Jeff Bezos famously said, “Be proud of your choices, not your gifts.”

This quote stuck with me for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is a deeply seated belief of mine that, as people, we are a reflection of our choices.

I believe that’s true of every founder’s business, too.

If I've said it once, I've said it a million times: productizing your services is the key to scaling your business to seven and eight figures.

It simplifies everything.

By productizing, your marketing becomes clearer and more effective in attracting your ideal clients because you can clearly communicate what your service does and who it is for.

Most of us start our solopreneur journey with big visions—freedom, money, control. You name it.

But then the dog catches the car.

For a lot of service providers, selling custom work for a diverse group of clients sounds fun.

With each new project, you get the opportunity to learn something completely new. Maybe it’s a fresh perspective on an industry you’ve never worked with. Or a different business model, or technology you get to ramp up on.

Your mindset shapes your actions.

One common mistake new entrepreneurs often make is expecting the actions that worked for them as employees to yield the same results as entrepreneurs.

That’s because they’re using an "employee mindset" rather than an "entrepreneur mindset."

I’ve had quite a few conversations with founders recently who are struggling to find a good salesperson.

They have the typical things in place:

A decent comp plan that competitive for their industry

Enough demand to support them, or data to hunt with if they don’t

Some sales processes, a CRM, and a few even have sales playbooks

You can’t get enough social proof. Period.

You should try to capture every piece of positive feedback you get about your product, service, and business, especially if you are in the startup phase.

You probably already know that every testimonial, compliment, and published win is a great asset to use for marketing. They make great social media posts. They look good on websites. They reaffirm decisions on booking pages.

They even reinforce existing clients’ decisions to work with us.

So, from a sales, marketing, and client success standpoint, they work.

Most business problems have more than one answer.

There’s an endless number of ways to find new customers. There are hundreds of ways to sell things. There are dozens of ways to run meetings, interview people, set up reports, build funnels, and deliver services.

And the wild thing is, many of them work.

The question is, which is the right answer… for you?

Are your clients hiring you for your expertise or execution? There’s a big difference.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: A prospective client hops on a call with you or your team. They’ve got a problem. And they’ve got a solution. They just need someone to get in there and do the work.

If you’re on this list, chances are you’re a business owner.

You might also be the main person closing deals in your business.

Maybe, you’re the only person generating any business at all in your business.

And then doing all the work, too.

It’s common. It’s how most service businesses start. But it’s also why most service businesses fail. Because it isn’t sustainable in the long-run.

Sitting in 3 different C-Suite roles - Chief Sales Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, and Chief Executive Officer - has led to some strong opinions on one thing in particular: **congruency**.

“Congruency” is one of those words that gets tossed around in business circles so much that it loses its power. Right up there with “synergy.” 🤮