EPS 50 - How To Plan Your Entire Year on One Sheet of Paper with Laura Posey

Erin Austin: Welcome to the Hourly to Exit Podcast. Ladies, I am so excited about today's guest, Laura Posey. Laura, welcome to Hourly to

Laura Posey: Exit. Thanks for having me today, Erin. I'm excited to be

Erin Austin: here. Well, we have a ton to talk about, but before we get started, would you introduce yourself

Laura Posey: to the audience? yeah, so I'm Laura Posey.

Laura Posey: I live here in Richmond, Virginia. And, my whole job, what I do all day, every day, is working with coaches and consultants to show them how to plan their entire year on one sheet of paper, and then how to get it all done. That is

Erin Austin: amazing. there's not a single person listening to this episode right now who does not want an easier and simpler way to get things done.

Erin Austin: So this is gonna be tremendously helpful to everyone. So I was looking at a recent, webinar that you had on LinkedIn where you talked about using your. Framework to plan your entire 2023 on a single piece of paper and be prepared for a success no matter what the economy does. And so when I think about your one page business plan, this simple success plan.

Erin Austin: I think about something that I like to talk about, which is, is there a Rembrandt in your attic? And basically that is, in business terms, not in, literally Rembrandt. Yeah. But in business terms, where we have that hidden undervalued asset that we just use in our business all the time, and we don't even realize how valuable it is because maybe we haven't even put it in paper.

Erin Austin: We just. Goes through the process. Every time we bring in a client, we go through the process. Every time we create a deliverable, we go through that process and it's just part of what we do every day. And we're not thinking about the independent value that it may have. but when we talk, when we look at whether or not you have a Rembrandt, your addict, we look at all those internal processes.

Erin Austin: And, how do we systematize 'em if they aren't already. formalize 'em if we want to use them to say, train people internally to do what you do or to license it to other people to do what you do, or to turn it into a product that you can sell separately or have available separately.

Erin Austin: So when I think about. You're a simple success plan. I'm wondering like, is that the process that you went through from services to framework to product?

Laura Posey: Yeah, I think the way so many things start is I needed it for myself. Mm-hmm. And so I created it for myself and it worked really well.

Laura Posey: So I was like, well, let me see if this works with my clients. And so, yeah, started doing that with clients. And then over the years it's, it's just evolved and grown as I've gotten better at what I do. And, yeah, now it's, really the center of everything that we do. Like, I just don't work with anybody now unless we have a plan in place first, because we all need to know what we're trying to accomplish, where we're going and what we're doing.

Laura Posey: Yeah. I mean, you say

Erin Austin: that you, the one page plan generated over 2 million in your business. By that, do you mean that was, uh, that's how you created your business or that's how you use it, exploit it, and there or both?

Laura Posey: Um, a little bit of both. Like it, it's been the. The, I always talk in, when I'm talking to folks about what I call a front door offer and, you know, it's, it's the door.

Laura Posey: You bring everybody in, and then once they're in, then there's all sorts of other stuff that you can do with them. Mm-hmm. And it's just been my front door offer for so long now. Mm-hmm. Um, because it, it just sets the foundation for everything, right? Yeah. So, um, not all, not all my money comes directly from planning.

Laura Posey: But it all starts with planning.

Erin Austin: Well, let's back up and talk about like yeah. Who is your client? Why do they come to you, and how

Laura Posey: do you help them? So my clients are generally coaches and consultants. Um, they're in the five, maybe they've hit low six figures. Um, and they, they don't wanna scale. Like, they're not trying to have a giant team and, you know, rule the world.

Laura Posey: They just wanna have a really kick ass lifestyle. They wanna make, you know, two 50 a year personally in their bank account. Mm-hmm. Maybe they've got a part-time va somebody to do their web stuff for them. Mm-hmm. Um, and they just wanna show up and, and do great work. And get paid really well and have a lot of freedom and free time to live the rest of their life and spend the money that, that they're earning.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Erin Austin: Yeah. I will say that has been me for many, many years and until, uh, recently may not recently, I've been, you know, looking at doing other kind of more scalable stuff and. And expanding. Um, but that was absolutely, you know, having that flexibility and yeah, being able to go to the tennis match if you wanna be able to hype with the dog if you want to, but still have, use your expertise and be able to, um, do good work at the same time.

