608: The 5 Levels to a Million-Dollar Creative Business

I think more creatives should be millionaires. Today I'm going to walk you through step by step how to actually do it. Let's dive in. I'm a huge believer that your business should support your life not the other way around. But for most creatives, this is not the reality. Instead of you running your business, it feels like your business is running you and it's like a runaway train. It feels like you're always chasing invoices, delivering to clients, managing projects, then you've got to market your business and you've got to make sure you actually eat some food. It gets overwhelming. And when your business feels like that, what it means is that freedom, the very reason you started your business, feels further and further away. But the problem is, most creatives haven't seen the pathway to build a million dollar creative business on their terms, to build a million dollar creative business that gives them the freedom they want, that allows them to work on the projects that they want, to work in their genius zone, to work with their dream clients, choose when and where they work, all of that good stuff, they don't have a pathway for that. And so today, I'm going to show you the exact pathway to build a million dollar creative business without losing your freedom, without losing your soul, without burning out or becoming just a glorified manager of people. This is the pathway that I will every single one of my creative clients through. It is a game changer. It's super strategic. And it's the thing that you need if you want to hit seven figures in your creative business. So let's dive into it. There are five levels to building your million dollar creative business. There are five core pieces that you have to go through step by step. And we have to get the order of this right. What's really interesting is that hitting a million dollars a year in your creative business doesn't actually come about by you doing more. It's actually about you doing the right things in the right sequence. It's about doing the right things at the right times. So the first thing we need to do is, I love that ASMR. So level one, the thing that we must do first is we need consistent revenue, consistent revenue. So what does this mean? This means, well, can I get consistent clients month on month? So this is where we really need to think about, OK, do I have a really killer offer that my dream clients are like, oh my goodness, take my money, right? So this is about your offer. Do I have consistent, repeatable lead flow? Or am I relying on referrals and word of mouth? Do I actually have a lead generating system in place to consistently get new clients every month? And then the third piece is, can I actually, once I get the leads, can I convert them? So do I have a really dialed in sales process, a sales funnel? Do I have a structure for how I sell that converts really well? OK, I didn't mean for that to rhyme, but it did. It's perfect. So the reason we start here is because if we don't have this consistent revenue, we can't scale. We need the consistency so that we can hire, so that we can actually expand and grow. We've got to start here. So that's level one. Level two-- once we've got the consistent revenue, level two is growing profit. So once we've got level one dialed, we've got this consistent revenue. The next level is all about growing profit. Now profit is really about, OK, how much money am I keeping? When I take out tax expenses, equipment, all of the things that actually are required to run my business, how much am I keeping in my business? And what's really interesting here is a lot of creatives, just whatever money's left over after that, they kind of count that as their salary. But what I want you to think about is, OK, if I'm operating like a seven-figure business owner, I need to take a salary from the business. And I need to take profit from the business. So not only is it about, OK, how much money is the business making, it's also about you. How much money are you actually taking home? We also want to think about, well, do you have a financial buffer? We want to think about your cash flow. If something happened and you couldn't work for three months, do we have a really good buffer in our bank account to look after us? So profit is what keeps our business alive. Revenue is where we start, but profit is really where we level up again. And here's what I want you to take away from this. This is an action for you. I want you to look at your pricing. I want you to look at your expenses and actually look at, OK, what are the raw costs of me doing this? Think about your salary. What would you make in the real world? OK, that needs to be your salary. And then profit happens on top of that. And so I want you to think about your pricing. I want you to think about, OK, well, maybe I'm not charging enough. If I don't have profit left over, most creatives are under charging when they come to me. So we're thinking about, well, all right, you need to make profit. You need to charge more. Level three on this million dollar creative path. We've got consistent revenue. We've got growing profit. Now we have strong leadership, strong leadership. This is where we're really thinking about, OK, can the business run without you? Can the business actually run without you? If you took a month off, could the business operate without you? Do you have team who can handle the delivery? Do you have team who can support you in the marketing? Who can sell for you? This is where we get you out of the chief everything of a subplace and we step you into this creative CEO space. So when I'm thinking about strong leadership, I'm thinking about your team. I'm thinking about your systems and operations. I'm also thinking about your mindset and your identity. Because for you to go from being a photographer to being a CEO, there is a big mindset level up here. So this is where we have to go, OK, I'm not just the technician anymore. I'm not just a creative. I am a CEO. I'm a leader. I have to onboard my team. I have to hire well. I have to set expectations. I have to build systems so that this is actually a business that can make a million dollars a year and can ultimately run without me. That's the kind of business we're wanting to build. Another piece of resistance that can happen here at this level is if you are a control freak, it can be really difficult and really challenging to delegate. Oh, no one's going to do it as good as I could. Oh, like, they're going to stuff it off. I'm going to have to redo their work anyway. It's just easier if I do it myself. I hear this all day long. Strong leadership means letting go of control. It means delegating. It means setting up systems and expectations with your team so