Graham Cochrane (00:08.502)
If you're doing six figures a year, maybe $100,000 to $300,000, and you feel like you've hit a wall, I need you to hear this. Working harder is not going to get you to a million dollars a year. In fact, it's probably the exact thing keeping you stuck. Now, I've coached hundreds of entrepreneurs through this exact ceiling, and every single time it comes down to the same three things. And today I'm giving you all three.
The exact shifts that take someone from grinding at 200K a year to running a part-time million dollar a year business. Let's get into it.
Graham Cochrane (01:10.19)
So oftentimes entrepreneurs come to me because they want to scale to seven figures, meaning they want to be hitting a million dollars a year in their business every single year consistently and they want to enjoy their life at the same time. And this is rarefied air. only five percent of businesses in the United States make a million dollars a year of revenue. Revenue, right? And a lot of those businesses are very non-profitable. There may be
10, 20, 30% profit margins. So meaning they're taking home 100, 200, 300k. But in this type of coaching, consultant, author speaker business, you can have 70 to 90% profit margins, meaning you keep the majority of that million dollars a year, which is incredible. So that is rarefied error to get to a million dollars a year, but it is more doable than ever before. But what got you to 100 to 300K a year?
will not get you to a million dollars a year. It just won't. There are these shifts. Getting to your first six figure year, it's just takes whatever it takes. And then from 100 to 300K, it's a sweet magical time, but it's pretty much just doing a little bit more of what you did to get you to 100K and some momentum is in your favor. And momentum, the wins of momentum are amazing. However, if you find yourself stuck at around $300,000 month after month, year after year,
And yes, stuck at $300,000 is a good problem to have. I get that. But you and I are talking about we want to have better problems. So don't feel guilty about feeling stuck at 300K because you know who you are and you know what a feeling is like. If you're stuck at 300K, there's a reason. That is the ceiling of a certain level of entrepreneur. So I'm going to give you two quick hints right at the beginning before I give you these three shifts of what it's going to take to get to the next level. Number one is you are going to have to become a different person.
And not this is not scary, this is not hard, but what got you to 300K will not get you to a million because who you are is what got you to 300k. And who you are is not enough yet to get you to a million, not your personality. You are a wonderful special snowflake, and your mom loves you, and I love you, and you're incredible. I'm saying the way you think as an entrepreneur is not enough yet. So you you have to level up first. And by the way, that is the whole game of everything in life is if you want more out of life, you have to become more.
Graham Cochrane (03:37.826)
That is why we constantly are in personal development. That's why we constantly have coaches. That's why we constantly go to events. We read books. Like always be leveling yourself up. The best investment you can make, period, is in yourself. Because when you level up, everything around you levels up. Your relationships, your finances, your business, your health, your spiritual life, everything levels up when you level up. So you have to level up to get from 300K to a million. There's no hack. There's no trend. There's no algorithm. It's you.
And even if you got on a trend or an algorithm or a hack that got you to a million, it won't last because you aren't the person to sustain it. So why would you want to shortcut the process of becoming who you need to become to be a million-dollar a year part-time business owner? Okay. That's number one. But number two, this is easier than you think. Because what got you to 300K was doing all the things. Working hard, trying all the things, being gritty, being resilient.
Being willing to get your hands dirty, that's incredible. What will get you from 300k to a million is finesse. And by finesse, I mean you have to stop doing diluted work. You are all over the place. Everyone I've ever coached that is stuck at 300k in that ballpark is spreading everything out and they are diluting all of their efforts. And so dilution is the problem. It's your problem.
So to get to a million dollars a year, it's not doing more of all the things harder. You're already tapped out. You're tired. You're already working hard. That's not your problem. Your problem is you're spread too thin and you don't have finesse. So we want to get really, really focused. So this is not laziness. This is just let's, this is the privilege of being able to realize you can do less but better, fewer but better things, and you'll scale. You'll be able to triple and beyond. So
What I want to walk you through are the three major shifts of focus, because really this is a going from dilution to focus that will get you from 300k to a million and beyond. Are you ready? I hope you are. If you do this, it will work. If you listen to this and go, that's cute, but I don't like it, then enjoy being stuck at wherever you're at, which is not a bad place to be stuck at 100, 200, 300k a year. I get that. But you will wonder why you haven't reached a million dollars a year in one, two, three, four, five years.