Laura Posey: Exactly, exactly.

Erin Austin: And is there something, so what are they feeling then? Like, what is, what is their pain when they go, I need to go talk to Laura.

Laura Posey: Yeah, so generally they're at that place where, They've bought, you know, every online course that there is on marketing and LinkedIn strategies and lead generation, and God only knows what else.

Laura Posey: Now, it's all, uh, it's all about ai, right? Mm-hmm. Everybody's buying all the AI stuff and, and they're just like, none of this is working. I don't know how to put all this together. I know all this stuff, and I'm still not earning enough money. Mm-hmm. And so I sit down with him and. And you know, say like it, you've got all the pieces, parts that you need.

Laura Posey: It's probably nothing else that you need to learn. You just need to put it in the right order. You gotta start with like, what do you really want in life? Mm-hmm. Like, let's get really serious about your lifestyle and figure out how much that's gonna cost. And then let's build a business to deliver what it is that you really are looking for.

Laura Posey: And so we, you know, we walk through a plan, you know, and we, we look at the basic stuff like, you know, what are your goals? But we look at money goals, but, you know, how much time do you wanna take off? How do you wanna feel in your business? Mm-hmm. Um, you know, what's on your bucket list that you wanna get done, that you're actually gonna get done this year?

Laura Posey: Like, what are you committed to doing that's like super fun or super interesting? Um, And then we start looking at what are the changes that have to happen in your business if you're gonna make the money that you wanna make. And so I use a a, a framework cuz I love frameworks, um, that I built called the Success Circle.

Laura Posey: And it looks at the 12 areas of your business. And, and we literally like colored in like the, you remember the old life wheels? Mm-hmm. And you would color in the little pieces of pie to see how well your wheel rolled. We do the same thing for business. And it helps people realize like, oh, this is where I need to actually invest more time and money.

Laura Posey: This is what's holding me back. So we start putting together like, what are the projects that need to happen to make those changes? And then how are we gonna get 'em done? Mm-hmm.

Erin Austin: Well, it sounds like prioritizing, like Yeah. Yeah. Because you can't do do it

Laura Posey: all. Yeah. Yeah. And and I think so often it is just folks are.

Laura Posey: Putting all their time and energy into the wrong things. They're often getting the cart before the horse. You know, like it doesn't matter how good your lead gen is, if you don't know who your target audience is, if you don't have a good offer. Mm-hmm. Like a really good offer. Right. If you don't have good core messaging, if you don't know what your buyer's journey is, it doesn't matter how good your lead gen is.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Like, you're just gonna piss 'em away. So like, Let's get those things in place first. Mm-hmm. Right. And we can start talking about lead gen and you probably already know everything you need to know about lead gen and it's not working because you haven't done all the other stuff first. Yeah, that is so true

Erin Austin: because everyone, you know, I find that a lot of.

Erin Austin: Business coaches are trying to turn us who aren't marketers. Into marketers. Yeah. And like I'm not a marketer. I will never be a marketer, you know, Hey, I know what I know. I don't know. And so I just need answers. For that. Yeah. And then I need to move on. I don't wanna become an expert marketer. And so, yeah, so just kind of getting to the basics and getting to like, so we can start implementing and executing on, right.

Erin Austin: Whatever the process will be is. So

Laura Posey: who should I have? Who should I have conversations with? What offer am I gonna make to them? How am I gonna frame that offer in a way that they go, oh my God, where have you been all my life? And. You know, like what does it take to get them to where they're ready to have a conversation?

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. And, and it's just conversations. You don't need a fancy website. You don't need automation. You don't need any of that mess. Right. If you can talk to another human being, huh? You're good. Yeah, absolutely.

Erin Austin: I, I was talking to a colleague of mine who was starting a new business without a website and she was doing like, you know, cause she just hadn't gotten to it.

Erin Austin: Yeah. But she had all these contacts and her basically her business is putting people together. So like I couldn't talk to people. That's what I do, you know? And, uh, great sales without a website, which we now think is unthinkable. Right. Yeah. Yeah. One of the things that makes me insane is, I'll just make my little one IP little detour, is how focused people are on trademarks.

