Smashed my first 10k month!

[Black_Dragon43]

Anyway, my frustration is with the money-chasing shortcut mindset. Not with coaching itself

That makes sense, thank you for clarifying that.

I guess what I’d ask is if you think that doing what you wrote about above is sustainable — just sell 5 people a month at $10,000 and don’t care at all about their results?

In my line of work I’ve met many agency owners who did $10K/mo and even as high as $50K/mo and then back to $0. Having one big month doesn’t mean you have a sustainable business model. The problem with most of those businesses is that they have no systems, so they get a big result, then come brag about it on the forum or reddit or a testimonial, and then they’re back to $0. I’ve seen this happen 20+ times.

So to me, it has nothing to do with morality at this point and everything to do with smart business sense.

If your clients don’t get any results, and moreover, it’s obvious that all you care about is their money and not helping them out, then you always return to square 1 — getting new clients. You have no sustainability, and no capacity for growth, because you’re still limited to acquiring the same number of new clients every month.

Keeping clients is how you grow: if you get 5 new clients / mo every month, and you keep 3 clients, 5 months down the line you have 20 clients. Your business is growing.

If you get 5 new clients / mo, and you lose all of them, then you’re always at 5 clients/mo and you never grow.

So sooner or later, no matter how daft you are, you’ll realize that retaining customers is the missing key to building a real, sustainable business. And it’s what you have to do to chase what you want most, the money.

So the market corrects itself, and forces you to improve the business if you want to keep growing and developing. At the same time, it’s worth remembering that the problems you’re trying to solve as a coach are HARD problems. Like really hard. That’s why there is so much demand and scammy providers, because those problems aren’t easy to solve. From this POV, the knowledge that you’ve obtained success before with the methods you’re teaching can keep you going, whereas someone who doesn’t have your experience may get discouraged and give up.

 

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[Emperor7]

That makes sense, thank you for clarifying that.

I guess what I’d ask is if you think that doing what you wrote about above is sustainable — just sell 5 people a month at $10,000 and don’t care at all about their results?

In my line of work I’ve met many agency owners who did $10K/mo and even as high as $50K/mo and then back to $0. Having one big month doesn’t mean you have a sustainable business model. The problem with most of those businesses is that they have no systems, so they get a big result, then come brag about it on the forum or reddit or a testimonial, and then they’re back to $0. I’ve seen this happen 20+ times.

So to me, it has nothing to do with morality at this point and everything to do with smart business sense.

If your clients don’t get any results, and moreover, it’s obvious that all you care about is their money and not helping them out, then you always return to square 1 — getting new clients. You have no sustainability, and no capacity for growth, because you’re still limited to acquiring the same number of new clients every month.

Keeping clients is how you grow: if you get 5 new clients / mo every month, and you keep 3 clients, 5 months down the line you have 20 clients. Your business is growing.

If you get 5 new clients / mo, and you lose all of them, then you’re always at 5 clients/mo and you never grow.

So sooner or later, no matter how daft you are, you’ll realize that retaining customers is the missing key to building a real, sustainable business. And it’s what you have to do to chase what you want most, the money.

So the market corrects itself, and forces you to improve the business if you want to keep growing and developing. At the same time, it’s worth remembering that the problems you’re trying to solve as a coach are HARD problems. Like really hard. That’s why there is so much demand and scammy providers, because those problems aren’t easy to solve. From this POV, the knowledge that you’ve obtained success before with the methods you’re teaching can keep you going, whereas someone who doesn’t have your experience may get discouraged and give up.

If your clients get results and re-order your stuff, then it isn't scrappy.
You can keep on selling to them, so far there is results.
It depends on how you do it.

 

[Andy Black]

I'm just going to braindump...

the problems you’re trying to solve as a coach are HARD problems

I've done a bit of paid coaching every now and then. With the right clients it's fun and they move forward fast as they were action takers in the first place. But with some people its a nightmare. The problems being solved are mindset and that's above my paygrade.

I decided to do the work rather than coach others on how to do the work. It's why I have free videos on YouTube and a paid newsletter and courses. I can direct people to those rather than get pulled into coaching.

Coaching is a very different business than doing the work for clients, or selling courses. DFY clients want to delegate/outsource the work. Coaching and course clients want to DIY it.