Graham Cochrane (05:59.416)
And it's because of this. So if you're ready to level up yourself and level up your business in the process, let's do it. All right, here we go. Number one is you need to go premium. The fastest, most elegant way to scale to a million dollars a year is to be a premium provider. This could be called going high ticket. If you are selling $297 courses, $997 coaching, you know.
Packages, even $3,000 offers, you are going to work way too hard and still not reach your goals of a million dollars a year. The odds are not in your favor. But if you decide to go premium, you decide to become a $10,000 coach, meaning your coaching package is $10,000 to work with you, either one-on-one or in a group program or whatever price. But that that price and beyond, like
You are one ten thousand dollar offer away from completely changing your life. I 100% believe it. And I help people do this every single day. This is the number one thing you can do that is actually easier than what you're currently doing that can scale you from wherever you're stuck at 100, 200, 300K to a million dollars a year. And what this looks like is taking the transformation you already provide clients and repackaging it and repurposing it into a premium.
Offer a ten tausend dollar or more offer.
That is going to attract a premium buyer. It might not attract the people you're currently attracting right now. You're attracting tire kickers and freebie seekers and as Myra and Golden will call them, cheaple people and free people. They want things for cheap or free. Like you're attracting a certain type of person because that's what you're putting out into the world. Your offer is a signal. And the moment you start to put out a $10,000 offer, you send out a very different signal, which attracts a very different group of people who are.
Graham Cochrane (08:02.899)
Absolutely in your industry and niche. I've seen it in every single industry or niche. You just don't know them yet because they're not paying attention to you because you don't have an offer for them right now. So most people are diluting their business because they are focusing all their efforts on these low ticket offers. And the reason why people do this is because they're scared to charge more and they don't understand the the psychology of charging premium prices. And let's be honest, it's easier to sell a lower ticket thing because people don't have to think hard about buying your hundred dollar, two hundred dollar, three hundred dollar thing.
People buy $100, $200, $300 lotions and shoes on Instagram every day without consulting their spouse or even thinking twice about their budget. They just whip out their credit card and buy it because that price point is easy to sell at. That's why everybody sells at that price point. It's easy. You don't have to have a good offer. You don't have to be a good salesperson. You don't have to good have a good product. You just have to have something that people are willing to give a chance, take a chance on. So I get why you're doing it, but it's not going to get you to a million.
Now it's possible before you want to hate me in the comments. It's possible. I know it's possible because I did it. My first business, I got it to a $1.2, $1.3 million a year business selling 97, 297, 497 courses. But that was a different era. And it is a lot harder now to get the amount of leads and eyeballs that you need to sell.
Enough copies of whatever you're selling at those price points to reach a million dollars a year. It is possible, but a lot harder than it was. So why make it harder on yourself? Do what Seth Godin says: build a downhill business, an easier business. I call it building an effortless business. So, how do you create a $10,000 offer? Well, the shortcut is come to my 10K offer challenge. It's happening next week. Click the link below in the description of the show notes or go to 10kofferchallenge.com. If you miss the one that we're doing next week, because of whenever you're watching this.
Check the dates and see when the next one's happening. But you should come. I run this event as regularly as I can. The VIP tickets will sell out. So grab one of those before they are gone. This allows you to come an hour early each day and get your questions answered by me live. This is all live. It's five days of coaching on Zoom. You will walk out of there with your own $10,000 offer. And you will not only walk out of there with it, you'll understand why it's irresistible to your ideal person and how to sell it. And you'll be confident to sell it.
Graham Cochrane (10:18.368)
This could be the most transformational week of your entire business career. So come grab a ticket at 10kofferchallenge.com. That's the short answer. The longer answer, which I don't have a ton of time to go into today, is you have to understand what people are buying. They are not buying your thing. They're not buying a course. They're not buying coaching. They don't want any of those things. They want the outcome. They want the payoff. What do they get out of it once they?