Erin Austin: Like the first thing people wanna talk about is trademarks. I'm like, who cares? Right? You have a solution cares.

Laura Posey: Oh, but I got this sexy logo. Man, I don't want anybody to take my logo. Exactly. Alright, whatever.

Erin Austin: Yes. Let's get to the basics. I love, I love that. Okay, so for our evolution of like having a framework and. Kind of productizing it mm-hmm. And using it as a lead generator, like what, how did that process look for you? Something that happened organically and you're just like, Ooh, but luck. Will it luck? Did someone help you formulate that?

Erin Austin: Um, did you use a lawyer for any part of it? How did that look for you?

Laura Posey: Um, yeah, so I, I it's definitely been, you know, an iterative process. I started selling it literally just one-on-one, like the people that I knew. I, I did a lot of, um, Speaking at one time. So, you know, when you're on a stage, like whoever's facing the back of the room is the, the, you know, the intelligent one.

Laura Posey: People just believe what you say when you stand on a stage. Mm-hmm. And, um, and so I would get up there and I'd talk about planning and people would come up to me afterwards and go, wow, I really wanna learn more about that. Let's have a conversation. Okay, great. We'd make the sale. And, and I'd work with them one-on-one.

Laura Posey: And, and so then I just started thinking like, you know, tired of traveling. And the one-on-one is okay, but I really wanna reach a broader audience. Mm-hmm. And so I just looked at, okay, what, what it, you know, what do I do with the individual people that works? What is the process that I take them through?

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. And then looking at that and say, well, how would I take a group of people through this process? What would be different and how would I manage that? Um, that group and, and how much time do they need? Like when it's one-on-one, we just lock ourselves in a room for a day and we crank it out. Mm-hmm.

Laura Posey: But if you've got a hundred people, you can't get it done in one day. So, you know, I just started looking at like, okay, well what does it take? Do, how much time are, are people gonna need to take this idea that they've learned and, and get it done so we can go on to the next idea? Um, and a lot of it, quite honestly, was trial and error.

Laura Posey: Mm. Like, well, let's try it. How many people can I do in a one day? Well, I can deliver the content. I just can't deliver. I, I can't help everybody. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, then it, then I was like, well, let me just make it an online course. If I'm, if instead of me repeating myself all the time, let me just record everything, all the training, add a workbook to it, you know, traditional online course, and then it just becomes a marketing exercise, right?

Laura Posey: That's where you do turn into a marketer, right? And that's where I, I sort of got my marketing chops, was marketing my own stuff. And um, and then I realized like, You know, nobody's life changes from taking an online course. Mm-hmm. Because most of the time they don't finish it and it doesn't matter. Like, I tried every kind of thing I could think of to like, if somebody stopped moving forward to nudge them and, and I just couldn't get people to finish.

Laura Posey: And so, um, I thought, well, what if I just. Do it live. Like what if I just do the training live and answer the questions live and we'll do the work on the calls live and just stretch it out and how will that work? And that seems to be the, the magic formula right now. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, I, I just do it with, you know, a hundred, 150, 200 people at a time.

Laura Posey: That's a big cohort. Wow. It is. Um, and I, you know, I've got a co-coach that is on the call with me, so she's kind of running the back end in the chat and everything so I can just show up and do, um, and it works really, really well. Like people actually get stuffed done. It is super important

Erin Austin: to have that live component.

Erin Austin: It is just so

Laura Posey: important. It mm-hmm. It is. And, and I think it's just completely scalable. Like I was. Thinking about it the other day and um, I was like, well, how many people could we handle on a call like that might I, I'm like, we could do 500 and we could do 500 with the team I have right now, so. Mm-hmm.

Laura Posey: Like, right. Let's see what that would look like. Mm-hmm.

Erin Austin: Well that is kind a daunting, I'll couple of things. One, you know, everyone kind of.

Laura Posey: Gets the

Erin Austin: need to the scale to go from the one-to-one model to the one to many model. Yeah. But they're not sure how it, it looks. But there are a couple of things that I think prevent them from making that leap.

