Ep. 70: Create More Cash in Your Business by Knowing Your Numbers (Guest Marley Majcher the Profit Goddess)
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Get the Balance Right Ep. 63 - Understand Your Numbers (with Guest La'Vonne Shields)
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Do you struggle with cash flow?
Do you want to make more money in your business?
In this episode, we discuss how knowing your numbers can help you create more cash in your business. To explore this topic, we are joined by Marley Majcher the Profit Goddess and author of the book, But Are You Making Any Money? Stop Being Busy and Start Creating Cash.
Marley has quickly established herself as a top business coach in LA. In addition, she is known as the Party Goddess. Marley is the CEO of a nationally acclaimed full-service event planning and catering business with the same name. Marley has created events and parties for A-list celebrities, which include Snoop Dogg and Britney Spears.
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From the Episode:
Heather: “Marley Majcher, welcome to Get the Balance Right Podcast.”
Marley Majcher: “Thank you for having me. I'm excited.”
Heather: “I am very excited to have you on the program. We are going to be talking about making more profit in your business, and you've even written a book about this as well. Before we dive into all of that, I have to ask you a little bit about yourself. You are a speaker you're also known The prophet goddess, the party goddess, You got a lot of goddesses going on in here. Where did this all start?”
Marley Majcher: “It started with a hot mess is where it started, like the exact opposite maybe what it looks like now. I got my business degree from Georgetown and you would think that would be what I needed to start any kind of business and does nothing to do with Georgetown.
It was everything I should have needed, but I got into the restaurant business very early on. my goal was very simple. I wanted to do a million dollars in sales, which is great if you're doing a million dollars in sales and also focusing on your profitability is not so great when your goal is just sales and your goal is a million dollars in sales and you're spending 1.2 million to get there, which a lot of us do, whether we realize it or not, that just don't have that profit in the sales aligned.
What happened to me happened to a lot of people, which was, built the company app. , we took over a banquet operation. We started doing full service events. I then rebranded after I got divorced from the chef and the restaurant and this whole very long 29 podcast worthy tale.
At a very low point in my life , my dad was like, listen, you love the events. Why don't you do the events? And so I was like, fine. What's the biggest name you know, other than ruler of the universe and I was like, I'm going to call it the Party Goddess because I showed did not feel like a party goddess. And I remember going to an industry event and, we're in LA and New York are two of the most competitive markets there are in the world. And I remember going to this event and these other planners were like, what was your name?
But at that moment, I remember thinking to myself, you know, what. I will fix you one of these days. And now I can be like, oh, I did, because I went on to get all these celebrity clients and get a lot of press.
And it was a very strategic move. However, even though it was much more of a strategic move than I had when I was spending 1.2, instead of doing sales of a million. I still was missing a component. So then my dad comes back into the picture we're having dinner and he's saying to me, that's great that you're doing something for Brittany Spears and that's great, but blah, blah, blah.
But are you making any money? And that was really the turning point and he was like, no, how much money are you making? What's in your bank account, I remember it was so disheartening because I was like, how am I supposed to be so fabulous and make a lot of money?
Which you know, was of course my goal was to make money. It wasn't just to be fabulous. That was the moment that I decided, listen, I am done with this game and I just didn't want to tell a different story. But unfortunately, when you've gone to a really great school and you've had a lot of press about this supposed to success, you are, it's not so easy to then be like, how do I learn this stuff that I think everybody thinks I should know about my margins and everything? And do it on the DL, especially since at the time I had very bad undiagnosed ADHD. So I just was like going to do this undercover. I came up with this little rinky dink system based on, A's B's C's and D's to price out your product or service. And the only reason I even shared it with anybody other than myself was for industry convention.
We would get a free ticket if we would teach a class. I was like, that's awesome. I'm going to teach this class for an hour, knock that out. And then I'm gonna, drink for the rest and I'm gonna have this free, very expensive conference ticket. And I hear my hour's up and I'm like, okay, tick-tock. People had questions and it was like standing room only. And I did not understand this. And they were like, , how did you price this? Or how'd you price that? And it was just like, did you guys not hear the first part? Did everybody come in late?
But the most revealing thing came out of it, which was that they said, yeah but you're the only one answering the questions.. I was like I'll tell you, how I do it, but kinda don't hold me to it and know I'm here really for the free class. And then afterwards I kept answering questions and I'm just thinking, what is wrong with these people?