Go through your training and material, take your advice, implement what you teach. What does it do in their life? That's what people are paying for. And we are undercharging for that transformation because we aren't, we aren't even actually confident about the value of the transformation we deliver. So it is your job and my job to first uncover, excuse me, discover for ourselves what the true value of our offer is and our transformation.
And then in the sales presentation, it is our job to uncover that for our prospect. This means stop talking about all the workbooks they get, stop talking about how many videos it is, stop talking about how many calls they get, whether they get to be in a Slack channel or circle group or school group. Nobody cares about those things. They care about their baby being able to sleep through the night so that they can sleep through the night, looking good with their shirt off, having no more back pain.
Being able to speak Spanish almost fluently when they go to Costa Rica for their vacation in a couple of months. Like that's what they care about. How is this going to transform their life even in a small way? And what is the true value of that? That is where you get your pricing from. Not the format, not the amount of calls, none of that matters. You can do whatever you want. You can sell this as a two-day event if you want. It doesn't matter the fulfillment of it, the pieces of it, which what matters is the payoff of it.
So, your number one job this week is to reimagine what you're selling as a $10,000 offer. If you are not willing to do that, good luck trying to reach a million dollars a year. I'm just, I'm trying to tell to you straight. I there there's no incentive for me to lie to you. Okay. The only reason I created a live event called the 10K offer challenge is because I thought, what is the one thing I could give people that if they actually implemented, would transform their lives? Right? And it's creating
Graham Cochrane (12:43.637)
A $10,000 offer. I just got a message from one of my past clients, Thomas. He sent me this message just this week. He said, if you ever for some reason doubt what you teach, don't. It's changed my life, man. I just threw out a few emails today and boom, $20,000. We'll probably do another $100,000 in the next four weeks. he's like, I feel confident enough to go full-on coaching now. He's shutting down a bunch of his courses. My life is so relaxed now.
A few hours in the morning, a few weekdays, and the rest of my time is one piece of content on YouTube twice a month. Then just making games. He's a video game developer, hanging out with family, mowing the lawn. Life is very different because of that single challenge week. He came to the 10K Offer Challenge, completely changed his business and his life. There's a reason why I made this event because it's the path. It is the fastest path. So I would come if you haven't already come to the 10K Offer Challenge, get your ticket below 10kofferchallenge.com. But
You need to go high ticket. That's the number one thing you do this week is reimagine your offer as a high ticket premium offer. And yes, not everyone's gonna be able to want it or afford it. That's not the point. The point is to reach your goals and allow your if you want to still help people, yes, then have your weekly content on YouTube be free. I do this for free. I serve you for free. This doesn't cost you anything but your time. Okay. So consume this all you want. I don't feel bad if you can't afford my $55,000 mastermind.
or $100,000 coaching program or $25,000 coaching program because you will be able to at some point. If you implement what I teach here, you will make money and then you can afford to hire me. But even if you don't hire me, go and use this for free. Right? So I want to serve people at the highest level with my highest priced offers I possibly can, but I also serve you here with my free stuff. And you can do the same for your clients. So go high ticket, be premium.
Number two, okay, let's let's assume you're like, I'm gonna take you up on that gram. I'm gonna come to the challenge, I'm gonna create a 10K offer, I'm gonna go premium. The second shift you have to make to reach a million dollars a year part-time is you have to go with precision in your messaging. Your messaging is not precise. And what do I mean by this is you are again diluted on your offers, low ticket, you need to go premium. You're diluted on your messaging messaging, you're super wide, you need to be precise.
Graham Cochrane (15:05.737)
stop speaking to everyone and start speaking to one person. One person. Okay. You were trying to reach everyone. You're trying to sell to everyone. You're trying to appeal to everyone. And therefore your marketing material is diluted and it sounds very vague and it doesn't really connect with anyone. And there's a lot of debate right now about niching you shouldn't niche. You should go abroad. You should always niche in terms of your messaging. Your messaging
Around your brand and offer should always be to one type of person who has one specific problem that you solve. Right? Specialists get paid. If you have a brain injury, right? My my sister-in-law's mom just had a stroke out of nowhere, very healthy, had a stroke. And they took her to the hospital and they're did some scan, there's some issue with her brain. Now,
Do you think this woman wants to go to a general practitioner? A doctor that can do, I can do everything. I do a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Or do you think she wants to go to a brain surgeon? She wants to go to a brain surgeon. Why? Because he's a specialist. That's all he does. Now, the general practitioner might know just as much, possibly, about brains as the brain surgeon, but we would never assume that and we would never feel comfortable with that because why? Because he's a general practitioner.
