Welcome to Make More Money Without Selling Your Soul. The podcast for bold entrepreneurs ready to simplify scale and reclaim their time. I’m Polly Lavarello, Evergreen scaling strategist and cushy business pioneer. Join me and my occasional guests as we explore the themes of wealth, selling and well-being, because building a business that works for you changes everything. Let’s dive in.

The Real Predicament: Life Outside Business

Hello, and welcome to the show. Now, I wanna talk about how to make launch size revenue without launching, and not in a really naff way, not like a, “Just build this funnel and build that funnel.” I wanna talk to you about the very real-life predicament of so many people who get on discovery calls with me, and here’s what they nearly always say in one flavor or another, okay?

So the common predicament is, “I have something going on in my life outside of my business that requires a lot of my attention.” Sometimes that’s caring for elderly parents. In some cases, I have had clients who are experiencing cancer or recovering from cancer. In some scenarios, my clients have children, and they are the primary carer. So many different things, right?

I’m not here, by the way, to dictate what you should or shouldn’t do in that scenario, okay? I know in some scenarios, people choose to not work in that time. And if that is the avenue you’re currently exploring, please, I don’t want you to feel any shame because ultimately people are in a similar predicament to myself, which is there ain’t no backup plan.

A girl’s gotta live, a girl’s gotta eat, a girl’s gotta pay her bills. So while it would be lovely to be able to put time and energy fully into these things, sometimes the necessity to work is still there. But equally, we only have our one body, our one health, our one life, and we know we can burn out if we do things badly, okay? A lot of the time these people come to me and they have clients who get brilliant results. But what they’re also aware of is that if they were to continue earning, let’s say, 2 to 3K months and maybe occasionally a 5K month that kind of comes out the blue, they know that for the amount of time they need to spend marketing themselves, doing admin, doing taxes, what they end up paying themselves hourly isn’t really a reflection of the hours they work.

And some people have a really horrible reality check as to realizing they are earning less than they would in a conventional job, and it’s just not feeling worth it. So I guess there are kind of two scenarios wrapped into one. The one where you’re working so hard and what initially felt like, “Oh, I’ll feel good when I get to three, four, 5K months,” suddenly doesn’t feel so good when you recognize what’s involved.

And also the scenario where your health, or your family’s health, or your family’s wellbeing is something that is also your responsibility on your mental shelf, and your business still needs to be running. And I think this is really important to speak to because equally I’ve spoken to people who’ve never had to think about any of these things, and they’ve been able to hustle and they’ve told me, “Oh, I love the work I do. I don’t even count the hours I do.” And I always warn those people that I’ve spoken to many people who say that to me at the beginning of the year, and by the end of the year they’re telling me that they’ve had to ditch their business because they’re burnt out. If someone tells themselves that they love the hours they work and that they’re really happy to work weekends ’cause they love the work they do, be very careful, because a lot of us start genuinely feeling that way, but the body will say no. The body will say, “You need a break.”

So this is usually the predicament of somebody who comes to me. They’ve often been in work a few years, and they know they love what they do. They don’t wanna go back into an office. They don’t wanna have a boss. They are really used to the freedom and flexibility they have, but they would like some more money to show for what they’re doing, right? Because they’re looking at all these other people who are no more qualified than them — in some cases radically less experienced than them — who are making more money and with apparently a heck of a lot more ease, and it doesn’t seem fair. In those moments, we just wanna throw our toys out the pram, right?

So I’ve given you the context here, right? And I’m giving you this context because it matters, because very often in this space, the advice we’re receiving is from bro marketers. I hate that term ’cause it’s very generalized, but to kind of summarize what I’m referring to when I talk about bro marketers, I’m talking about people who glamorize what it is to hustle. Cancel your Netflix subscription, cancel your holidays. Your kids don’t need to see you — they’re gonna watch you working hard and making money, and that’s the best thing you can do for your kids. Quite a few toxic things that can feel reassuring in those early stages. And look, I’m not gonna pretend earlier on in business there isn’t what I refer to as the push before the cush. But despite there being a push before the cush, it is really important that we get ourselves out of that mindset, out of those habits, out of those behaviors when we recognize we’ve achieved growth — because to get to the next level of scaling, it is not about working more hours, ’cause there are no more hours to be found.