Erin Austin: One is just, you know, I get paid, you know, More for the one-on-one stuff than I do for the one to many. Is it going to cannibalize my one-to-one work? How will those clients view me if I, so there's that, you know, the worry about cannibalizing kind of the premium work, let's call it. And then the other is, you know, how do I, if I have a relationship-based referral-based business, How do I grow an audience to be able to sell one

Laura Posey: to many?

Laura Posey: Yeah. Um, so the, the first question in my experience has been, um, that the one to many actually supports the one-on-one to one, one to one, and I end up with more one-to-one than I want. Mm-hmm Because of the w to many. Cuz what happens is they come into the w Toman environment and they go, mm, I need more.

Laura Posey: Right. I'm, I'm, I'm a bigger business. I, I I just need more. Can I talk to you about that? Do you do that? Mm-hmm. And so then we have the conversation and it goes, you know, from a thousand dollars sale to a $20,000 sale. Right. And, um, and it's like, okay, yeah. Can do that. Um, so rather

Erin Austin: than being a replacement, it's more like a, another ladder on the step of working More intense.

Laura Posey: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it, it just, Again, like I bring everybody in that one door, right? And some of the folks that come through that one door go, no, I need a whole lot more. Mm-hmm. And then so we just have the conversation and then we, we move into the one-on-one. And, um, so I think it, it actually helps you to have one to many.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. The, the list piece. Right. You know, I mean, the. Everybody's like, email's dead, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I've been hearing that for 15 years. Um, it still works. Um, and the, the beauty of email is that it is an asset that you own, right? You, you have these addresses that you can use and yes, some of 'em are bad and blah, blah, blah.

Laura Posey: But y you have people that you can communicate with whenever you want to. Mm-hmm. And. And so growing that list I think is really, really important. Um, I'm not a, a giant fan of building your business on somebody else's platform. Mm-hmm. So like Facebook groups and LinkedIn groups and blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever the newest thing is.

Laura Posey: Um, you know, doing TikTok videos and, you know, I mean, just TikTok recently, You know, states are going, Hey, we're banning TikTok. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. It's

Erin Austin: a pretty big state. Yeah.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I don't know anybody that's banning email. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, so I think it's, it's super helpful to start building your list and, and the easiest way I've found to build a list is one to speak.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Podcasts on stages at your local chamber of Commerce, wherever your people are. Go speak and even if you don't get paid to speak right away, get in front of people and offer them something. Mm-hmm. Have a free, something that su supplements the whatever you're talking about. And about 80% of your audience will opt in.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. And so, you know, if you think about that, okay, if I'm talking to 200 people, I got at least 150 new names. To add to my email list. And they're op, like they're on their phone texting. Mm-hmm. The code. Right. And they're getting the stuff. Mm-hmm. And that, that's just a, a, a one to many way to build a list.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm.

Erin Austin: Now it's interesting what you mentioned about TikTok and um, cuz I hadn't even thought about, you know, cause we, you know, pre the issues that we're having in 2023, you know, we've been told to make sure you own, you know, kind of your audience. And so you connecting, you're collecting those emails even if you don't have a list that you have that a way to reach out to them.

Erin Austin: But you know, the world is getting more volatile, you know, with Yeah. Issues like TikTok with, you know, Twitter, I mean, people who had massive Twitter. Um, yeah. And maybe that's, you know, the less viable things that are going on with, you know, uh, with Facebook. And so you really are more vulnerable than we ever have been when we're trying to build Yeah.

Erin Austin: You know, part, uh, any asset on somebody else's platform. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. That that is,

Laura Posey: uh, yeah, that is crazy. There's a reason they call it rented media, right? Mm-hmm. And, and if you're building on rented land right. Somebody can come along and take your house whenever they feel like it. Right? Right.

Laura Posey: They can change the algorithm. I know like with Facebook advertising, when Apple came in with all the privacy restrictions mm-hmm. It devastated. Absolutely devastated some folk. Because their entire business was built around Facebook advertising and this data that they could no longer get. Mm-hmm. And it, they lost access to the data.