I didn't think I had much to offer, but I really realized there was a need, not only in our industry, but in creative industries in general.
For people to talk openly about their numbers and their margins. And I, was never trying to get anybody to share their, the secrets to Coca-Cola.
But what I was trying to do is just have a conversation. Critically think and think, do I want to charge as a hybrid? Do I want to charge some markup? Do I want to discharge as a flat fee? Like, how do I want to charge? But you can't figure out any of those things unless you're having a conversation about them.
And most people were very uncomfortable having that conversation. When people wanted the next place to go, I didn't have the next place to go. And I ended up writing a book called, But Are You Making Any Money? It really laid out the system that very much changed my life it just gave me the discipline and the foundation and the structure, so that I could put the numbers and all that stuff on autopilot. And then I could do what I love I just had never taken the time before, and I didn't think it could be done easily because everybody makes it so freaking complicated. And it's not that complicated.”
Heather: “Okay, so you've laid out a lot of stuff, let's unpack some of that. Let's first start off at you where the party goddess and restaurants in general are. That's a tough business anyways, and it's really tough to make a profit in that. I've looked at the books for restaurants and their expenses are through the roof that's a really tough business.”
Marley Majcher: “People don't realize it. And in hindsight, It was great that it was so tough, right? Because believe me, I used every excuse in the book of, oh, it is a tough business, but if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere.
And then you really decide, do you want to be. In business as your own boss and what are the trade offs? To do well, you have to dig into your numbers. And unlike a lot of businesses, the numbers are all co-mingled right? Because , you have an invoice coming from a fish purveyor and you have an invoice coming from your meat purveyor. And then that recipe is mixing it up with the paprika from this and the dada da from that. it isn't as straight forward. As I bought this and I sold this at a market it's very muddled and hidden.”
Heather: “Definitely you hit the nail on the head. That is exactly right. I love to talk about numbers. Obviously I'm a CPA, so I love this kind of stuff. And I love the fact that you're not an accountant, but you're interested in this side of the business. And I think this is where business owners really need to be, because the more that they can understand their numbers.
The more profit. They can actually get out of the business because if you're not looking at understanding this stuff, you have no idea if your margins are working or not. If you're pricing correctly, if you need to increase sales, increase marketing, like there's all these levers that go on in your business. And if you don't have a handle on these things, you won't know where to pull the lever.”
Marley Majcher: “Your ladder is perpetually up against the wrong wall period because every person ever consulted. It's always the same thing, which is they say, I need more customers.
I need more business, or I need more. And I just want to start the conversation by saying, please, don't say you need more. Cause that's exactly what they do not need. In fact, they often need less customers and may need less of all this noise and what they need is just a very pared down. Target audience, where they come up with something that, scratches that itch for that audience and provides real value and that they can make reprecateable.
Without that, it is very difficult to make money. You start chasing the wrong feathers out of the pillow. There's enough guess work when you do know your numbers, and enough things about market volatility and target audiences and fickleness, just do your homework, understand your numbers from the get-go and then do all the other fun stuff. Because once you have the foundation it's simple.”
Heather: “Pricing can be very difficult for some women entrepreneurs. Especially in the beginning they might have some sort of imposter syndrome and they feel like they can't price the way that they should they're not getting the fair market value for their services.
And maybe they've gone through training, that they deserve to be paid higher, but they're looking at their peers and they're like, oh, I'm new to this coaching or whatever. And they don't want to ask for higher wages. sounds like you went through this phase.”
Marley Majcher: “I'd say imposter syndrome. Because remember imposter syndrome also is also about the story that's going on in your head. It doesn't necessarily mean that you are an imposter, right? My interpretation of it is means you're thinking of yourself as an imposter. Just like I was in that class when I kept giving the disclaimer like, when they're asking me questions and I was like, wait, you do know who you're asking.
I wanted to keep putting that forward because I felt a certain level of responsibility in reality, the feedback I was getting from them was we are getting a lot of value. So close your mouth and let us get it. Women in general, yes, I'm generalizing, but really seemed to feel like my God, unless you're a rocket scientist with a PhD in every single aspect of the business you're doing, you're a fraud and that's not the case.