Working Smarter, Not Harder

It is about working smarter. And a lot of people at this stage will almost not feel safe recognizing that more doesn’t always necessitate more. It is the whole “work smarter, not harder” thing — I know it sounds like a cliché, but it’s mother-effing true. So yeah, and obviously why are they talking to me? Because I am the woman who, back in 2020, was two years into being on Universal Credit with two young children. I literally grew my business within a baptism of fire, and I did burn myself out basically at the very beginning of my business — before I even went all in as a personal brand.

The 3 Things You Need for 10K Months

To get to that first 10K, you require essentially three things. You require a strong brand, and it really helps to have a hyper niche — not just “I help women with their health,” because that’s not even a niche. What kind of women? What about their health? What is the result they desire? What is keeping them up at night that you promise to solve?

I have a wonderful client inside the accelerator who came to me and shared she loved being a witchy therapist but wasn’t sure if it was marketable. I encouraged her to double down on that niche, and now she’s got 8,000 followers — I don’t think she was even at 1,000 when we started working together. The engagement is properly up because people are so excited to see that transformation from therapist to someone who understands them. That’s why simple, authentic niching works. So often we overthink our niche — it’s very often just who we are, stripped back, not hiding in the shadow but stepping into the light.

Okay, so strong personal brand is the first piece you need. Second part is you need an offer, and ideally I recommend starting with a 12-week premium offer — 12 weeks to a desired transformation. If it needs to be 8 weeks, make it 8. People will much more happily hand over their money for something where they can see the result by Christmas, or by the summer, or by Easter — it’s much easier for you to say, “Here are the steps we take to get there,” because with defined steps you won’t have to do crazy mental gymnastics to explain it. So you’ve got a personal brand, you’ve got the offer, and your time is divided between marketing, selling, and client delivery. As you learn what your clients repeatedly need support with, that becomes the basis of your group program — because you can’t hit 10K months on a premium offer alone; a group program is the next step.

Building Your Simple Offer Suite

So that’s how the simple offer suite gets built: mini offer, group program, and premium offer. A lot of my clients, as their group program scales, either remove one-to-one work altogether or add a premium mastermind — whatever floats your boat. As you’re making more money, you have options. At one point I was making 30K a month from my group program alone — that was fun. That’s how it gets to be. Use a premium offer, personal branding, and list building to get to a 10K month, then layer in a mini offer so when you’re running ads to grow your list, you have an exciting, low-cost entry point for people to get to know you through a mini offer or workshop.

The Mini-Offer Funnel & Workshop

That’s the funnel. On top of that, I’ll be running a workshop taking people through actual case studies of what it looks like and how they can implement this in their own health and wellness business. I’ll talk more about that workshop in September.

Key Takeaway: Simplicity Is Queen

So if you wanted to think about the core thing to take from this episode, it’s that simplicity is queen. Keep your offer suite simple. Put yourself in the shoes of your ideal client — they don’t want 15 different ways to work with you. More options creates overwhelm, and while people are still clicking around trying to decide, a competitor will come in with a clean, easy path and you’ll lose them. So keep it simple, and keep it clearly connected to what your ideal client desires. If you’re not feeling that ease right now, I’d recommend downloading my guide to get a clearer vision of what you need to be focusing on, because inside that guide I also share what to focus on and when — which is really important when it comes to business growth.

I really enjoyed recording this episode, and I hope you enjoyed it too. If you have any questions, hit me up in my DMs. I’ll see you in the next episode. If you enjoyed this episode, as always, please share it, and leave me a lovely review — I read every single one, and it makes me smile ear to ear every time a new one comes in. I’ll be in your ears next week!