In my case I get businesses as clients for my DFY Google Ads consulting/service, and those who want coaching/courses typically want to sell Google Ads as a service (i.e. be me).

Those are *completely* different avatars and markets. In my case I decided to focus on one rather than be split between two. (And that "one" market of business owners who want DFY help is made up of thousands of markets anyway).

Coaching is big business, and an honorable one too. After all, we tell people it's better to teach a man to fish than give him a fish, and that's what coaching and courses try to do.

I'm with Lex. It's the intent that matters. Are you serving people or "making money"?

And I agree with Black Dragon. I'd hope the smart businesses realise, as MJ said, that "Money is proof we helped our fellow man."

 

[Lex DeVille]

In my line of work I’ve met many agency owners who did $10K/mo and even as high as $50K/mo and then back to $0. Having one big month doesn’t mean you have a sustainable business model. The problem with most of those businesses is that they have no systems, so they get a big result, then come brag about it on the forum or reddit or a testimonial, and then they’re back to $0. I’ve seen this happen 20+ times.

This is generally what I've seen. It's why the mindset frustrates me. Like watching a train wreck in slow motion. I believe this is what we see in the OP as well.

So to me, it has nothing to do with morality at this point and everything to do with smart business sense.

I'm no defender of morality (and if I defend it, it's probably because it benefits me or I've fallen into groupthink).

If your clients don’t get any results, and moreover, it’s obvious that all you care about is their money and not helping them out, then you always return to square 1 — getting new clients. You have no sustainability, and no capacity for growth, because you’re still limited to acquiring the same number of new clients every month.

Keeping clients is how you grow: if you get 5 new clients / mo every month, and you keep 3 clients, 5 months down the line you have 20 clients. Your business is growing.

If you get 5 new clients / mo, and you lose all of them, then you’re always at 5 clients/mo and you never grow.

So sooner or later, no matter how daft you are, you’ll realize that retaining customers is the missing key to building a real, sustainable business. And it’s what you have to do to chase what you want most, the money.

What I've seen is by the time a coach realizes they need repeat clients, they've run out of money, put themselves into a bunch of debt buying coaching solutions, damaged relationships with close friends and family, and now they can't afford to play pretend coach anymore because they've got nothing left to work with.

So the market corrects itself, and forces you to improve the business if you want to keep growing and developing. At the same time, it’s worth remembering that the problems you’re trying to solve as a coach are HARD problems. Like really hard. That’s why there is so much demand and scammy providers, because those problems aren’t easy to solve. From this POV, the knowledge that you’ve obtained success before with the methods you’re teaching can keep you going, whereas someone who doesn’t have your experience may get discouraged and give up..

The market corrects itself, but most coaches do not improve. Improvement requires resources, whether those are financial, relational, or even internal. The people being sold into these programs are not thinkers or entrepreneurs. They're usually women or hyped up 20-year-olds with big dreams, and no history of success who aren't aware of the psychological tricks used by marketers.

These coaches did not obtain success before with their methods. Many had never considered coaching until they saw an ad on Facebook. They didn't have methods. They didn't even know methods were a thing. They are not coaches and they are not entrepreneurs. They're just people who fell for a scam.

I think we're basically saying the same thing. Again, I'm not on about the morality of scams. It's only frustrating to see people bring that mindset to this forum where shortcuts and money-chasing behaviors are not considered the norm.

If your clients get results and re-order your stuff, then it isn't scrappy.
You can keep on selling to them, so far there is results.
It depends on how you do it.

Everyone gets results no matter what they do in life. Good results are what matters. Someone ordering again based on an internal belief that making another purchase holds the secret key to their success does not mean the product isn't crap.

 

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[Black_Dragon43]

The market corrects itself, but most coaches do not improve. Improvement requires resources, whether those are financial, relational, or even internal. The people being sold into these programs are not thinkers or entrepreneurs. They're usually women or hyped up 20-year-olds with big dreams, and no history of success who aren't aware of the psychological tricks used by marketers.