that you are not doing all of the things. And Dehrmartel says 80% done by someone else is 100% freaking awesome. And so we need to adopt that mentality here as well. So at this strong leadership level, this is where we move out of being just the creative and we stop being the bottleneck. All right, level number four is high leverage. This is where the business really starts working for you. This is kind of where it's like a 1 plus 1 equals 5 situation when we have leverage. So there are three key ways that you can get high leverage in your creative business. Number one is having one to many offers. An example would be if you're a web designer, you might have people come to you that aren't quite ready for your high ticket offer. And you say, hey, listen, I've actually got a template that you can install yourself. And you've built the template once, they purchase it, and they install it in their business. And it's like done and dusted. There's no actual time required from you. OK, that's one example. Digital products could be another one. Maybe it's a coaching program. Maybe it's a course. Maybe there's like a how-to series that you have. Or maybe you have an AI tool that you want to share with people. All of these things, people can purchase. And what's really cool about that is you create it once. It keeps delivering for you. And there's no time for money involved. OK, that's one way that you can have leverage. Not every creative that comes to me wants to do that. And that's totally fine. OK, but that's one thing. The second piece is recurring revenue. Recurring revenue in your creative business is a huge piece of leverage. Because if you have to go out every single month and generate new work, it means that you're having to chase new leads every single month. But if you've got recurring revenue, whether it's a membership, whether it's a retainer, whether you've got people on a project basis with you that you work with consistently, that gives you beautiful, predictable revenue. It's really good for your cash flow. It's really good for your business to stack that lovely recurring revenue. Not to mention, it makes your business a little less stressful because you're not having to chase new work every month. So that's another piece of leverage. That's another lever that we can pull. The third piece-- and this is really interesting and exciting-- the third way you can get high leverage in your creative business is by building a brand. In the age of AI, where there's so much noise, there's so much content out there, one of the highest leverage activities you can do is build a brand. Whether it's a personal brand, a company brand, whatever. You need to build a brand so that you are the only option in your niche. If people feel more connected to you, they're going to buy from you. As opposed to all the other graphic designers, all the other videographers, all the other photographers out there, if they feel a deep connection and loyalty to you, then they are going to choose you every single time. So that gives us leverage, especially in the age of AI. Now I want to make this really clear. You do not need all three of these things to build leverage. Choose one or two and focus in on that. Final level. My favorite is true freedom. This is the whole point. This is the reason you quit your day job and your family thought you were crazy because you started a business. This is why we do it. So when I think about freedom, I'm really thinking about the question, okay, do I actually have the wealth, the time, the flexibility, and the control to design my life on my terms? This is where we move from, okay, my life is just all about the business to know that the business supports my life. So we have to get really, really clear on what it is we want from the business. We don't just want a job, we don't just want a career. We actually want freedom. So we've got to set the business up really intentionally to give us that. So when I think about true freedom for creative, I'm thinking about three cool things. The first is choice. Do you have flexibility to choose when you work? Where you work? Who you work with? What you work on? Or are you stuck doing everything yourself? Are you taking on projects that don't light you up because you just don't have these foundations in place? That's like the first thing. The second thing is we're thinking about empire. Now, empire is kind of a funny word and I think people can go, oh, I don't know if I want to build an empire, Laura, I just want to pay my bills and have a nice life. When I think about empire for us as creators, I'm thinking about, okay, how are we using the money that we're making in the business to actually set us up financially for the future? To set up wealth for the future. So maybe it's investments. Maybe you want to be able to like actually diversify your income. These are really important things for us to do. So not all of our eggs are in one basket. Imagine if your business not only gave you the fulfillment in the work that you do, but it actually set you and your family up financially for the future. That is what is possible when you build this seven figure creative business. This business that is super profitable, that is highly leveraged and that can run without you. This is what's possible for you. So the third and final piece here when it comes to true freedom is legacy and impact. For me, true freedom is not just about me. It's about my community. It's about my family. It's about organizations that I really care about. If we could make a crap load of money, who else does it impact? Because then it becomes, well, I'm not going to play small because this person misses out if I play small. My family misses out. My partner misses out. My local community misses out. Or maybe there's a global organization or a charity or someone else that you want to partner with and donate money to. If you don't make a crap load of money, you can't help those people. And so that should be the driver of like, this is why I'm hustling. This is why I'm working my cute little butt off because I want to impact more people beyond just me. These are the five levels. This is the million dollar creative pathway. What's really important is we need to do this in the right sequence. These are the building blocks. You need to do these in order. Okay, you've got to start at level one, then to level two, then then we move up from there. When revenue is consistent, when profit is intentional, when leadership is strong, and when leverage is built, then freedom becomes inevitable, which is really, really exciting. Now, this is the million dollar pathway. And if building a million dollar creative business is your goal today, then my friend, I want to encourage you. Get to it. Get to work. It's possible for you.