Laura Posey: Yeah. Yeah. So it used to be when you went into, to set up Facebook ads, I mean, you could set up, you could build audiences by all sorts of stuff you should not know about people. Mm-hmm. Uh, Uhhuh. Mm-hmm. And. And when you would, when somebody would opt in, um, through a, an Apple device and, and certainly Windows devices is as well, um, Facebook would gather whatever information they could from that device and learn all sorts of stuff about you.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Right? That, that they could then resell to advertisers. Oh, and Apple put the kibosh on that. And so, you know, now suddenly Facebook is going well. Um, we don't know as much as we thought we did, and the stuff that we do know we're not allowed to tell you anymore. And so mm-hmm. It really wrecked a lot of people's businesses.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Um, and so I, I am a big fan of having multiple streams of lead generation. Mm-hmm. Um, and, and, you know, build some on the socials. Um, just don't. Make it everything, right. Builds up, you know, builds stuff on stages. But has the pandemic taught us? Stages change. Stages change. Yes, absolutely. Again, like I know lots of people who were stage speakers whose businesses disappeared overnight.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. I have a, a colleague who had a $700,000 business just disappeared overnight.

Erin Austin: Mm-hmm. That was the entirety of his business was live. Doing live. Yeah. It just

Laura Posey: went away. Mm-hmm. Um, pivoted pretty quickly, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. But, um, So just lessons learned and, and having watched a lot of people get in big trouble, you know, it's you diversify your assets.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. List, building your email list is an asset diversify. Absolutely.

Erin Austin: Well, speaking of assets, I mean, with your simple success plan, is it registered in the copyright office? Does it have a trademark? How does, how, how does it, you, you deal with the IP part

Laura Posey: of that? Um, yes. So I, um, the Simple Success Plan is a registered trademark.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Um, I have the paper around here somewhere. I can look it up. Um, yes, I used an attorney, I'm clapping. Yeah. Cuz I didn't wanna deal with that crap. Like, I just don't wanna deal with that crap. You definitely, yeah. And, and, and I've been on the, the other side of things like the, originally the simple success plan was called, um, the one page strategic plan.

Laura Posey: Mm. How turns trouble there? Somebody owns, somebody has a trademark on the one page. Mm-hmm. For like a ridiculous number of codes. Yes. Mm-hmm. Right? And so he sent me a very nice email and said, Hey, I own that. Was it nice? It was okay. It was nice. And we had a conversation and, and, um, and I've, I've been on that.

Laura Posey: Like I, I had a business, um, A little side business and I got an email from, or I got a letter from Media General, uh, the attorneys for Media General, letting me know in no uncertain terms that they own the trademark for the term Virginia business when it comes to any sort of publication. That is shocking

Erin Austin: to me what people were able to get trademarks for.

Erin Austin: Yes. I mean, like you could never today, but there was a time and you get Yeah.

Laura Posey: And I'm like, well, I'm not gonna win this battle. So change the name, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Erin Austin: Change business. Wow. I was curious about the Weather Channel when I said, I'm like, when I noticed I, how do you get a trademark on the other channel?

Laura Posey: You know? Well, Intel owns pretty much it. It any word. Followed by inside. Um, have a, have a friend who, uh, started a business called, um, brand Inside. And they were, they do, uh, branding, but they do like internal branding and employee development and stuff. Mm-hmm. And Intel sent them a very strongly worded letter letting them know that they were in violation of their trade.

Laura Posey: And I'm like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait. They make. Chips, and this is a service marketing company, what the hell? And Intel was like, no, we own all that shit. Wow.

Erin Austin: So, yeah. Crazy. Right? That is crazy. Well, I mean, you know, I guess it falls into the super trademark category of things, like anything that's even associated with these like massive, uh, trademarks.

Erin Austin: Yeah, kind of. They just gobble everything up, which is pretty obnoxious, but you know. This is what it is.

Laura Posey: Exactly. So, but

Erin Austin: I want to, you know, kind of go back to the point like, you know, if you'd not been able to get Simple success plan, you couldn't get the first one you wanted. I mean, there's another one.