It just isn't. You might feel that way. But that's very different than posing as somebody who knows what they're doing at some point would just have paralysis by analysis. If we never hung out our shingle and we're waiting to be perfect. You would never get anything done, Nobody should wait until they're perfect to go into business because there's so many amazing things that will never be accomplished.
You have to just try. But you do have to constantly look at listening to podcasts like this and sharpening the saw and continuing to educate yourself. Absolutely. But you don't have to be rocket scientists going into it.”
Heather: “You work with your clients with pricing, is that right? Do you coach them through that process? How does that work? Exactly. Do you find that people suffer from maybe imposter syndrome or maybe they're new to. Whatever it is that they're doing, they feel like they have to price themselves lower to entice more customers.
How do you work through this?”
Marley Majcher: “The one thing that my customers all have in common is overwhelmed they just are in their brains way too much. The first thing I do is lay it out for them and say, is listen, if you have a question or you don't understand something, I'm saying you raise your hand and ask.
I don't care if it's P-N-L and you're like, what is that? Go ahead and ask. Now, if you've asked me a hundred basic questions in 10 minutes, I might say, Hey, listen, why don't you read this? Two chapters of XYZ before we meet again. point is they have to understand. It got to take a deep breath by the time they get to me, they've done their homework online.
They know my deal, so they know I'm probably not going to eat them for lunch because I was a bigger train wreck than they could ever be. They have a certain amount of okay, I think this is like a safe place, but it's still a little bit I'm playing here kitty, right? Like they're still keeping. The, like I've got this which falls away very quickly when I asked them very specific questions , and the main at the time burst into tears, but I'm like, that's okay. it just shows me that. You just want help and you're ready for help.
And then I ask general questions that sometimes people want me to kind of like, but no, I need more customers. And I'm like, okay, hi, right now I'm in charge. And I'm an ask the questions. I'd be very surprised if that's what you need. And if it is then you know your money back, but I need to ask the questions because. People are solving the wrong problems. They're not getting to the root of the right problem. And if you're not at the root of the problem and you're off over here it's just, totally a waste of time. It's a waste of money and you really will jump off a bridge. So my process is about asking big picture questions, and then.
I course, correct. As I go, like I start asking questions. It's like one of those. Yes. No things, , yes, no, go to the left. Okay. And then what about this? Yes. Not like a doctor figuring out you're like, okay, I can now rule out appendicitis.
Okay. I can now rule this out. I can now roll this out and you really get down to it. And then usually about. 40 minutes or so in. I start thinking to myself, okay. I think I got it. I got a beat on this per up here. I know where we're headed and then we start getting somewhere the second appointment is usually pretty painful.
Whether like, I just felt beat up last time we talked and I'm like, I get it. ' I'm exposing all these things you know, but you're like, oh, you don't want to know. And you feel like it's going to be horrible to fix it, but there's magic and fixing it. And there's tremendous confidence that comes only from doing the work and only going, oh, I know these numbers.
I might not be exactly where I want it. But I know what my numbers are and once I can get them to drink that Kool-Aid and realize there's such good stuff. If you just do the work, just stick with it a little bit longer and the payouts will start coming, it's not like you have to wait a year for the payoffs to come bill start, just jump in and go step-by-step and understand.”
Heather: “You've built a business based on really yourself as the center of the business. With women that you work with that are the creative types, are they generally focus of their business? And if that's the case, how do you help them promote themselves? You've been regular on MSNBC and Fox.
Is that part of the building, your profits and your businesses, putting yourself out there?”
Marley Majcher: “It can be, it can also be the exact opposite. Early on. I was doing that, but it was the opposite. Meaning I thought I'll be on TV. I'll get more customers. I go back to that piece. If you don't have a product or service that you're selling your customers, once they buy it, all you're doing is digging your hole faster.
Take two, or take nine of me, depending on how you want to look at it was yes, I'm going to get press and yes, I'm going to get high profile clients so that I can get press. The reason that I want the press is for two reasons, It will give me exposure to so many people that I'm not going to have, but then what it's going to do is give me the credibility and right or wrong; and I've had this conversation so many times somebody shouldn't have. Have credibility just because they have a celebrity client or, Chanel shouldn't be elevated just because all these famous people and wealthy people wear their logos, but that is how our world works.
