Judah. So my younger son, Judah, is learning to drive. We've spent lots of time in the car, quality time where he's not looking at his phone, and we have the chance to talk. But of course, most of our conversations during that period, especially since he's new behind the wheel, are
centered around driving. And the other day, I was teaching him something as we were on a bigger road that I remember very clearly my dad teaching me when I was learning to drive, which had to do with navigating a highway, and instead of watching the road directly in front of you, trying to keep your eyes on
the horizon. And as I was explaining to him, I was like, you know, if you're watching the road right in front of you, there's going to be little turns and stuff, and you're going to be constantly adjusting, and it's going to be an uncomfortable ride for everyone. But if you keep your eye on the distance right, sort of at the horizon line, then you can anticipate what's coming. You're going to make corrections in a smoother way. It's just a better
way to drive. And as I was saying that, I was like, oh, man, this applies to so many things in life and in business. And it got me thinking about the three systems that we all have in our businesses that if you've been listening to the podcast, you've heard me talk about before. You've got your marketing system that helps bring new clients into your business. You've got your sales system where you convert those new people who are interested
into paying customers. And then you have your fulfillment system where the people who have hired you then get what it is that they hired you for, and you really do have to have all three of those systems for a functioning business. However, again, as you may know, if you've been listening to me for a while, I am a staunch believer that you need to create those systems and dial in those systems in reverse. So everybody wants to start with marketing.
Everybody wants to, like, get as many clients in the door first. But if you do that, and then you don't have a way to sell to them, there's no point in all that work. And if you are able to sell to them, but then you're not giving them a great experience, you're wasting your time, because it's going to damage your reputation. It's going to ultimately be like a giant revolving door. You're going to be dealing with client
issues anyway. The short version is start first with making sure that you're delivering a fantastic end to end experience. Then worry about selling to the people to get them into that experience. And then once you've got the sales and fulfillment set up, then you can worry about opening the doors wider and
finding more clients. Today, I want to talk about not driving lessons and not the three systems, but rather an example that has shown up in my own life here in the last week, of a business that did not execute on that well. And this is not a photography business, so I'm not throwing anybody under the bus. It's a pretty perfect example of a situation that we want to take as a cautionary tale, and so I'm excited to share that with you, which I'll do right after our Intro Music. Welcome to this
can't be that hard. My name is Annemie tonken. Tonken and I help photographers run profitable, sustainable businesses that they love. Each week on the podcast, I cover simple, actionable strategies and systems that photographers at every level of experience can use to earn more money in a more sustainable way. Running a photography business doesn't have to be that hard, you can do
it, and I can show you how. Last fall, I was actively searching for a piece of software to allow me to host a private podcast. Dana and I had been running the consistency club for almost a year, and one of our big goals for the second year was to create a private podcast for our members so that they could, you know, get their content in an audio format, rather than having to watch the videos. And my intention was to then move that into all of my other courses.
The simple sales blueprint would have its own private podcast. Revenue on repeat would have its own private podcast. And I could see all kinds of ways that having private podcast software would allow me to serve people in a different way and make my content more accessible to people. So I was looking around and you know, as with everything else in the world, there's a whole bunch of different pieces of software that allow you to do
that. Unfortunately, the software that I was using for this podcast did not have the private podcast capability, so I was having to find something new. And it came down to a few different options. They were all, you know, relatively, they had the things that I needed, but the one that had all the stuff that I wanted, all the different connections and automations and things that were going to make using the software easier was by far the most
expensive of the bunch. And then I found a deal on one of the not that one pieces of software, where it was a lifetime deal, so you paid a relatively big chunk up front, but then I wasn't going to have to continue to pay. And I was like, I'm going to be using this for all of my different courses. And I love the fact that I can just create these private podcasts for all different kinds of reasons. So I'm going to invest in this
upfront investment. And then, you know, who doesn't love paying once and not having to pay again, right? But there were trade offs, as I said, the the most expensive software that was a monthly payment that had many more automations, the one that was going to be the single payment was talking about like, we've got all that stuff in development. So my hope was I'm going to sign up for this now and then later. It's just going to get better and better, and
this is going to be great. So I've been using an ad software for the better part of a year, and it has worked fine. Again, there are some manual things that my team has to take care of all the time, but it's not been a huge deal. There's no fancy bells and whistles with this software, but it works. And again, the price point was
right. And then I got an email last week in my inbox, and I'm actually just going to read that to you, because the thought of having to write this email to what I'm sure were 1000s of people who use this software gives me like the internal shutters. It says, hey, there it is. With a heavy heart that we have to announce that the podcast platform will be
shutting down. We've had an awesome run over the past four years, but it simply has not been possible to sustain the amount of usage with the revenue generated. Unfortunately, we've not been able to generate enough monthly recurring revenue to keep up with ongoing costs. We're currently working on finding deals with other podcast hosts to make this transition a little easier for you, hopefully
these will be shared shortly. To be clear, we will no longer serve as your podcast host as of the 30th of August 2024 so you will need to import your show to a new podcast host and then redirect your feed to the new RSS feed. This can be done, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We want to thank you for your support over the years. And of course, if you have any questions, please reply to this email nightmare you guys. That is a nightmare of a situation to run into. Like, here you've been
chugging along. This was the first that I had heard of it that wasn't like they had sent out an email three months before, saying, Hey, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna need your help, like, bring more people into the platform, or, unfortunately, we are going to have to start charging you. There was nothing, and then there was, you have less than a month to get out, and that's not
a small thing. Repointing your podcast doesn't necessarily take a lot of time, but there's a fair amount of tech involved in, you know, getting everything reconnected in the new place, first of all, researching and finding a new place, and then going back and getting all of your data and all of that. Basically, they were saying you have 30 days, and then you have no support whatsoever. So my team and I have been scrambling.
