Young and Profiting with Hala Taha (Entrepreneurship, Sales, Marketing)
Donald Miller on How To Make Your First Million in Business | YAPClassic
Fri, 31 Jan
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Donald Miller once lost all of his life savings to a bad investment. But after he decided to start taking 100% ownership of his life and business, everything changed. In this episode, Donald is back on YAP to focus on how to grow a small business! Donald will explain why we should think of our business as an airplane and why most small businesses today are failing. He will also break down how we can get ahead of missteps as business owners. In this episode, Hala and Donald will discuss: (01:00) Introduction (02:27) Donald Miller's Journey from Failure to Success (04:48) Understanding the S-Curve in Business (10:27) The Airplane Analogy for Business Structure (20:14) The Importance of a Clear Mission Statement (30:48) The Reality of Business Ownership (32:15) Core Values: The Backbone of a Strong Team (33:31) Key Characteristics and Critical Actions (35:32) The Three Essential Leadership Personalities (38:04) Making the Customer the Hero (46:49) The Power of Story in Sales (51:51) Integrity in Business Donald Miller is the CEO of StoryBrand, an agency that has helped more than 10,000 organizations clarify their brand message, and Business Made Simple, an online platform that teaches business professionals everything they need to know to grow their business and enhance their value on the open market. Donald is the host of the Business Made Simple podcast and the author of the bestsellers Building a StoryBrand, Marketing Made Simple, and Hero on a Mission. His book, How to Grow Your Small Business, provides a proven 6-step plan for growth so you can stop drowning in the details. Resources Mentioned: Donald’s Podcast Business Made Simple: youngandprofiting.co/3Eia9oJ Donald’s book How to Grow Your Small Business: A 6-Part Strategy to Help Your Business Take Off: youngandprofiting.co/42ygiHi Episode Sponsors: OpenPhone - Get 20% off 6 months at openphone.com/PROFITING Shopify - Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at youngandprofiting.co/shopify Airbnb - Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com/host Rocket Money - Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to rocketmoney.com/profiting Indeed - Get a $75 job credit at indeed.com/profiting Active Deals - youngandprofiting.com/deals Key YAP Links Reviews - ratethispodcast.com/yap Youtube - youtube.com/c/YoungandProfiting LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/htaha/ Instagram - instagram.com/yapwithhala/ Social + Podcast Services - yapmedia.com Transcripts - youngandprofiting.com/episodes-new All Show Keywords: Entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship podcast, Business, Business podcast, Self Improvement, Self-Improvement, Personal development, Starting a business, Strategy, Investing, Sales, Selling, Psychology, Productivity, Entrepreneurs, AI, Artificial Intelligence, Technology, Marketing, Negotiation, Money, Finance, Side hustle, Startup, mental health, Career, Leadership, Mindset, Health, Growth mindset. Career & Entrepreneurship Career, Success, Entrepreneurship, Productivity, Careers, Startup, Entrepreneurs, Business Ideas, Growth Hacks, Career Development, Money Management, Opportunities, Professionals, Workplace, Career podcast, Entrepreneurship podcast
Chapter 1: What is Donald Miller's journey from failure to success?
In this episode, we unpack the secrets of building a thriving entrepreneurial venture. This conversation was back in 2023. It was the third time that Donald came on the show, and he had so many incredible tips for building out a small business.
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Chapter 2: Why do most small businesses fail?
We talked about everything from crafting the perfect mission statement, when to be financially transparent with your team, and why most businesses fail today. He also explained why you should think of your business as an airplane. Okay, gang, make sure your seats are back and tray tables are in their full upright position because this episode is about to take off.
So Donald, my team tells me your new book, How to Grow Your Small Business, has already sold more copies in a pre-sale than any other book that you've ever written. So that's incredible. And I think it's a hot topic, right? The economy is not doing so well. I think a lot of businesses are struggling. So let's begin there. Why are so many small businesses failing?
Have you ever wondered what separates successful small businesses from those that struggle to gain traction? Today on Yap Classic, we're showcasing an interview I did with Donald Miller, the host of the Business Made Simple podcast, as well as a bestselling author and CEO of StoryBrand. In this episode, we unpack the secrets of building a thriving entrepreneurial venture.
Well, I'll tell you how it all started for me, and it started with failure. So failure is only a bad thing if you let it take you down, but if you let yourself learn from it, you can get somewhere. I actually, 11 years ago, lost all of my money, my entire life savings in a bad investment. I had paid off my house. I sold my house to buy another house.
This conversation was back in 2023. It was the third time that Donald came on the show and he had so many incredible tips for building out a small business. We talked about everything from crafting the perfect mission statement, when to be financially transparent with your team and why most businesses fail today. He also explained why you should think of your business as an airplane.
