In this episode, the speaker, Alex, shares his insights on business strategy and growth, drawing from his experience with acquisition.com. He emphasizes the importance of focusing on actions that attract and retain customers, increase their value, and ensure these processes are sustainable. Alex discusses the significance of delegating tasks effectively and the pitfalls of being unable to have difficult conversations with underperforming team members. He introduces strategic frameworks like "What? Who? How? So?" for decision-making and stresses the need for businesses to prioritize impactful and easy tasks over new, untested ideas. Alex candidly addresses the common desire for quick success and the reality that consistent, incremental improvements are the key to substantial growth. He also touches on the power of word-of-mouth marketing and the critical role of product quality in business success. Finally, Alex advises listeners to work on the core aspects of their businesses, such as customer lifetime value, before scaling or marketing aggressively.
"And so you like, give your clients all these lectures about self discipline and being hard and believing in your better self. But, like, you will take actions that are, in direct contradiction."
The quote highlights the inconsistency between preaching self-discipline to clients and failing to follow through with disciplined actions in one's own business practices.
"The wealthiest people in the world see business as a game."
This quote emphasizes the perspective of successful business people who treat business ventures as strategic games to be won.
"And the first framework that I wanted to give you around strategy is how does this get us more customers? How does this make them worth more? And how does this increase the likelihood that those two first things don't stop happening?"
The quote outlines a strategic framework for business growth focused on customer acquisition, customer value, and sustainability of growth strategies.
"The difference between the guys who become bigger business owners and the ones who don't is they have to think, how can I get my team to do this for me?"
This quote discusses the importance of delegation in business expansion, suggesting that successful business owners think strategically about how to involve their team in task execution.
"If you've given the same who the same thing twelve weeks in a row, like, each quarter, and the what's not done, the who's the problem."
The quote suggests that repeated failure to complete tasks by a team member indicates a performance issue that needs addressing for the health of the business.
"More, better, new. So as soon as we figure out that we have the highest strategic leverage activity that we can in a business, we then are asking ourselves, can we just do more?"
This quote introduces a framework prioritizing the expansion and improvement of current successful strategies before exploring new avenues.
"The thing that is killing most of you guys is the desire to ten x in 90 days and then not doing it and trying something new and hoping for a silver bullet that never comes."
The quote warns against the unrealistic expectation of rapid, massive growth and the tendency to abandon steady progress in search of a miraculous solution.
"If you actually just wrote all the things that you need to do down and then you tick them off and you realize that it takes two years to build an exceptional business and you did nothing but just actually do all the shit you know you should be doing, you usually build a pretty exceptional business."
This quote emphasizes the value of methodically completing tasks that are essential for business growth rather than seeking shortcuts.
"Because the thing is that that list for a $10 million company is longer and bigger. That list for a 100 million dollar company is longer and bigger. And it's just shit that needs to get done."
The speaker points out that the complexity and volume of tasks increase with the size of the company, highlighting the importance of scaling efforts appropriately.
"So when you have your big list of shit. Just put it as 1234. Just put a number next to it. Really easy, lots of impact. Really easy. Do these first."
The speaker suggests a simple method for prioritizing tasks, which involves ranking them based on ease and impact to tackle them effectively.
"Branding is the consistent action of associating the unknown with the known."
This quote defines branding as a process of creating familiar associations with something that is initially unknown to the audience.
"No one knows that you exist to begin with. What are we talking about? You're like, I want to rebrand. It's like, why?"
The speaker critiques the premature focus on rebranding when the initial brand has not yet established significant market presence or recognition.
"Referrals, by the way, are nonlinear in that they are exponential in nature. Two bring four, four bring eight, et cetera."
The speaker highlights how referrals can exponentially increase customer base without direct marketing efforts.
"Once you get that right, then when you're pouring all this gas in, you can catch it. Because if you got a hole out the other side, your constraint is the fact that people don't stay."
This quote underscores the importance of customer retention before focusing on acquiring new customers, using the metaphor of fueling a vehicle to illustrate the concept.
"The guys who can spend the most money on marketing are the ones who make the most money from ads."
The speaker explains that businesses with a high LTV can afford to invest more in marketing, which in turn can generate even higher profits.
"It's like you have to solve the root issue."