Erin Austin: At the end of the day, the value and the trademark is the transformation that you provide. And you can exactly whatever name you want on there, you know, who cares what it's called. Yeah, it is. Yes, exactly. Exactly. But once you do have, you're known for that transformation, you do wanna make sure that.

Erin Austin: Everyone knows that's yours, and therefore that's why you want that trademark. So they know it's your, your idea, but we should not like let the tail wag the dog. Is that what it's Yeah. That we, uh, gotta

Laura Posey: have, well, it gets into that, you know, getting bogged down in minutia that isn't growing your business.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Right? Mm-hmm. Right. Like I see folks are like just obsessed about their website. Mm-hmm. You know, and they're spending hours and hours and hours and I'm like, You don't have any traffic,

Erin Austin: like nobody's gonna see it.

Laura Posey: Like just exactly right. Put up a nice looking page. Got some info on it. You can add more later.

Laura Posey: Yeah. Yeah. It's a website.

Erin Austin: Yeah. I'm sure we've all been guilty of that for sure. Oh yeah.

Laura Posey: I've, I've, like, these are all lessons, like when I say, God, it drives me crazy when people do this. It's because I've done it. Mm-hmm. Right? And, and I've learned not to do it because I've watched it fail.

Erin Austin: Yeah. Yeah. Well, we are about halfway through, gosh, we are halfway through 2023, so I don't know how that happened exactly.

Erin Austin: Insane, insane. Uh, but what, what new happened in 2023? I used to ask, you know, what do we see ahead for 2023? But now I'm gonna have to say, ask, you know, what, what kind of changes happened in 2023 as we were coming out of the pandemic? And, you know, People quiet, quitting, and, you know, all kind of gig economy.

Erin Austin: Like what, what's going on?

Laura Posey: I think it's the rise of ai. Mm-hmm. Like, that's what I'm seeing mm-hmm. Uh, in the world. I, I, I hear so many folks going, oh, I need to learn ai. And I'm like, do you even know what it is or what it does? Like you just, you've heard you need to learn it and. And I keep, you know, people that are like, oh, it can write all your copy, it can do all your copywriting, it can do all of this, it can do this, it could do this.

Laura Posey: It, it's like, it's gonna work all this magic for you. And I'm like, well, yeah, it does a lot of stuff, but you still gotta have the right prompts. And like, there's work that goes into it and, and I think there's still just no substitute for humans getting together even on Zoom talking. Yeah.

Erin Austin: Yeah. AI does not have a personality.

Erin Austin: AI has no eq, AI can't read the room.

Laura Posey: Yeah. And it's like, oh, we can, we can do a, you know, I can do a promotional video using ai. I don't know how to do it. But somebody could do that. I could say, I need a video though of me. Mm-hmm. Fake me, right. Talking about this. Mm-hmm. You know, and, and I could get AI to write the script and da da, da, da, but it's gonna suck, right?

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. You know, or I could just sit down and record a video and talk about what I need to talk about. Mm-hmm. And let people see the real human, you know, who makes mistakes and, you know, that has, doesn't do hair and makeup, and is just like, you know, a normal person. Right. Yeah.

Erin Austin: At the end of the day, like if what you do is something that someone could, you know, uh, six months ago could have gone on Google and figured out without you, then you're in the same position like you need you.

Erin Austin: Right. That's not where you should be. Right. If you're an expert, yeah. It shouldn't be just. Out there for somebody else to like kind of sift through, uh, a database and come up with whatever it is that you do that's special for Right. Getting delivered to your clients. That's still, that's still is necessary to differentiate, differentiate you from everybody else.

Laura Posey: It's, and it, it's crazy. I mean, they, the things that I see people building as businesses and I'm just like, I'm pretty sure a machine does that already. Mm-hmm. Like how are you doing it differently than the machine? Like, you know, I love my accountant. I adore my accountant. Fabulous person, right? But my accountant doesn't give me tax strategies.

Laura Posey: She just takes all the junk eye giver and puts all the numbers in the right boxes and makes things balanced. Cuz I don't really care about doing that. Right. Right. Like I'm pretty sure a machine can do that because there's software out there that doesn't. Well,

Erin Austin: they haven't. Yes. She

Laura Posey: just takes my junk and puts it into this software that she uses.