The sooner you realize that, and the sooner you realize to charge what you're worth the world values. Okay. I can trust that person. They've got the credibility because they have been featured in all these things. I could still be a fraud people can still slip through the cracks, but it became a strategy.
Then I could be more selective about working with people who are the best fit I got to be more selective, but it also benefited them I now know what is a really good match.”
Heather: “The book that came out a few years ago, did that come out of your coaching with people or came out of other business?”
Marley Majcher: “What the book was based on was the whole system that I had written in the background for myself this is how I'm going to price. I'm going to do this. And then I'm going to add this so it's my Excel sheets, what really got me off the duff was when people would say, hey, how can I get more? How can I was like, and there was no more it's very inefficient to field. One question, another question so it's nice to be like, go read the book, then come back to me.
When you get some credibility and you get some street creds, and then you're on TV for the book you start realizing. Oh, I can craft the message more. And this is what resonates with people, more, et cetera. Then it just fuels the whole thing it starts helping you define your space.
There billion business books out there. I'm certainly not the only one that's written anything on pricing. I think mine is the best one on pricing because I think it is the simplest most straightforward. For somebody who doesn't want to spend their whole life, trying to figure out how to price, they want to go back to making cupcakes or whatever it is they got in their business to start with very few people get in business to just price.”
Heather: “Do you have a favorite method of pricing? I mean, There's by the hour there's value pricing, , there's the three tiers want to give us a snapshot of what you prefer?”
Marley Majcher: “Cause I think we're both pretty high energy. I feel like this is going to lead to like somehow the Shamwow commercial, there's more like, but there's another pricing strategy. What I would recommend for my clients is unique. Not in the sense of it's a totally unique strategy, but my advice would be unique because it takes into consideration so many different factors.
If I'm talking to somebody who's an event planner, who's running a business in New York. I know a lot about how they price events in New York. And I know you're going to be swimming upstream. If you try to price differently, it doesn't mean you can't do it. You can use that as a differential advantage, but if I think, this person is already confused. I sure as heck, I'm not going to have them pick away that they're going to now spend all their time answering objections. There are different cultural norms too,. I want to come up with kind of the secret sauce that's going to take into consideration. How does their market currently priced? What kind of personality do they have? What kind of, an ability to answer objections? How much competition do they have? That is huge. If you are in a crowd of one, guess what? You're selling water in the Sahara. Doesn't matter. how I tell you to charge if it's a mark up or whatever you do, the more crowded the field you're in, the more things you've got to take into consideration and the more on your game you've got to be, and the more unique a service you have to provide, people seem to forget like, oh, my product or service is so unique.
Okay. Yeah. I should say unique, but something unique that everybody wants or that enough people want. Because it doesn't matter just being unique, alone, whatever it has to scratch some itch. And it has to fill a hole out there. And if it doesn't, you're not going to be able to charge what you think you're worth.
You're going to very much get what they think you're worth, which is not much.”
Heather: “On your website, you have a very fun quiz. That is, which cocktail are you. And one of them is a Vodka and Red Bull. The other is a Dirty, Dirty, which I don't actually know what that is. And a Blue Sapphire. What is this quiz about and what is this get at?”
Marley Majcher: “What it gets at is what productivity style you are like, how productive are you? And the reason I did it as a cocktail, who wants to take a quiz that says, and you, my friend are a librarian and you are something else that's not particularly sexy. I mean, let's face it. My brand is around a good time. So I wanted to have a good time. The cocktails would sorta be like, as you can imagine, the vodka red bull is you are in it to win it. You have your stuff nailed and God help you. You don't need me or anybody else to coach you. You would still crush it now down the line, obviously it's, the fruit, you're more likely that you're just in it for a good time, meaning your business is kind of more your hobby. There's plenty of substance, but I get there in a fun way, which is asking you the questions in a way that's going to bring you what kind of cocktail you are instead of asking you the questions that are just going to be like a dumb way of asking them.”
Heather: “I love that. That's great. We actually had a guest on that was a marketer and they said that when they interviewed their clients, one of the questions that they asked them is which cocktail they would think they would be. And when they were on my show, I was like, gin and tonic. Cause that's what I like to drink, but I'm like, that is so boring. I don't want to be a gin and tonic I'd like to be a Manhattan or a Metropolitan.”
