Business Was Hard Until I Understood These 4 Concepts

How I got here…

21: Graduated Vanderbilt in 3 years Magna Cum Laude, and took a fancy consulting job.
23 yrs old: Left my fancy consulting job to start a business (a gym).
24 yrs old: Opened 5 gym locations.
26 yrs old: Closed down 6th gym. Lost everything.
26 yrs old: Got back to launching gyms (launched 33). Then, lost everything for a 2nd time.
26 yrs old: In desperation, started licensing model as a hail mary. It worked.
27 yrs old: "Gym Launch" does $3M profit the next 6 months. Then $17M profit next 12 months.
28 yrs old: Started Prestige Labs. $20M the first year.
29 yrs old: Launched ALAN, a software company for agencies to work leads for customers. Scaled to $1.7mmo within 6 months.
31 yrs old: Sold 75% of UseAlan to a strategic buyer in an all stock deal.
31 yrs old: Sold 66% of Gym Launch & Prestige Labs at $46.2M valuation in all-cash deal to American Pacific Group. (you can google it)
32 yrs old: Started making free content showing how we grow companies to make real business education accessible to everyone (and) to attract business owners to invest or scale their businesses.

Today: Our portfolio now does $200M/yr between 10 companies. The largest doing $100M/yr the smallest doing $5M per year. Our ownership varies between 20% and 100% ownership of the companies. Many of them we invested in early and helped grow (which is how we make our money - not youtube videos).

To all the gladiators in the arena, we’re all in the middle of writing our own stories. The worse the monsters, the more epic the story.

You either get an epic outcome or an epic story. Both mean you win.

Keep crushing. May your desires be greater than your obstacles.

Never quit,

Alex

*FULL DISCLOSURE*
I make content to make money - just - on a longer time horizon than most. I want to build trust with business owners so we can find the best ones and help them scale. And if they’re awesome, write them a check and go all the way as partners.

[vedanshsrivastava]

00:02 Identify the ideal customer to serve
01:55 Identify ideal customers for better profits
06:02 Businesses must solve the dilemma of needing money but also requiring ideal customers.
07:53 Business growth requires changing compensation and charging more.
11:40 Charge based on value, not based on wallet
13:37 Focus on quality inputs over revenue goals
17:25 Enduring short-term pain for long-term gain in business
19:12 Confront sticking points to avoid stagnancy and reputation damage.
22:54 Eliminate alternatives to show commitment
24:44 Commitment is key to the success of a diet, marriage, or business.
28:11 Success is not just about what works, but considering alternative paths
30:05 Businesses must sell better or recurring versions of their product to survive
33:48 Shift from blame to accountability for skill improvement
35:34 To survive, a business must solve key problems and adapt to changes.

[monsieurene]

I’ve been list3ning to Alex for 2 years. I went back on his first podcast and listened to everything. Almost 700. My business is not successful, and I do a maker work every day till 12PM. Sometimes more. I shifted my mindset to the input. As long as I do the behavior, i’m winning. I’m in a season of no and I work on week-ends. I have no idea how long it will take for me to succeed, but as Leila said, I will not be the reason why it didn’t work. Volume negates luck. More Better.

PS: just to be clear i’m having the hardest and most fulfilling days of my life.

[leapthenest]

Alex you have helped me to achieve my dream of being self-sufficient as a musician.

Everyone told me to become a doctor and to give up on music.
Your value is true 🕊

[timdemoss]

Loved that laugh at “You’re scaling the problem, not the solution.” Honestly what a great line. Thanks for this video Alex!

[yeebb]

4 problems every business has to solve:
1) finding your customer
2) charging too little or paying too much
3) overexpanding
4) focus

Bonus:
Self-development

[RogerD-wlvh]

Alex is on fire 😂 he's not sleeping anymore, giving value is worth more than anything

[adaelliott]

I've never listened to a person whose every word is important and meaningful. No fillers, no fluff. I am scared to breathe in case I miss a single syllable. Alex, we owe you so much.

[rinathama]

I love how he's teaching honesty in business. I always had an imposter syndrome for even charging any price.

But now that I think about it I used every trick in the book to get my leads and conversions. And didn't deliver on half of the promises.

Basically I was a scam. I'll do better 🤝thank you alex

[LouisDillard]

I totally get the temptation to take on any client with a heartbeat and a credit card when you're starting out. It's survival mode, but eventually, you realize not every client is a good fit for your sanity or your bottom line.

[ChrisCadenhead]

My perspective is quite unique as I have taken Alex’s teachings and viewpoints and tried to apply them to the music business. (I actually saw him and Leila having dinner in a restaurant I play piano at in Vegas and I complimented him on his beard haha). So far it is working out tremendously. Specifically, his viewpoints on rate negotiation/value prop have helped me increase my personal rates and I finally generated 5 figures in a month a few times now from playing piano in live performance settings (which is wild lol). I used to be the guy to accept every gig coming my way but now I realize that in doing so I devalued my 35 years of experience and wasn’t seeing my competitive advantage in the marketplace. I started a music software company (which is finally something I can scale) last year and now I’m able to watch videos like this with any sort of relatability as I am stepping into entrepreneurship and out of the gig economy (although the gigs I negotiated for are the highest paying, comparatively speaking). The way Alex views the world has helped me align with similar visions and business life on a whole has improved greatly. Thank you Alex for just being yourself. Keep pushin’ yall!

[AlexClarkcompany]

I just discovered your channel through this video. Case studies are extremely beneficial and I hope to see more in the future! Creating wealth includes developing habits, such as setting aside money on a regular basis for smart investments.

[Abi-kv]

One of the best videos of Alex, although he already said that in other videos, but there’s something that was for me in this one. Tremendous value as always!

[ZackaryPrebble]

This is great, I love this shift back to biz content.

I know these are primarily recorded at the acquisition HQ, but it would be cool if there was a webpage where I could see Alex's upcoming presentations.

[adamweah]

Another banger! Thanks Alex. It's sad how difficult things have become in this recessive economy. I was wondering how to utilise some money I had. I used some of it for e-commerce business, but that sank. I'm thinking of how to protect my $250K-worth stock portfolio from decline, but haven't figured which way to go.

[Eshium]

Alex has been one of the people who I’ve never met that has helped me change my life permanently. I quit my full time job because I was sick of that life and I knew I could do way better if I truly committed. I started my business and it’s definitely hard but the meaningful and purposeful stress that it brings will never compare to the stress of doing something meaningless 8 hrs a day working for someone else.

[markb.]

content idea: document someones starting/improving a business by mentoring

[ForrestLittle-ghon]

The focus part is what people need just starting out, eliminate alternatives and pick something. Grated, its nice to know yourself and what you're most interested in. Serial focus through to the "this just isn't working out" phase, if that occurs or not. Alex has probably done something on this already, if so I havent seen it yet. I mow lawns and enjoy producing art, I like being in the role of inspirational coach for artists but I want to make money selling art first, so my process of elimating alternatives is to do my art until somebody buys one. And wait for the possible "this just isn't working out" moment, what, another 12 months? I share to give a glimpse of a normal guy reasoning about this content.

[SHANONisRegenerate]

Work once (live) then stream on all the platforms for ×1000 leverage. Thats the lesson.

[ambitiousmindsofgreatness]

This is the best video on business I've ever seen. Thanks Alex.

[TatiannaSpencer]

I really resonated with what Alex said about commitment and decisions. As someone who struggles to stay focused on one thing for more than a few weeks, think it is crucial to consider how I can improve my focus. It’s interesting to think about focus as being driven by learning new skills in order to solve problems that present themselves in your business. I think gamification is a brilliant way to stay motivated!