Laura Posey: Right? Mm-hmm. Right. You know, so I'm like, Hey, how long is that gonna be? Like a

Erin Austin: job. Yeah. Yeah. If you're not providing some type of strategic advice behind that, you're not able to like say, okay, Laura, what do you want, you know, retirement to look like. Let's figure out, you know, and, and, or, you know, lifestyle issues and how do you finance them and how, you know, it has to be something other than just the numbers.

Erin Austin: Yeah. Or, you know, if you are a writer, it has to be something more than just, you know, Putting together some webpages. It has to be something

Laura Posey: unique. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it, AI can write your book report for you. Yeah. Because mm-hmm. It book report isn't necessarily your opinion, right? Mm-hmm. Right. Um, and AI's gonna be better at the research, so if you're just putting out facts and regurgitating stuff, other people have said mm-hmm.

Laura Posey: Yeah. AI's gonna eat your lunch, but, yep. Yep. If you actually have an opinion and, and a strategy and a, a viewpoint, a framework, yes.

Erin Austin: All those things. Love that. All right. So as you know, this is the Hourly to Exit podcast where I encourage female founders of expertise-based businesses to build a business that they can hopefully sell someday.

Erin Austin: So, As the female founder of an expertise based business, do you have plans to sell your business? What's the next chapter for

Laura Posey: your business? Yeah, so I actually have somebody who wants to buy it, and I just keep mm-hmm. Um, pushing him away because I wanna get the valuation up. Mm-hmm. Significantly higher.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. I also have, um, a colleague who would be like the perfect fit to. To take it over. Mm-hmm. And, um, so we're just starting to have some discussions. I'm not anywhere close to ready to go. I'm just having way too much fun. And

Erin Austin: so, um, that's the beauty of building a business that you love, like you, there's no urgency to Yeah.

Laura Posey: Yeah. I mean, it, I, I've, I've built it to suit my lifestyle. Mm-hmm. And so I work really hard in the winter. And then I take summers off and the rest of the time I work about three days a week. And that like totally suits me. Mm-hmm. And I, I mean, gosh, I love the income. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, like it's just nothing like getting the check that, right.

Laura Posey: So every two weeks it's like, whoa, look. So

Erin Austin: when you talk about increasing the, the valuation, like is there something specifically that you're working on to,

Laura Posey: to help do that? Yeah. So, you know, it's always about replacing yourself, right? Mm-hmm. People, people wanna buy your cash flow, they don't wanna buy your ip, and so it's creating the machine that anybody can run.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Right? And, and the like the guy that, that wants it, he's got other properties and other lists and other. Experts who do different things, he just doesn't have this piece. Mm-hmm. And so it, it, it's a nice addition to his puzzle. Mm-hmm. Gotcha. Um, and, and so, you know, he'll just market my stuff to all of his other lists and market all of his other stuff to my list.

Laura Posey: Um, and because everything can be delivered, you know, in a pretty turnkey manner or it's mm-hmm. Um, so it. And obviously he can replace me for less than what I cost, right? Mm-hmm. Right. Um, so it'll throw off a pretty good amount of cash, but yeah. We know that

Erin Austin: revenue generator is your ip, right? Yes, it is.

Erin Austin: It is

Laura Posey: it. No, I totally get that. It's the, the thing is though, like, I, so just for as an example, I have a, a, a good friend, colleague who is the most magnificent IP I've ever seen. I mean it is. So her frameworks are beautiful. Her books, I mean, big corporate clients, like the whole nine yards, but she never built anything outside of herself.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Other than the ip. And she tried for probably four or five years to sell the ip. Mm-hmm. And could not get a buyer. Yeah. Um,

Erin Austin: Yeah, it's not, we don't, we don't create IP like, just cuz it's pretty Right. It is the leverage that we get out of it. Like how we Yes. Deploy it. That is where the Exactly.

Laura Posey: Yes.

Laura Posey: Yes, exactly. And she just never trained anybody to do what she does. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so she was going to, she was trying and, and people just said, well, you know,

Erin Austin: We'll just wait for you retire and then we'll just go get it.

Laura Posey: Like, you know? Right. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I didn't mean that as a slam dunk. Yeah, no, no, it's okay.

