You’ve heard the rumors and I’m here to confirm YES, they are true. It is possible to build a 6- or even 7-figure course business without launching.
I know this to be true because I’ve done it myself, but you may still be wondering if moving away from a launch model is right for you.
Well – listen up, because today I’m going to share with you three signs that you are ready to stop launching and start scaling. Let’s get started.
My name is Caitlin Bacher, CEO of Scale With Success®, and I’m on a mission to help course creators all over the world grow their business in a way that is profitable and scalable. I’m sharing revealing insights about what it really takes to scale an online course business to millions of dollars per year. Join me here to discover the tough decisions I’ve had to make, the biggest failures I’ve had to bounce back from, and the learnings that emerged every step of the way. I’m so grateful that I have the chance to tell you everything right here on Scale With Success®: The Podcast. Let’s get started.
Today, I want to talk about one of the most important keys when it comes to scaling your online course business: choice.
The reality is that everywhere we turn we we get pummeled with advice that there is only 1 right way to do something:
- “You must launch your online course three times a year in order to scale.”
- “You must offer a full product suite of at least three different courses in order to scale.”
- “You must offer a high-ticket offer in combination with your online course in order to scale.”
None of that is true.
Now, if there is one thing that I want you to walk away with at the end of this episode, it’s that you get to decide what you do or don’t do in your business. There is more than one path to the same outcome.
It’s your decision to make if you want to stop launching your course and move to an evergreen model that gives you more money, more time freedom, and helps you build real momentum.
My clients and I are living proof that it is 100% possible to turn your online course – just 1 online course – into a 6 or even 7-figure business without launching. But it’s not easy.
It’s not easy having the courage to stop listening to well-meaning internet marketing experts that are constantly telling you that it’s their way or the highway.
Friends, I have news for you: There is no right way to scale your online course business. There is only a right for YOU way.
And that may change depending on what’s going on in your life right now.
We are all different. We’ve got different goals, different life circumstances. And I’m not going to sit here and pretend that I know you better than you know yourself.
Today, I’m going to share with you three signs that are likely indicators that you are ready to stop launching and start scaling. But you’re the only one who will know for sure.
So as you are listening to me share these three signs, I want you to really consider whether you are running your business based on what you want to do or if you have been doing things just because that’s what everyone else is telling you to do.
There is more than one way to get to your desired destination. There is always a choice.
So, here are 3 tell-tale signs that you may want to stop launching and start scaling.
#1: You’re not meeting your revenue goal.
Have you ever heard of that phrase, ‘what got you here won’t get you there’?
It can be so incredibly frustrating when you have a great product but you are struggling to get it in the hands of the right people.
When you are selling your expertise, you know that the money you make is a direct reflection of the number of people whose lives you can impact.
I know your free content is incredible, but you and I both know that the real transformation happens in the transaction, that moment when your prospect decides that they are committed to solving their problems and they’ve chosen you as the person to help guide them to where they want to go.
Whether you’re stuck at $5k per month and trying to get to $10k per month, or if you’re stuck at $20k per month and you’re trying to get to $100k per month, it is incredibly frustrating.
Feeling trapped and maybe a little bit confused about why launching isn’t working for you anymore is the pits.
In your panic to make sense of things, maybe you’ve started thinking that the price of your online course is too high, or maybe you’re thinking that there are no more people left on planet Earth who are interested in the problem that you can solve, or worst of all, you might be thinking to yourself that for whatever reason having a 6 or 7-figure income is just not meant for you.
You’re not the only one.
I felt the exact same way and I know just how painful it can be when you see others around you celebrating their success and you can’t help but think why not me? Well, why not you?
Launching is neither good nor bad, but one thing’s for sure – it’s not right for everyone.
Growing my business from the ground up with a young daughter was one of the hardest things that I’ve ever had to do. And hearing advice from people who seem to have all the time in the world to launch and launch and launch didn’t make things better.
I thought something was wrong with me, that I wasn’t working hard enough, that I wasn’t working fast enough, and deep down I was terrified that maybe I just wasn’t smart enough.