This is true – it's one of the reasons why I stopped working with coaches. They have a similar business model to agency owners, but the people who usually get attracted to coaching are struggling with some form of mental health issue of their own. No disrespect to anyone, but this is what I've noticed. Most often they are middle-aged women who feel broken and have little going for them, and they're attracted to coaching as a way to solve their own problems. If you go into a Taki Moore mastermind (the coach's coach, so to speak), you'll see this type most often. No disrespect to Taki either, I actually think his material on how to become a coach is probably the best on the market. You can certainly learn a ton from him about running your own coaching business. And anyone wanting to become a coach, I'd direct to him. But most people still struggle, because they have other problems, which aren't really business-related. And you can give them the best business systems, but they still won't implement or execute it properly.

I still commend my brothers in arms who are trying to help coaches grow their business. It's a very tough market. I myself never reached above $120K/year selling coaching services. It's hard to find clients. It's OK, as a one-person business, but it's very tough to scale it. This year I've 10x-ed by switching to selling a service, instead of coaching and building what's now a 10-person team. People are lazy, and they just want the result, done-for-them, rather than coaching. They will pay a lot more for the result, and you can actually control the outcome a lot more this way too. I'm just putting this out here for anyone struggling with coaching – you may consider pivoting and changing your business model, you may find it much easier to grow this way, just as I did. You may not even understand, before you actually make the pivot, what a huge difference it makes. For me, sales became like 10x easier.

 

[Andy Black]

That's today's LinkedIn and Facebook post sorted...

 

[Andy Black]

They will pay a lot more for the result, and you can actually control the outcome a lot more this way too.

This x 1000.

By the time I've been paid less and spent more hours trying to coach someone on how to build their Google Ads campaigns I'd have done it, better, faster, and been paid more.

 

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[New Rich]

It's all a pyramid scheme. I see absolutely 0 evedence of re-orders or proof that these people actually got results. I'm surprised you found people desperate enough for this!

What the F*ck are you actually selling?

You do know this is illegal right?

Who hurt you brother?

 

[Kevin88660]

Off topic, but it helps to know the perspective and context of history when talking about Alexander.

Everyone loves to say that he conquered most of the known world by 30, but in actuality this wasn't really the case.

He didn't really hold onto all this land. After he died, Macedon/Greece lost all of this land within a few years because they lacked the resources or planning to defend it.

He wasn't leading Rome. He wasn't Ceasar. Rome took eons to build and maintain and fortify, just like any empire.

In reality, Alexander was a spoiled brat who just so happened to have the best military in the world at the time thanks to his dad. Alex inherited this when his dad died and decided to go curb stomp everyone weaker, just to lose all of the land.

He was no better than the Mongols.

But the army doesn’t fight on its own without a leader motivating them.

Everyone fights for himself. The leader’s role is to build the culture, system and incentive structure.

 

[Black_Dragon43]

But the army doesn’t fight on its own without a leader motivating them.

Everyone fights for himself. The leader’s role is to build the culture, system and incentive structure.

Yes, not to mention that most of the giant successes have had a foundation already built for them by someone else. Alexander is in this sense no exception.

Donald Trump and his small loan of $1M (worth around $4M in today's money)
Elon Musk and his daddy's emerald mines, living in the biggest house in Pretoria, safes full of money in there, etc.
Bill Gates and his mommy's connection to IBM
Jeff Bezoz and his daddy's small loan of $250K (worth $500K in today's money)
Warren Buffett whose daddy was a US Congressman with access and influence

These people all had a foundation built for them. Even the so-called self-made ones, if you dig deep enough, for most you'll find political access, access to capital, sexual favors (oh, hello Elizabeth Holmes – took an arrest and a court case for the REAL details to come up about the real reasons why she got funded) and so on. What's the real story of Sara Blakely? Maybe we'll never know...

And I would go further – I would say that Alexander succeeded DESPITE his army, many who were tired of fighting and were plotting against him. According to some sources, that's exactly how he died, poisoned by his own people, who were tired of fighting and ongoing expansion, and wanted to enjoy the spoils of war. Most didn't share Alexander's ambition.

 

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[Aidan04]

According to some sources, that's exactly how he died, poisoned by his own people, who were tired of fighting and ongoing expansion, and wanted to enjoy the spoils of war.

Most historians say he died of Malaria or Typhoid.

Everyone fights for himself. The leader’s role is to build the culture, system and incentive structure.

Yes, the "empire" that almost immediately collapsed after his death and left many people worse off than before.

Please stop using Alexander as a good example.

If you want to see historical figures who truly changed the face of the world at a young age, look to people like Marcus Aurelius, Mozart, Joan of Arc, and Blaise Pascal.