The other house sold, so I was sitting on a pile of cash, put it into an investment, woke up one Monday morning, and my entire life savings was gone. And it was devastating. Eleven years later, I had a 17 million dollar company with more than 50 percent profit, 30 employees. And life was very, very different.
Okay, gang, make sure your seats are back and tray tables are in their full upright position because this episode is about to take off. So Donald, my team tells me your new book, How to Grow Your Small Business, has already sold more copies in a pre-sale than any other book that you've ever written. So that's incredible. And I think it's a hot topic, right? The economy is not doing so well.
And one of the main reasons it was different and one of the main reasons I think businesses either succeed or fail is I 100 percent took 100 percent ownership of my career and my life and my business. Everything that negative happened, I took ownership of. Everything positive happened, I took ownership of. I didn't trust other people to make me money anymore.
I think a lot of businesses are struggling. So let's begin there. Why are so many small businesses failing?
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Chapter 3: What is the S-curve in business?
I put out an online course, and people would buy the online course. Anything I could do, I would do. And that started getting very successful, true to the S-curve, the initial rise in the S-curve. And we got to about $3.5 million or something like that. People were loving my marketing framework, the StoryBrand framework. We were consulting with giant brands, Procter & Gamble, Ford Lincoln Group.
I love that explanation. Thank you so much for covering that. Before we get into the six steps, I want to talk about your experience because we see you now, you're leading a $17 million company, like you were just saying, you're hosting one of the most popular business podcasts in the world. You're a business guru.
But when you first started your business, you were actually drowning in your day to day. So I want to do a little bit of comparing contrast. What was Donald like day one or like year one of his business? How did you spend your time? And then let's contrast to this to Donald now with his six steps, all the knowledge, all these like, you know, you've had so much experience since then.
Even the NSA and the government we began consulting with. Everything was going really well. I had a mentor who is still a very good friend. His name is Bill. And Bill scaled up his company, his father's company, into the billions and then took some of that money and bought other small companies and was mentoring some of those CEOs. He didn't buy my company, but he was mentoring me nonetheless.
And you have a whole framework around running a small business. So what was your day to day like year one versus now?
Well, about six years ago is when my business really experienced a transformational moment. It happened in my driveway. Before then, I'll get to the driveway in a second, but before then, I was what I call diving for dollars. We were just trying to find money anywhere I could get. If you paid me to speak, I'd go speak. If I could get a book contract, I'd get a book contract.
And I mentioned to him, I'd love for my business to get to $100 million. We were standing in my driveway after having met for a couple hours. And for the first time in my relationship with Bill, he just kind of looked at me a little bit puzzled. And I knew that the $100 million number was really big and he didn't think I was going to hit it.
That's the first time I'd ever seen that expression in him as he looked back at me. And I said, Bill, what's going on? He said, Don, in order to hit $100 million... you are going to have to, quote, professionalize your operation. That's what he said to me.
I put out an online course, and people would buy the online course. Anything I could do, I would do. And that started getting very successful, true to the S-curve, the initial rise in the S-curve. And we got to about $3.5 million or something like that. People were loving my marketing framework, the StoryBrand framework. We were consulting with giant brands, Procter & Gamble, Ford Lincoln Group.
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Chapter 4: How can mission statements drive business success?
Yeah. So with this analogy of the plane, I'd love for you to explain the rule of proportions. Why is it that we sort of have to look at everything at the same time and make sure we're being balanced and not just focus on one area and another area at a time?
Well, the problem is your business isn't worth anything. You know, if somebody comes to buy your business, one of the first questions they ask is what happens when you leave?
What somebody wants to see if you want to value your business at 4, 5, 6, 7, 8x EBITDA is they want to know that you can go to Turks and Caicos and lay on a beach for two months and never answer your phone and the business gets stronger. That's what they want to know. So the problem in my life at that time was this business depended completely and totally on me.
Let's look at the airplane and talk about the airplane analogy as a decision-making filter. We know that we've got a good sales team. There's a couple people who are selling a lot of stuff for us. It's really great. But we've got this product, and we're getting many calls, many calls. Customers can't figure out how to log in or something like that, and the sales team is answering those calls.
I was the guy who was actually necessary for this business to go and grow. Today, we have close to 800 certified facilitators, coaches, and guides who go out and teach these frameworks. Now, if I left, we would need a new host for our podcast. And that's about it. We would need a new host for the podcast.
That's a common problem in a small business. So we decide, okay, we need a customer service representative. The customer service representative, for a really good one, you're going to pay between $60,000 and $80,000. You're going to be right in there. You want somebody who can grow and run a management, manage a customer service team.