We've been trying to figure out how we're going to manage this relatively big project in and among all the other things that
we have going on this month. And I'm not going to lie like I'm pretty upset about it, like, this is a, this is one of those situations where I appreciate that they were offering, you know, a really good deal to bring in more people, but somebody somewhere did not do the math correctly when they looked at like, well, if we charge this amount and we only charge it once, is that going to cover us for the ongoing costs? Do we have a new plan to bring in more people at a month to
month kind of a basis? Clearly, they didn't. And not to say that things can't go wrong in businesses, and that, you know, I'm not mad. I'm sure that they're more mad at themselves than I am at them, but it put their customers in a bad position. And ultimately, the private podcast software that I have decided to move to is that top tier podcast software, although I'm going to be paying
more for. It has a good track record, tons of high profile happy clients, and has all these integrations with all the other software so I can run that in a more automated way. In the long term, it will cost me more, but it will probably end up saving me plenty of time, and to be perfectly honest, I'm a little mad at myself that I didn't just go in that direction in the first place. But we have all been wooed by a deal that maybe seemed almost
too good to be true, right? And when you are in the position of being bitten by that situation, it reminds you that sometimes you get what you pay for. So why am I sharing this story here on the podcast with a bunch of photographers, most of whom don't need private podcast software, right? I want to reiterate the dangers of short term thinking when it comes to
our businesses. Photographers, just like any other business owner out there, can fall into the trap of focusing on immediate gains rather than thinking about the long term stability of their business. For example, you might run a sale that you haven't quite crunched the numbers on, and you're not really sure that it's going to be profitable in the long run, but you want to attract some clients quickly, you just need bodies in the door, and so you create this too good to be true,
kind of an offer. And it might work in the short term. You may get extra people coming in, but what ultimately happens is that, over time, that forces you to start cutting corners on quality, on the time that you put into things. We all have a finite amount of time. And then most of us, if we're running a sale, like a fire sale type of situation, we're already in a financial bit of a crunch, so we end up narrowing things down by lowering the prices to a point where we are just squeaking by.
The cash flow situation is really dire, and it takes us to a point where we're not able to spoil our clients. We're not able to invest in good marketing, good education, sustainable business practices, the software that we need to run our businesses. If a lens breaks, it's like a total disaster in our businesses. That's not sustainable. That is, it's like a shooting star,
right? It's amazing while it's happening, and then it flames out on the flip side, if you have your eyes on that horizon line, if you say, this is the business that I want to build, this is the service that I want to give my clients. And then you work back from that, and you run your numbers, and you say, here are the expenses that go into this. And these are real expenses that if I don't pay for these expenses, ultimately the
work is going to suffer. So I have to build those expenses into the business model, and I have to pass those expenses on to my clients in the form of more expensive services. When you set a business up that way, it does take a longer amount of time to find your ideal clients, because you have to find people who can afford that and are willing to afford that, but if you stay true to that quality, to that knowledge that what you are building is sustainable in the long run, you will fill up
your calendar. The people who come will be thrilled with the experience, and you will build a reputation in your community, that you are here to stay, that you are not some shooting star photography business that you know may be able to make photos on the cheap this week, but next week, they're not going to be there at all. Whenever I'm talking about sustainability, I tell some version of this same kind of story, but most of my stories are just parables of
sorts, right? I'm making up fictitious businesses and creating these situations where a business has to shut down, or, you know, the none of the clients go back. This is a real situation, and it really impacted me. It's not just that this business is failing. It's that all of these people who have private podcasts posted on this platform are now having to scramble with only a few weeks.
And I'm guessing I'm not the only one with something of a bitter taste in my mouth about the way that we got kind of screwed. Now I paid a relatively high fee several months ago with the idea that, like, oh, great, this is going to be ongoing forever. As it turns out, I didn't save myself any money at
all. I spent more money than I would have if I had gone with a more expensive business up front, because not only did I get less than a year out of that investment, but I also now have to pay my team and, you know, do my own work to get everything moved over. This isn't meant to be complaining, it'll be fine. I'll be fine. It's meant to be a reminder that this is not some
sort of abstract warning. It is a real thing, and I know it isn't sexy, it's not instant gratification, but in a world filled with those things,
instant gratification, right? As photographers, I think that we are uniquely positioned to remind ourselves because of the nature of the work that we do, because of the fact that many of us in our marketing materials talk about the fact that, like you know, you want to think about how you're going to love these photos in the future, and think about you're investing in something in the future. We need to kind of take our own medicine
on that. We need to lean into this long range view that we embrace in our art, but sometimes forget in our businesses. So I hope that that gives you some food for thought this week. I hope you have a great week, and I will see you back next week, because this business was built to be sustainable. Well, that's it for this week's episode of This can't be that hard. I'll be back Same time, same place next week.
In the meantime, you can find more information about this episode along with all the relevant links, notes and downloads at this can't be that hard.com/learn. If you like the podcast, be sure to hit the subscribe button. Even better, share the love by leaving a review in iTunes. And as always, thanks so much for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic week. You