I completely understand that launching is right for some people, but it wasn’t right for me.
And it wasn’t until I stopped launching that I was finally able to blow past all of my revenue goals.
My launches were lucrative, but they were incredibly stressful and they didn’t align with the life I wanted to lead or the mother and wife that I wanted to be, which takes me to sign number 2.
#2: You have no time freedom.
The reason I started my business is because I really valued my time freedom.
But the launch model left me feeling like I had zero time.
I was either launch prepping, which typically started six months before the launch as I mapped out and created all of the launch content that I need to deliver during the launch runway, which was typically the four weeks preceding the launch, then during the launch, which was typically a 2-week period, and then I had to prepare all of the materials to be delivered post launch.
Then the whole process would immediately start all over again.
Worst of all, sometimes my launch would be scheduled to happen and circumstances outside of my control would limit the effectiveness of that launch. But I had to wait a whole other 6 months before I did it again.
This caused so much financial strain and stress.
I remember after one particularly terrible launch, I had to schedule a bunch of last-minute joint live webinars over the next 6 months on top of all of the launch prep that I was actively doing just to make ends meet.
I was barely paying myself.
Nobody talks about the mental toll that launching takes on companies with really tiny teams. It’s just not realistic for most of us.
Once I made the decision to stop launching, I was definitely a little scared, but I was also excited.
Most of my friends were still launching and they thought I was a little wild for doing something different. But I did it anyway.
I made a plan and got to work.
That year my annual income went from 200k to $1 million. It was absolutely wild.
While it didn’t happen right away, eventually I was able to have money coming in every single day as my Profitable Sales Engine™ was consistently and predictably turning complete strangers into customers.
While it did take a lot of time and focused attention upfront, eventually I was able to create a business where I was freed from the launch cycle and had more time to spend doing what I loved the most, connecting with my friends, my family, and my community all without the stress of an upcoming launch.
#3: Your audience isn’t growing.
Do you still feel like your industry’s best kept secret?
It used to drive me crazy when someone would make a post on Facebook and they would be asking for referrals for a social media expert and every name under the sun would be mentioned in the comments of that post except for mine.
I was constantly comparing myself to others and wondering what they had that I didn’t.
One of the most unexpected gifts that I received after I made the decision to stop launching and start scaling was momentum.
I wasn’t on a never-ending roller coaster of starting and stopping promotions.
It didn’t happen overnight, but over time more and more people began to associate my name with my area of expertise. I got more interview requests, more partnership requests, and I started to be that person that was mentioned on those Facebook threads.
Has that ever happened to you? It feels great to be recognized for your work.
My business was scaling. My audience was growing. And because I had money coming in month after month, I was able to reinvest those funds back into my business for continued growth, which brought even more attention and opportunities to me.
I remember when I was launching all the time, I was too burned out to take interview requests.
Finally, I had the opportunity to not just take more interview requests but to actually enjoy doing them.
Even though my business has generated over $10 million since I made the decision to stop launching, I still feel like a complete beginner and I don’t ever want that to change. I want to keep learning, to keep setting new goals, and to keep moving forward.
Staying in that beginner mindset, being curious, being open to new perspectives is what makes scaling so fun. And for me, all of that really began to happen once I was able to build some momentum with my audience growth.
If you have a desire to meet bigger revenue goals, to enjoy more time freedom, and to really become a leader in your niche, then letting go of launching and stepping into something new may be exactly what you need to do.
The choice is yours.
I appreciate you being here and make sure to tune in next week for another episode of Scale With Success® – The Podcast.
Are you sick and tired of launching and looking for a proven method to generate consistent revenue from your online course on auto-pilot?
Sign up for my free masterclass, “How To Generate Launch-Sized Revenue Without Launching” and I’ll show you how our clients are making MORE money in LESS time than they ever did while launching.
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Today’s episode is brought to you by Scale With Success® Accelerator — an online course designed to help you generate launch-sized revenue without lanching. If you want to learn MORE about our proven method for success, click here to watch my free masterclass. See you in there!