Laura Posey: Be where I wouldn't be where I am without all of my ip. Right. I mean, that, that's what's gotten me here. I mean, so

Erin Austin: that's, that's how we get out of this selling our time business is by creating these things that Yes. And. Exactly. Generate revenue without us. Yes.

Laura Posey: All right. Yes. That's, that's the key is the generate revenue.

Laura Posey: People wanna buy your cash flow, and if you are a hundred percent responsible for your cash flow, there's, when you retire, there's, there's

Erin Austin: no cash flow. Exactly, exactly. Unless you become employee machine. Yeah. Yes. All right. So, uh, we. You know, one of our missions here is to create more wealth in the hands of women to create an economy that works for more of us.

Erin Austin: And so I love to introduce the audience to organizations who are doing great work in that area. Is there one that you'd like to share with the audience?

Laura Posey: Yeah. There's a, a group here in Richmond called Safe Harbor, and they help women who are in abusive relationships. Safely get out with their kids. Um, they help set them up in new careers, new houses, um, absolutely everything they need.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. Um, they take care of all the legal work as well to make sure that they, they have all the protections that they need and, um, they're just great organization. Love it. Thank you.

Erin Austin: So we'll have that in the show notes so everyone can find them and support their work. And so I know you have an offer as well, some goodies that you'd like to share with the audience as well.

Erin Austin: Yes.

Laura Posey: Yeah, I, uh, I'm a big fan of giving people for yourself because it, it's useful, so. Mm-hmm. Um, I have a, it's a single sheet of paper. It's called the Daily Success Checklist. And you do like fill it out every single day, and it keeps you focused on your long-term goals, keeps you focused on your projects that you're working on right now.

Laura Posey: Keeps you focused on the things that make you a healthy, whole human being and it keeps you focused on the most important tasks that you need to get done each day. And then it helps you end the day with a reflection so that when you finish that piece, you are done with work for the day, whether that's at 10 o'clock in the morning or six o'clock at night.

Laura Posey: Mm-hmm. And you can walk away knowing that you have done everything that you needed to do today to move things forward. It's settled. You can go leave, work and be a whole human being. You can be present with your family. You can be present in your life and not be thinking about work all the time and not wake up

Erin Austin: in the 3:00 AM Not that that ever happens to me.

Erin Austin: Yeah,

Laura Posey: yeah. No, it, it, it, it's a, it's a such a fabulous tool for just looking at it cuz it, it. It's one sheet of paper, like, it's like this is what I can get accomplished today. Mm-hmm. And so you do exactly what you are capable of doing that day. And then you're done. Mm-hmm. And so there's not this endless list that's haunting you and hanging over your, your head and it's always keeping you focused on the important things mm-hmm.

Laura Posey: That are really driving the business forward. And there's room in there for all the little petty stuff that has to get done. Cuz let's face it, there's little petty stuff that has to get done. Okay. Um, But it's my number one tool for focusing in getting stuff done. And so you can just hop over to the website.

Laura Posey: It's simple success plans.com/daily. Great. And download it. And there's a whole A tutorial video and downloads and fillable versions and printable versions and all. Fantastic.

Erin Austin: Well I need one of those cuz I do have some of those 3:00 AM moments too often. So Yeah, and I'll get,

Laura Posey: we'll get you with, get you Outta those, fix me up.

Erin Austin: So we will have the, uh, links to all of those in the show notes as well. Where else can people find 

Laura Posey: you? Um, easiest places to just hit me up on my website. I mean, you can find me on Facebook. Mm-hmm. Um, I. I have LinkedIn profile. I never hang out there. I hang out on Facebook. Um, I'm not an Insta gal. Mm-hmm.

Laura Posey: Again, like I have a profile, I don't do anything. Right. Um, so yeah, hit me up on Facebook, hit me up on the website. Um, you can just shoot me an email and, uh, ask me questions. I love to talk about business and meet new people.

Erin Austin: Fantastic. Well, thank you so much, Laura. You've been tremendously generous and I know everyone wanna follow up with you with those very helpful resources.

Erin Austin: Thank you.

Laura Posey: Thanks.