E28: Follow the Yellow Brick Road

Erin Austin: 00:00:00

Hello ladies, welcome to 2023.

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As we enter the second year of the Hourly to Exit podcast, I am super excited to

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share some of the changes that we're implementing starting immediately.

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So as I mentioned at the end of every episode, the podcast is very, I am

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an expertise-based service provider, and I am working right alongside

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you and my clients in the process of building and scaling a business

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that I can hopefully sell someday.

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So it's no surprise that I get inspired by my clients, by my fantastic and

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generous hourly to exit podcast guest who I use as a source to answer

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all of my questions as well as.

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And from the many people that I get to hear from on LinkedIn and

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webinars and other public forums.

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So all of these inspirations have led me to rethink my business, and

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I'm excited to share the new approach that we will be taking to get

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more wealth in the hands of women.

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Now, you know, That there is no profession more wedded to the hourly model than

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lawyers, and I am guilty as charged when I went out on my own in the early

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two thousands, you know, after being a general counsel at a big company, I

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started the same way that many of you did.

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Billing hourly?

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Yes.

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I sold my time.

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I quickly changed to a flat fee model, but that was not

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because of some grand strategy.

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I just hated tracking my hours.

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And that worked well for me and provided a comfortable income

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and a comfortable lifestyle for me and my family for many years.

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And then, as you know, came the circumstances that brought

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on the unquenchable urge to do more meaningful work.

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For me, that meant being part of creating a more equitable economy, and my sweet

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spot is in the professional services area, so I pivoted to working with experts.

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Of course, that has forced me to make sure that I am drinking my own Kool-Aid.

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And the truth is that as of today, as I record this, unscalable

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one-on-one services are the sole source of income in my business.

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So I started asking how do I turn my expertise into scalable and

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saleable intellectual property?

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You can guess what Recommendations immediately started coming in.

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Sell legal agreement templates.

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Well, creating another agreement template site.

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It's a hard no for.

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Yes, I wanna increase my income.

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Yes, I wanna decouple my income from my time, but equally

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important is increasing my impact.

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That's why we're here.

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And selling legal templates alone would not further my mission.

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So I've continued my one-on-one work.

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Having many, many wonderful conversations both privately and publicly with

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exceptional entrepreneurs who founded expertise-based businesses.

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In all of those conversations, although I didn't recognize them as such at the time,

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are fantastic market research, and with every conversation, the right direction

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for me became increasingly clear.

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I need to provide more education.

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So in order to increase my impact, in order to get more wealth in the

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hands of women who can then change the world, I need to reach more people

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than I can on a one-on-one basis only.

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I can only serve a limited number of clients on a one-on-one basis, and there

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are many women who cannot afford, who are not ready for my one-on-one offering.

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And that's where education comes in.

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To increase my impact, I need to reach more of you.

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So my goal for 2023 is to make sure that everyone has access to the knowledge

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and resources required to create the foundation for building wealth.

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That means building assets and assets in the expertise based business.

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That means intellectual.

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So in future episodes of the podcast and across all the platforms where

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I communicate with you, please look forward to hearing more information that

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focuses on creating that foundation.

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That will be the basis for turning your expertise in intellectual property

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and transforming your business from an income producer to a wealth builder.

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There'll also be a lot more solo episodes that'll be focusing

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on the four key steps to.

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A new IP based revenue stream.

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Those are creation, ownership, protection, and monetization.

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So, As always, the guest experts on the podcast will continue to share

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their wisdom on different aspects of the hourly to exit journey.

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However, my offerings will change to focus more specifically on the

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first step of that transition.

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Turn your expertise in intellectual assets so that you can stop selling time.

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. But before you can do that, you must own and control the intellectual

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property created with your expertise.

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You know, all of the experts that I've had the pleasure to speak with

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have built successful businesses.

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They've used their expertise to generate comfortable income.

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They've built their reputations as experts.

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Those are all wonderful accomplishments, but like me,

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they're starting to ask what's next?

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So maybe they're getting a little burned out from one-on-one work and

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are looking to step back, or maybe they've hit a revenue ceiling and

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wanna grow without working more hours.

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Perhaps they're eager to get out of implementation and focus on strategy

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and thought leadership, and all these experts are savvy enough to know that

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they need to create assets to grow their business to the next level.

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So I was having these conversations.

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There was this specific question that I kept hearing over and over, am I

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ready to create intellectual property?

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Now, this was such a frustrating question for me to hear.

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You know, I've heard other experts in the consulting space say that you need

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to read just a certain level of authority before you're ready to create ip.

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Well, that's simply not true.

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Not only are you ready to create ip, you already are as an expert.

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You are creating intellectual property every day.

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Intellectual property is created every time you use your intellect and every

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time you pay someone to use theirs.

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I'm creating intellectual property as I speak to you right now.

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. So the answer to the question, what's next?

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What's next is making sure you own and control the intellectual property

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that you create using your expertise.

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That is the first, and it is the essential step to starting your hourly

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to exit transition So expect to see offers that focus on this initial step.

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And in particular for the B2B professional services provider, we

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are going to be digging deep into the effective use and negotiation of

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services agreements with your clients.

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Because this is the number one way that service providers lose control

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with the intellectual property.

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If you don't understand what you're signing, you're not going to be able

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to own and control the intellectual property that you are creating every day.

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So we have to make sure that you understand that , that's step one, and

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once we start owning and controlling the ip, then we'll be ready to add a new IP

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based revenue stream to our business.

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for most of us, myself included, of course, IP-based revenue

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will be additive to our current one-on-one services revenue.

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So in other words, we add that IP-based revenue stream to provide revenue

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diversification in our businesses.

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in addition to that, revenue diversification, there are a

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number of other benefits from that IP-based revenue stream.

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These include.

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Obviously decoupling income from time, it helps you create a business that

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can operate independently from you.

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Your business moves from being expert, a k a time base to expertise, a k a IP based.

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It enhances your revenue visibility, meaning you're better

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able to forecast your revenue.

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It decreases client concentration.

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We know how dangerous having a few whale clients can be and is a pitfall

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of many one-on-one service providers.

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it increases your reach and impact.

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Of course, it reduces performance risk, and it reduces collection risk.

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It increases profitability.

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It simplifies the sales process and my favorite, it transforms your business

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from income producing to wealth building.

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I believe in the value that each of you brings to your clients, and I'm

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here to support you in your journey to building a business that thrives.

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I'm so excited to be on this parallel adventure with you.

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I'll be creating and releasing educational materials that will be my IP and my IP

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based revenue stream that propels me.

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My hourly to exit journey, and as you receive that knowledge and apply that

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to your business, you will travel along your hourly to exit journey.

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So I'd love to hear from you, please.

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Any questions that you have about any of the topics that I talk about,

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in my net newsletter on the podcast.

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On LinkedIn.

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I'm always here to get your feedback and answer your questions,

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so thanks for listening and I'm looking forward to a wonderful 2023.