I always thought I was running a video agency.
After all, we were doing social media videos, FB lives, YouTube commercials, company videos, event live streams, and so on…
It felt so cool to say I own an agency.
But the reality was very different.
Working long hours, constantly dealing with scope changes and client fire drills.
And to make it worse, we were always struggling for cash, living month to month.
Yes, we grew each year but also did our expenses and our taxes.
And growth in a small agency, meant more work for me, more crap to put up with, and not necessarily more money.
The Turning Point
But in 2020, after years of trying, I finally had a breakthrough that allowed us to double our revenue the next year.
I went from seeing the business as an agency to seeing it as a service company.
And by a service company, I mean a plumbing company, a hair salon, a Mcdonald’s, etc.
Rather than being the experts applying our skills to solve any video challenge clients came with.
I did the opposite.
I put my ego and pride in my pocket and asked one question.
If we were a cleaning company, what would we look like?
When everybody in our industry is trying to be the most creative. The most unique, the biggest expert, and the most expensive.
I went the other way.
So I eliminated all services except one. Defined its scope and focused on applying all our expertise to become the best at this one thing.
The results?
Well…
It Was The Only Way
When I looked at agencies, I couldn’t find a model that would work with my vision.
I wanted to build a business that could run without me.
Build a true asset that I could sell one day or franchise if I wanted to.
And I realized the agency model is not designed for that.
So I began looking at different industries and experimented with what could work for us.
I looked into heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) companies, real estate companies, and even trash hauling companies.
I looked into manufacturing companies. Bringing in things like Toyota’s Lean Manufacturing and Ford’s moving assembly line production process.
I looked into books such as Blue Ocean Strategy, e-Myth Revisited, and Built To Sell, among others.
The outcome was a video service company that was able to run its services at scale with a small team.
Our system allowed me to step away from delivery. All while improving service quality, the client experience, and the profits!
Within months, we had clients amazed by the experience and the results. They wondered how is it possible to achieve such a level.
I know this because they told us.
Some asked me to talk to other agency owners to help them out. One even offered to invest in the business.
And this is what led you and me to meet here.
A Hard Pill To Swallow
Whether you are a freelancer, agency owner, consultant…
If you are involved in the delivery of the thing you sell, please keep in mind that you don’t have a business.
You have a job.
I say this because this hit me like a ton of bricks back in 2017.
30 years can pass and you will not have anything to sell.
If you are waiting for that one project that will turn things around.
It will not happen.
Not because you can’t win it, or your service is not good enough.
But because your systems and mindset are set to run things through you.
And so, if you want to turn things around and build a scalable business that can eventually run without you…
The first step it’s not to hire somebody to do bookkeeping for you.
It’s to transition out of service delivery.
Once You Take Action
My goal is to help you succeed at taking that first step.
Because once you do, something great will happen.
Your income no longer depends on your work and it’s no longer limited by time.
Instead, it will depend on how efficient are the systems you create.
The more people you can run through them, the more you will earn.
And once you experience that, there is no turning back.
From that moment your business starts to feel like passive income.
There is still plenty of work, but delivering the service doesn’t depend on you anymore.
This means vacations, sick time, paternity/maternity time, etc. don’t have to be put aside.
I’m glad you are here.
Welcome to the tribe.