 

[Black_Dragon43]

Most historians say he died of Malaria or Typhoid.

It's up for debate. How can you be sure about events so far in the past? You can't really... But suffice to say that many high-ranking officials weren't happy due to a few things, including being forced to marry Persians (whom they saw as barbarians) and being given no rest in Alexander's quest.

That is also why his empire divided so quickly. The other people around him had no interest to maintain his legacy.

 

[Aidan04]

It's up for debate. How can you be sure about events so far in the past? You can't really... But suffice to say that many high-ranking officials weren't happy due to a few things, including being forced to marry Persians (whom they saw as barbarians) and being given no rest in Alexander's quest.

That is also why his empire divided so quickly. The other people around him had no interest to maintain his legacy.

Good points. I love how we turned this guys thread into a historical debate hahaha.

 

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[Determined2012]

Connection and being relatable is a big and important part of the sales process

This is what social media influencers bank on everyday... with every post and every reel, tik tok, Youtube video, etc.... and because the connection and being relatable works so well, those influencers are becoming rich off of it...And because they are getting rich, they are losing their relatability to their target audience...Brands who hire those influencers are now shifting to micro influencers, who haven't "succeeded" (as much) yet, so that they can keep the connection and relatability to the target market as close together as possible...because that is what best converts in to successful monetization of the brands products and services...All of this to say, in today's landscape this is very accurate.

 

[Two Dog]

Wow, the volume of vitriol on this thread is really astonishing. It's so bad that I took a few minutes to look back through the guy's earlier posts to figure out who he shat upon in an earlier life. What you find is someone who read all three of MJ's books, tossed out a few ideas (food, protein drink, SaaS) and asked a *boatload* of open ended questions before coming up with the "stop jerking off" concept.

Here's one response from the protein drink thread:

I would be more concerned with how you have made ZERO F*cking dollars so far.

One year later, this thread got started.

Now that he's making money doing infomarketing (yes, selling courses and coaching are both infomarketing), y'all declared that he's not making money in the *appropriate* way. It would far better to pull in $10K monthly selling car toys sourced from China, ebooks on learning to meditate or pressure washing. All of which are apparently considered legitimate given the positive responses from other forum members on all of those topics. Try and find another thread where someone posts about jumping from $3K - $4K monthly to $10K and hearing "One month at $10K. You're a joke."

How about some background? The dude is Muslim and viewing pornography is forbidden. Given the popularity of porn with basically every human being on the planet combined with 1B+ Muslims, it seems like a pretty damn big market to me. It doesn't seem to bother anyone that he doesn't have years of experience in defeating porn habits (could be wrong about that, don't know him personally) , but God forbid he dares to offer coaching ON EXACTLY WHAT HE DID. Which was to start selling a course to an interested audience!! Anyone who thinks years of study and degrees makes someone better able to fix masturbation hasn't spent three minutes talking with a counselor, therapist or psychiatrist. 90%+ of what comes out their mouths is expensive BS. There's no magic number of years that makes anyone qualified to advise about anything.

I'm with @Black_Dragon43 on this one. The market determines what's providing value or not providing value.

re: Tony Robbins. TR was a 17YO *janitor* when he hooked up with Jim Rohn. I'm sure a summer of floor mopping provided all the worldly experience necessary to start teaching motivational seminars along with NLP techniques. I'm not against TR in the slightest, but the only "real world" experience he had before the first paid-for-him-by-other-people infomercial was in selling other people's seminars along with his own. He became an early millionaire by selling advice regardless of whether a single person received value from it or not. Just like the vast majority of informarketing gurus.

re: $12 billionaire advice book. It's a book. Sign me up for the version where the author interacts with the student.

re: Pyramid scheme. Ponzi schemes involve taking money, promising outrageous returns and paying off earlier suckers with money taken from later suckers. What he's doing in called infomarketing, not a pyramid scheme and certainly not illegal in any country.

re: Blame the student for poor results. Yep. Same as with every coach that ever lived. It's the bane of personal trainers, educators, gurus and talking heads that the stupid people are paying all this money and just won't follow their advice. Fat people won't lose weight, smokers won't stop lighting up, procrastinators won't take action.

How is that any different than 98% of the people reading MJ's books and trolling through TFF every day?