But the brain surgeon is a specialist. That's all he does. Now, I wouldn't, I wouldn't go to him if I had a heart issue. I would go to a cardiologist because that's all that she does is heart stuff. So specialists get more respect, and specialists get paid more because they solve one problem for one specific type of person. They are not struggling for money or for business. Do you understand that this is this is what you and I need to do? We we want to help all kinds of people, and I you will.
You will help all kinds of people, but not until you start speaking to one person about their one problem and their one payoff that they really want to have. One person, one problem, one payoff. Does that make sense? So your messaging is so diluted that you need to stop this week and get very, very clear on the number one question in business. The number one question in business is not what to do, how to do it, when to do it, why to do it. You don't start with why.
Graham Cochrane (17:31.105)
You don't none of Simon Senex stuff. You start with who? Who? Who is your person? Who are you put on this earth to serve? Who is your business built around? And do you realize that your business is the business of service? Like we are in the business of serving clients, helping them transform their lives. And so if you want to serve people powerfully, you have to be very clear on who you're serving, who you're best positioned to serve. I'm not best positioned to serve everybody.
Right. Like I am not best positioned to serve someone who wants to sell their business. I'm not in the mergers and acquisition business. I don't know anything about that. I'm not best positioned to serve somebody who wants to scale to a nine-figure business, meaning a hundred million dollar year business. That involves a lot of team, a lot of strategies and like tools and things that are not in my wheelhouse and I'm not even interested in. Right. So I'm not best positioned to serve those people. You know who I'm best positioned to serve?
Online business owners, coaches, consultants, creators, content creators, author speakers who are stuck at 100 to 300K who want to make a million dollars a year working 20 hours a week or less. I'm probably the best on the planet at that. If not the best, one of the best. Like because I've done that for myself multiple times in multiple industries, and I've done that for dozens of clients, paying clients multiple times in multiple industries. And I help thousands and millions of people do that from afar.
With my content. That's all I do. That's what I'm really, really good at. I am a specialist in helping you become a part-time millionaire. I'm a specialist in helping you build what I call an effortless business, a high-income, low maintenance business. Okay. That's what I do. So that's why I command high fees to do what I do. Somebody pays me $55,000 to learn how to do that from me. Literally, one of my clients joined my inner circle. It's a $55,000 mastermind, came to one call. So he paid me $55,000.
Came to one call. I gave him one idea that he implemented that week, and he used it to drum up four hundred and ninety thousand dollars worth of business.
Graham Cochrane (19:40.066)
He he literally created half a million dollars of revenue off of investing in in me for one call. I mean, he he's got a whole year of being in the group, but he barely comes because he's busy running his business. But I would say he got his money's worth, right? 10X's money. So I'm really good at what I do, but I'm not really good at a lot of other things. And the same is true for you. So just own it. Just own what you're good at. Own the type of people you can help and the that you want to help.
And then look at your messaging from your Instagram and TikTok bio to the content you produce, to your website, to your sales copy, to if you get on webinars, if you're on podcasts, like when you talk about who you are, what you do, who you help, look at that messaging and ask yourself: is this diluted? Is this trying to speak in general generalities to everybody, or is this very focused on the one person and the one problem they have and the one payoff they want? So
The tighter you get with this avatar, the sharper the marketing will be. And the sharper the marketing, the faster the breakthrough. It's not that your marketing's not working, it's that your messaging is diluted in your marketing. And that is most people's problems. And what's interesting is you can get to almost 300K a year with pretty diluted marketing because you don't need to sell that many things. And you can get a lot of people who think this is kind of for them.
But there's a limit and there's a reason why you keep tapping out at 300K. Because it's not dialed. And the moment you dial that in, your ideal person, especially if they're premium and you've got a premium offer, go, she's for me. He's for me. And and and they go hand in hand. If you want to sell high dollar offers, you have to be really focused on your messaging. Like there's a reason why people feel very comfortable handing me $25,000 and $55,000 regularly.
