you know, I'm not nice like you. I say now that you have a messaging framework because there's a whole framework and then you make your offer. You are gonna do this on a webinar or however you want to do it. Could do it live anywhere else 20 times.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And then shut up until you do those 20 times.
Speaker 2:Okay. Love it. Yes.
Speaker 1:Now here's the interesting phenomenon. Because when you start it right and you build off of it, it's great. Our most successful clients, I almost said clients, successful clients.
Speaker 2:Our
Speaker 1:successful clients are the ones that did that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Of course.
Speaker 1:They they just shortcut. Instead of James taking five years, they're like, I'm gonna take six months and just
Speaker 2:like gonna do it
Speaker 1:20 times. It again. Yeah. They realized they had it 80% there, but then like, oh
Speaker 2:Refinement.
Speaker 1:My audience is really responding to this. Oh. So instead of the survey Right. I'm getting it in the comments. They're telling me.
Speaker 2:Putting in the reps. It's so good, James. I actually have a dear friend who you're gonna meet tomorrow, who in her business the first year, she did a webinar every single week.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:And by the end of that year
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:She turned 300 in profit. Yep. No one Because she just did the reps.
Speaker 1:No one can do that and not come out the other side with something that sells and something that's There
Speaker 2:was a great guy on your BBD stage last year who did that. Do you remember him? He was an amazing case study.
Speaker 1:Was it Lennon? Yeah, was Yeah, was one of them. And he only needed to get to 13 before he unlocked all of
Speaker 2:it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So he's like, all right, I'll do it.
Speaker 2:He committed to doing a webinar every single week, and he got to 13. And he reported on how his numbers shifted and shifted His story made me cry. Yep. Go Lennon.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 2:I just loved it so And
Speaker 1:it's created this whole wave of like like I just I'm I'm gonna be like, just get out of the business then, know, get out of the kitchen if if you're not gonna play the game because people do their first webinar where they have you have no audience, you you haven't put any time putting any goodwill to the world, you don't you haven't put anything of value. You do your first webinar, which is zero to a sale in sixty minutes to 10 people no one bought, you're like, this doesn't work, I give up. Like, you should do a TED talk on how inspiring that is. Right? I know, I'm such a jerk.
Speaker 1:But that's the thing is like, if people do the hard things Yep. You're you're gonna get the the great results.
Speaker 2:It won't take you five years late James.
Speaker 1:No. I don't that that was Will my not. My mission is if I can short cut it
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Any amount less than what I went through, then I'm I'm winning my game.
Speaker 2:A 100%.
Speaker 1:If it took you four years, I win. Yeah. At my my intention for you.
Speaker 2:A 100%. Yeah. Okay, James. This has been so much fun Mhmm. In the vortex with you in our time warp.
Speaker 2:And now I do know that people can learn from you. And what do you have coming up?
Speaker 1:Okay. So the way we we teach is I like to approach things in layers. So there's you as the business owners driving the ship and we've all had experiences, everyone listening to your shows had experience where there was a change made from the inside and it changed out, you know, the inside out approach. So there's changes in how we need to show up, where we put our time and our attention, what we focus on, what our role is, what the stories we tell ourselves, all that stuff. That's a beautiful journey.
Speaker 1:And then if you apply that same concept to your business, it's the same thing. Changes within your business on the inside change it without too. And so this is where I really focus on with our clients. So we have this incredible three day, so it's a multi day live experience and it's called the business breakthrough experience. And it is designed to do something that I've had numerous experiences in my life, which are these breakthroughs in business.
Speaker 1:Now breakthrough in business occurs when the results that you get defy time and logic. We go from linear to quantum. You go from here to bam, breaking through the ceiling. And this happens through a series of different levers that we pull, you're welcome, Including just a paradigm shift in how we approach ourselves, how we approach our business. And the reason this is so powerful is that a lot of what you're seeing online are not the things that are causing results for the people that are having success.
Speaker 1:A lot of things that you don't you don't see how someone runs a business. You don't see
Speaker 2:It's invisible.
Speaker 1:The invisible behind the scenes underneath the surface things. And a lot of the people that you are seeing, you also have to wonder like how successful are they, right? You know, it's very easy to create the facade of success and then go, oh, if I just make videos of me on the beach, maybe I'll be successful too, probably not. So that's the the huge approach. And it's based on now twenty years of running a business, several businesses, doing over a $100,000,000 in sales in the digital product space.
Speaker 1:And then the amount of people that we work today with today at every level allows me to just keep my finger on the pulse of
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Of every niche, every model, every price point, and every strategy that's working. And I like to assimilate all that that data for people and say like, here's what's working, but here's how you need to work it to be an industry leader or to grow faster. Or even just identify what phase you're in so you know the strategy and the psychology you need to have at that at that level. Yeah. It's really designed for anyone who calls themselves a coach, you know, a personal brand, a thought leader, author, speaker, you know, etcetera, and wanna build a lasting business around it.
Speaker 1:I think that is the thing I love to, if there's anything I love to brag about, it's the length of time I've been doing this. And I think that's an important thing.
Speaker 2:I think it's a really important thing.
Speaker 1:It is because what I have been saying to people for a few years now is everything that you truly want from your business is on the other side of replication.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So the longer we do it and the more we do the same thing, the easier it becomes and the more it grows. And if we're doing the right things now, which I wanna help you with, then it's easier to replicate that. Yeah. So the business breakthrough experience. I'm really, I love this training.
Speaker 1:I love this work. It really came to me the first first time ten years ago, I said, I'm in the business of causing breakthroughs for business owners. And that's what we love to do.
Speaker 2:So great. So yeah. Alright. So if you wanna sign up for that, I highly recommend you do. Go to katenorthrup.com/james.
Speaker 2:I forgot there's no camera this morning.
Speaker 1:She's looking at a Looking into the piece of yeah.
Speaker 2:Katenorthrup.com/james. Yeah. James, I so appreciate you. I've learned so much from you over the years and also just right now in these past hour and forty Yeah.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Kate.
Speaker 2:So good. Thanks for getting in there with me on my launch and showing up for me and Mike and just all the humans you show up for. Your generosity knows no bounds and I'm really grateful.
Speaker 1:Well, I appreciate you saying that, and it's it's so fun. So I hope everyone has fun doing what they do. That's that's the goal.
Speaker 2:Yes. It is. Yeah. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Kate.
Speaker 2:If you are a digital course creator and or a coach and you wanna grow your business online, listen. A couple of years ago, I had someone sweep into my life and help us to grow our launch revenue to a million dollars for the first time and now to multiple 7 figures over and over again. His name is James Wedmore. He is an 8 figure digital CEO who coaches and supports people just like you who wanna turn their expertise into revenue using online business. Once a year, he does an incredible free training called the business breakthrough experience, and it is coming up.
Speaker 2:I will be there right alongside you learning these strategies. Head to katenorthrup.com/bbe. Katenorthrup.com/bbe, and I will see you for the business breakthrough experience.