The speaker stresses the importance of addressing the underlying problems in a business rather than looking for superficial solutions or marketing gimmicks.
"I just feel like so many of the gyms that I see and I go to, it's obvious, takes 5 seconds to see why they're not successful."
This quote suggests that often, the reasons for a business's lack of success are apparent to an external observer, though not always to the business owner due to their emotional investment.
"Onboarding, nonexistent churn through the roof. You should see my trainers slaving each other. It's terrible place. Absolute pig style."
This quote highlights the speaker's recognition of the problematic onboarding process and the high turnover rates within the company, as well as the stressful conditions for trainers.
"I'm going to market it. I'm going to market it real quick."
The speaker intends to focus on marketing strategies to improve the business situation.
"The only ask that I can ever have of you guys is that you help me spread the word so we can help more entrepreneurs make more money, feed their families, make better products, and have better experiences for their employees and customers."
This quote expresses the speaker's sole request for audience support in sharing the podcast to benefit other entrepreneurs.
"One brand is making associations between things that are intangible, with things that are tangible and unknown."
This quote defines branding as the creation of associations between the service offered and the intangible qualities that a company wants to be known for.
"If you feel sad, immediately translate that into I do not know what to do next."
The speaker offers a perspective on sadness, equating it to a lack of knowledge on how to proceed, which simplifies the approach to resolving the issue.
"If you have lots of options and you feel anxiety, it's because you don't know how to pick, which means you have to prioritize."
This quote connects anxiety to the challenge of making choices among many options, highlighting the need for prioritization and strategy.
"If you do not know what the constraint of your business is, you will not solve it."
The speaker emphasizes the necessity of identifying the primary limitation in a business to overcome it and improve the business.
"The definition of intelligence as I define it is rate of learning."
This quote offers the speaker's personal definition of intelligence, focusing on the speed of learning new information or skills.
"Same condition, new behavior, which means the phone rings, and I trained you, and you answer it one way before I train you."
The speaker uses an example to illustrate learning, showing that a change in response to a repeated situation signifies that learning has taken place.
"The more problems I do, the higher my score is."
This quote reflects the speaker's understanding that consistent practice and problem-solving lead to improved performance, as demonstrated by their GMAT preparation.
"There's only eight ways to get customers. You got warm outreach, you've got cold outreach. You got paid ads, you've got content."
The speaker simplifies lead generation into four fundamental strategies, suggesting that these are the only ways to attract customers.
"You either spend $100 a day on ads, you do 100 cold outreaches, you do 100 warm outreaches, or you do 100 minutes of content."
By introducing the "rule of 100," the speaker provides a quantifiable target for daily marketing activities to drive business growth.
If I can go get my customers to tell everybody about my book, then I won't have to.
This quote highlights the concept of using customer referrals as a form of leverage to promote a product without the direct involvement of the business owner.
If you want to get more leads, you have to do these things. If you want to get even more leads, you get other people to do these things for you, which starts with you doing these things to get those people.
This quote emphasizes the fundamental process of generating leads by initially doing outreach oneself and then scaling by having others do it for you.
Business can feel confusing, and usually it's because we have not defined terms.
This quote suggests that a lack of clear definitions can lead to confusion in business operations and communication.
Giving away really good free stuff, great way to get more people to opt into your thing.
This quote suggests that offering valuable freebies can be an effective strategy to attract more customers or users.
The franchises that are the most successful simplify it.
This quote indicates that simplicity is a common trait among successful franchises, particularly when they are scaling up.
The only way to become enduring with your business, if you want to sleep well at night, you have to fix the back end.
This quote stresses the importance of having a solid operational foundation to ensure business longevity and peace of mind.
I actually think your margins blow and I think you have a lot of interest because that's why I took the call. I knew the brand and I was like, I think you have really good products. I think you just have to get the ops right, so get your margins in check, right?
This quote underscores the importance of operational efficiency and profit margins over marketing efforts when it comes to improving a business's financial health.
Hey, if you find three, three months ahead, next month another 1%, and twelve months from now, you would have a business that would be sellable, would be investable, and would have already tripled or whatever was the profit of that, and made it a scalable enterprise.
This quote advocates for a methodical approach to improving profit margins by setting achievable monthly goals, which cumulatively can have a significant impact on the business's value and scalability.