So you're going to go ahead and spend a little more money on that. That money, you've got to say, okay, is that money going to the right engine, the left engine? Is that money going to the wings? Or is that money going to the body of the airplane? A normal customer service, they're going to save you some sales.
And quite honestly, I think we could find a better one pretty easily, but I'm not willing to give up the job at this point. So we're way further along than we were about four or five years ago.
Yeah. So with this analogy of the plane, I'd love for you to explain the rule of proportions. Why is it that we sort of have to look at everything at the same time and make sure we're being balanced and not just focus on one area and another area at a time?
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Chapter 5: What are the six essential systems for business growth?
Chapter 6: How does the airplane analogy relate to business structure?
I love this analogy. It really does help you get give a framework to kind of think of it intuitively. And I'm sure that as you're making decisions, if you learn this framework, you'll start to remember these things and not try to make your plane crash, you know, do everything you can to keep it flying.
And really what you're looking at, and you can see it within about 10 minutes of a conversation with the business owner, what you're looking at, imagine how, let's say that you and your friends are going to do a great week in Hawaii. And you buy the plane ticket and you're at the airport.
That's right. I agree with you. That's how we got there. And 17 million, there's a lot of people listening who have a bigger company than that. We're still very, very committed to growing this one to try to get to that 100 million. But the way that we will get there is we'll continue to engineer a really great airplane.
You walk out on the tarmac and that plane has a giant body, two tiny little wings, some little rubber band propellers on each of the wings. And fuel is is pouring out of the fuel tanks onto the tarmac. Are you getting on that airplane?
If you're on my sales team or my marketing team, you're probably going to be paid a little bit more than if you're in the body of the airplane. And even anybody in the body of the airplane, we're trying to figure out how to incentivize you and actually have you participate in the profitability of this business so that you can make more money.
No.
No. That's what so many businesses look like. And people don't realize it's happening. Well, I hired my uncle. Well, we clearly need a new logo and some swag. Well, let's create this website that isn't very clear and doesn't actually close sales and is kind of passive aggressive. All those decisions are how you engineer a really horrible, horrible airplane.
Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Yeah, fam, spring is just around the corner and I'm already planning my next getaway and that's to Portugal for my best friend's wedding. Now I'm paying for this one out of pocket because it's not for work, it's a vacation.
If you look at every single business in history that has crashed, what you're looking at is an airplane that wasn't engineered very well.
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Chapter 7: What are the key characteristics of effective leadership?
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Chapter 8: Why is integrity important in business?
Well, we've worked with a number of politicians on the Republican and Democratic side. I'm not a Republican or Democrat. I find myself pretty much squarely in the middle and don't really like either party because I think they're destroying the country. But I've gone in and I've helped some folks. And a few elections ago, Hillary Clinton's tagline was, I'm with her.
So one last question on sales, and then we're gonna close this out. So something that I read in your book that I thought was really interesting, and it reminded me of something that Jay Samet taught me a long time ago, or Jay Abraham actually is the one who taught me about it. He's like a big marketing guru.
And you actually turn down customers whose products and services, they wanna buy them from you, but you actually feel like it's not a good fit for them. You'll actually not sell something even though you can sell it. Why do you do that?
OK, well, if I'm with her, the story is about her. It's not about me. I don't know where we're going. I'm with her, but I don't know where we're going. I don't know what we're trying to accomplish. I don't know what's in it for me if we get there. In fact, I don't even know where there is. She did not effectively invite people into a story. And so it's not that people liked Donald Trump more.
I do that to protect my reputation. And also, that's the selfish reason I do it. The other reason I do it is because they're not going to get any value out of this. To bring me in for a day, we do these things called strategy sessions where I either come to you for a day or you come here to Nashville for a day. They're really expensive.
It's just that they didn't show up in the polls to vote for her. She had an incredibly low turnout. Donald Trump also wasn't all that much better. He also had an incredibly low turnout, but he just had more people than she did. And then you have Joe Biden later on, who's running against January 6th. He's running or he's running not against January 6th.
And they're expensive because for me to take a day and not write a book, the opportunity cost on that is very high. So what we promise people is that, look, I will only do this if we really believe that easily, easily, easily, easily, you can make a 10X return on your investment.
He's running against the spirit that led to January 6th. He's running against, you know, he had all sorts of villainous things that he could point out that he's running. It was a clearer narrative.
And so it's very important that we understand unless we're inviting people into a very clear story in which they, they, they, they get to be the good character winning the day to experience a better life, people are going to tune you out. You will see examples of that everywhere now that I just said it.
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