Because they know that I am the guy to help them. There's certainty, right? So high-ticket buyers, this is a lot of stuff of what you'll learn in the 10K offer challenge, but high-ticket buyers pay for a lot of things, but one of the things they pay for is certainty. They are tired of throwing money at so some subpark offers and alternatives and solutions and not getting the result. They would rather spend a lot of money.
Graham Cochrane (22:02.774)
To be certain of an outcome. And that's why they hire me when it comes to coaches who want to scale to a million dollars. Right. That's why people go to brain surgeons when they want certainty of an operation. And so the more certain you make them feel, the more likely they're willing to part with their money. And how do you make them feel certain? They realize, she's speaking directly to me. He knows exactly what my problem is. He's not like, yeah, I can help you grow your business a little bit.
no, I can help you get to $100,000 a month every month, working 20 hours a week or less. That that is a lot sharper. Does that make sense? So sell to one person, not everybody. So you're going premium, number one, you're focusing on precision in your messaging. And number three, you have to learn a word that most people don't understand, which is priority. We don't know, we we speak in terms of priorities. Here are my priorities. That's an incorrect word.
Right. If you've ever read Essentialism by Greg McCown, that's one of the number one things he taught at the beginning of book is the word priorities, plural, didn't show up in the English language until like a hundred years ago. It was always priority. It was always singular. That's the whole point, is you've got 10 things you want to do. What is the priority? What is the number one? You can't say, I have five priorities. No, it five things can't be the number one. One of them is the number one.
Right. So it's an incorrect phrase to say, I have all these are my top three priorities. No, you really have one. And so we don't know how to prioritize. We just feel like we should be doing all the things all the time. And then if you get stuck at 300K a year and you're tired and you're already working 40, 58 hours a week, you're like, how do I do more when I'm already maxed out? And that is a great question. And the answer is you can't. And you wouldn't want to anyway, because that's not going to get you to a million dollars. So
You have to prioritize and pick the one main thing. This goes down to Pareto's principle or the Pareto distribution, otherwise known as the 80-20 rule, which tells us that 80% of the results we want come from 20% of the effort we put in. It's lopsided in nature. So yes, you might be doing 50 things in your business, but 10 of them really move the needle. And of those 10, really only two of them really move the needle.
Graham Cochrane (24:24.414)
And so not all the things you're doing should be weighted equally. They should not all get the same amount of time or even be done at all because there's a few things that really, really matter. So I'm gonna simplify this for you for the sake of our conversation today. If you're a coach and you're online and you're creating content, you're likely on a platform or multiple platforms putting out content, messaging, ads, webinars, podcasts, social media, short form, long form, all this stuff, Substack, you're doing all the things.
You need to figure out what is the one platform where I'm getting most of my clients from? Not all. It's not 100-0, right? It's 80-20. But what is the one platform that you're getting most of your clients from? Are you actually getting any clients from any of the platforms? Are you just getting views? Because that's not the point. Remember, the point isn't to be famous or get views. The point is to get clients. But what's the one platform? For me, it's YouTube. For most of us, it's YouTube.
But you can decide, is it LinkedIn? Is it Substack? Is it TikTok? Where are you getting your clients from? Pick the one platform. Okay. And then go all in on that platform. Like you can forget all the other ones for now. I'm giving you permission to forget them for six to twelve months. Just go all in on the one platform.
Rory Vaden says diluted focus equals diluted results. And we talked about that in your messaging by being diluted, but your activity, if your activity is diluted, you're posting on all the platforms, but only one's really bringing in the needle, you're going to get diluted results. What if you stopped posting on five platforms and then just doubled the amount of posting you did on the one platform that really moved the needle? You would get more clients, which is incredible. So, with less effort. So pick the platform.
And and this is one way to think about this. I I have a strategy for business in six words. Do you want to know what that strategy is that will scale you in six words? Here we go. Do more of what is working. Do more of what is working. There we go. Six. Do more of what is working. Well, if that's not the most obvious strategy ever, let's unpack that because nobody does this. First of all, what is working? Do you know?
