As a business owner, you won’t be able to achieve personal Financial Freedom if you aren’t customizing your business. But since there are thousands of ways to get there, how do you know which is right for you?
All the well-meaning advice in the marketplace is too often a distraction. And rather than helping, you just feel overwhelmed.
We’re constantly bombarded with messages like:
“You need to focus on SEO, or your website will fail!”
“If you don’t start a podcast today, you’ll never develop a customer base!”
“Create an email funnel right now, or your business will collapse!”
Stop.
Breathe.
Ignore the panic these messages are designed to create. Because you’re smarter than that. You chose your own path—the one that led to you becoming a business owner.
And now you’re here to learn how to use the same entrepreneurial spirit that inspired you to set out on your own to make your business even more successful.
Where To Start Customizing Your Business
Customizing your business is crucial, but you don’t have to do everything at once.
Instead, you need to focus with precision on customizing your business the way that works best for YOU.
That’s why, in Chapter 9 of our book, The Truth: The Real Secret to Building a Business That Sets You Free, we discuss the five distinct Product Types that most businesses offer:
- Packaged Products – Self-contained physical or digital products. Examples are the computer or mobile phone you’re reading this on or non-physical product like digital courses and e-books
- Continuity – These are subscription-based products or services. Amazon Prime, Office 365, the Mindshift.money community, etc., that provide ongoing support for business owners like you.
- Partner Products – In this case, you work alongside someone to leverage your collective knowledge and interests to create a product.
- Affiliate Product – Usually a product produced and sold by someone else that you market to your audience. You receive a commission from any sales. Bloggers use this model to generate revenue creating blog posts based on an affiliate product that interests their readers.
- Coaching and Consulting – A more personal experience, coaching and consulting is all about creating custom solutions to issues based on your knowledge and experience. This is usually performed as one-on-one or group mentoring, training or coaching.
Where Does Your Business Fit?
For many business owners, your product will fit perfectly into one of these categories with no problem. For others, figuring out your product type isn’t so cut and dried. In fact, you may offer products that match multiple areas!
So how do you decide what product to focus your time and energy on?
First, list all the products or services you currently offer. Write a one to three sentence summary of what each does for your customers.
Next take a close look at the five Product Types listed above. Based on your product descriptions, how do your current offerings fit into these categories? Write down the Product Type you decide on next to each item on your list.
At this point, pause, and take a moment. Think back to when you first started your business. Remember the excitement and anticipation you felt when you made the decision to strike out on your own?
Write down the important WHY. Why did I start my own business?
Now, look back at the list you created.
What products are you currently offering that inspire the same feeling you had when you started out? Alternatively, what products would you like to stop offering altogether? Last, what new products do you want to offer that align more with who you are and what your mission is.
Once you’ve decided what mix of Product Types to use to customize your business, you can move forward with an intense focus on one or two areas rather than splitting your focus across all five.
Business Owner Bonus Tip
Evaluate each Product Type and make a decision about how those five Products will collectively make up 100% of your business.
Will 50% be Continuity and the other 50% be Coaching and Consulting? Or will you offer 100% Coaching and Consulting? Maybe 100% of what you sell is Affiliate Products. Or maybe you don’t sell Affiliate Products at all.
It’s really up to you and what’s right for your business model.
Need help designing your Perfect Business Model? Check out Module Two of our Cash Flow Cure Program where I explain each piece and walk you through the two key components of creating your Perfect Business Model—the business model that will truly set you free.
Our goal is to stop trading our time for money. Time is our most precious resource, and we need to be extremely selective about how we spend it.
Ready to take the next step and use customization to grow your business?
Join our tribe of courageous and dedicated business owners at Mindshift.money. You’ll connect with others who are hungry for change in both life and business. Also, you’ll have access to the Perfect Price Calculator that will help you easily work through setting prices for the products in your customized business model.
Start focusing on making your business the best it can be for YOU.
Makaylah Rogers is the co-founder of MindShift.money. She is a Thought Leader for her generation, teaching people how to rewrite their “money rules.” With an extensive background in wealth building and personal development, Makaylah’s path has taken her into executive roles in various fields including launching startups, real estate sales and motivational keynote speaking.