Graham Cochrane (26:43.5)
Like, tell me, what is working in your business? And by that I mean a lot of things. What is working to drive clients, not just views? What is working to increase profit, not just revenue? What is working to get your clients incredible results, not just collect their cash? What is working for your schedule? What is working for your energy levels? What is working for your joy? What is working for your innovation, creativity, and thought leadership?
What is working for your ability to coach at the highest level possible? What is working for your family life? What is working for your personality type? What is working for your season of life right now? Ooh, have we stopped to even ask what is working in all those areas? Not what used to work five years ago. Not what is supposed to work according to this guru or that guru. Not what I hope.
is working or will work because that seems fun to me, but what is actually working?
And implicit in understanding what is working is what is not working. Like what is not leading to all the results I want in my life. We should stop doing those things. And we should only do what is working and do a lot more of it. So if you're ever stuck, those are the six words to come back to. Do more of what is working. Now
problem with talking about this kind of stuff is that most people nod their head and good, that's nice. And they don't do it. And I think people underestimate the power of these three moves. They underestimate the power of going premium, how overnight you can transform your business. They underestimate the power of precision in your messaging and marketing, just picking that one person to serve. And they underestimate the power of priority.
Graham Cochrane (28:46.996)
Knowing the one, maybe two things that really move the needle in your business. Because they seem so simple or they seem cute or they seem basic. And we have been conditioned to look for complex, trendy, or interesting to be the thing we want. But I'm telling you, as a s of a person that's been in business for 17 years, next month, it'll be 17 years that I've been an online content creator and been in business for myself.
I've generated over $20 million online. I work five to maybe 10 hours a week in my business. And I'm generating around $3 million a year right now.
Just take it from me that boring is beautiful, that simple is successful.
That complexity will kill you.
And and I I just wish that the the things I offered were a little more sexy because then I think people would take them and roll with them. But I know that those who take what I'm sharing and apply it win. And they win for a long time because this is sustainable. And I want you to win. So are you gonna go premium? If you need help with that, come to next week's challenge, the 10K Offer Challenge. We'll fix that in one week. Five days of live coaching on Zoom with me. Get your ticket below, 10kofferchallenge.com. Number two.
Graham Cochrane (30:18.034)
Are you going to get precise in your messaging and your marketing?
Stop speaking to everybody, start speaking to one person. And number three, have you figured out what your priority is each week? Have you done an 80-20 analysis of your platform, of your marketing channels, of the work you do? What is the one to two things that actually lead to 80 to 90% of your revenue? And just do more of those. And I'm giving you permission to stop doing 90 plus percent of all the stuff you're doing right now.
Imagine getting 90% of your week back and actually still growing your business. Imagine what that would be like for your life. That is what is possible when you stop being diluted. And this is where most 100k, 200k, 300k coaches stay stuck for far too long. They are looking for the next AI agent, the next trend on social media, the next hire, the next.
ad strategy to grow their business to a million dollars a year, and they refuse to accept the simple truth that they aren't premium yet. They're not precise and they don't know how to prioritize. And if they can become the person who is premium, who is precise in her messaging, and who has prioritized his week, if they become that person, then the gap between 300K and a million closes in just a few months. Like it really, really does. I'm telling you because I've seen it over
And over again. And this is what I'm really, really good at doing. So whether you hire me as a coach, join one of my coaching programs, you come to the 10k offer challenge, you buy my book, The Effortless Business, I don't care. However, I can serve you, this is all I do. This is what I'm really, really good at. And this is what's working right now for my clients that are winning. So if you're watching on YouTube, leave a comment below and let me know which one of those three you're gonna dive into this week. Are you gonna go premium, focus on precision in your messaging, or prioritize your tasks?
Graham Cochrane (32:23.754)
And if you're listening on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you get this podcast, message me on Instagram at the Graham Cochrane and let me know that you enjoyed this episode and which one you're going to focus on this week. And I absolutely recommend that no matter what you choose to do, you come to next week's 10K offer challenge. It'll transform your business. I can't think of anything that could get you results faster than spending five days with me on Zoom to solve this one problem together. Okay. Hope this blessed you today and served you. I'll see you on another episode real soon.