Marley Majcher: “And there are so many ways to go with this because like me seeing you and your great background and the hair, and the whole thing, I'd be like a gin and tonic. I mean, and I liked gin and tonic. But I think it's almost like we have to think of the question and then like, say and think about the questions.
Not what would we like to drink? Cause what I drink is very different than the cocktail. I see myself as, right? I'm going to have a vodka diet tonic with a lime because friggin, you know because I should., What do I want to be, a pina colada, with extra meric hino cherry with so much sugary sauce. It's like dripping down the top , so the whole thing is this pink looking concoction.
I think it's a great question because it is telling a lot. Somebody just shooting from their practical hip. That's what I drank. Or somebody go on. What is my goal?”
Heather: “I love that. I'm thinking about it, gin and tonic doesn't make any sense for me. I think I'm definitely something that's in a pineapple with lots of umbrellas and things like that.”
Marley Majcher: “I'm with you. And , I'm in the pineapple right next to you.”
Heather: “This maybe crazy question, but because I'm an accountant, I think this way, one of the challenges that I find when I work with creatives is that oftentimes maybe they're marketer or something like that, maybe they haven't even really figured out their books or their numbers at all.”
Marley Majcher: “Maybe, how about whether they're creative or not? They probably haven't figured out their books because it's overwhelming. I don't know where to start. I don't know where to start, so I'm just going to close my eyes and hide and then hope she doesn't see the mess I've made.”
Heather: “Yeah. Okay. You've run into that as well.”
Marley Majcher: “I think it's natural because there's so much intimidation. You know what I mean when there were only three news channels and you have to be old enough to know what I'm talking about, but before we had 9,000 news channels Walter Cronkite would come on at this time.
And people who talked about numbers were men in suits the point is that if you are not that you're like, I can't do it. I don't know. I can't do it. I would never understand that. Just take a break. You can do your books and you can have fun with your numbers. Lord knows. I have fun with my numbers now, granted, I don't do them the same way everybody else does it. If I have to write checks and stuff, sometimes I write them in a color or sometimes I write into my list of who's got to get paid and I might write on a piece of paper with like my chicken scratch not in the perfect, like today, I'm going to pay this on QuickBooks, whatever, but I have a good time with it.
And then I'm not intimidated by it. I think the big message just should be, you can have accountants with pink hair and get your freaking maximum rebate or whatever you can have a coach who focuses on what kind of drink are you? So you can go have one after you have the miserable call ripping off that Bandaid, but it doesn't have to be horrible just because everybody, said it used to be.”
Heather: “Exactly. And I'm trying to break down that normalness of what people think of as accountants, because they think of them as really being like square boring people. And I know a bunch of accountants and they're not like that.”
Marley Majcher: “But then that is part of your brand and part of why somebody goes, oh my gosh, cool. Like how bad could it be if she's got like this fun hair and like the big smile you start going, okay, I can do this!”
Heather: “Exactly. Very cool. I want to ask you how people can work with you. I know you're a public speaker as well as a coach. And are you still doing the parties.”
Marley Majcher: “We are for, I hate to say it this way, but we are for projects that are win-wins meaning I do not want to negotiate on price and where I'm not saying I'm going to be the most expensive person. But, it has to have something in the project for me, maybe it is because it's some celebrity that I would love to work with.
Or maybe it's just so creative or maybe it's such a great cause, but I don't want to squabble back and forth about lower the rate to this, or can I lower it to that? I'm just, thank God. I'm at a point where I don't need to do that anymore. In business for a very long time, we have to do that to keep the lights on.
We still do events and we still have a full, almost 6,000 square foot warehouse. And I love that. I'm not going to load trucks on a Saturday night anymore, knowing that somebody just worked me down 10%. But as far as coaching clients , I think the most fun thing for your audience would be to go, and we have this little like free video kind of tutorial class on exactly what we're talking about.
And you'll know in 30 seconds, if you're like, okay, I'm not gonna learn anything from this girl or, oh my gosh, this could really help. And you just go to many dots, the prophet goddess.com, and that takes you to the little mini. And then from there, you get into our world, but you can always go to the Profit Goddess.com and check out our blogs and stuff like that.
And we just try to be really like content full so that you know, you're in a place where you're going to learn something.”
Heather: “It's a really fun site. It's got a lot of really fun visuals , and you've got the cocktail quiz that's on there as well.”
Marley Majcher: “And the cocktail quiz will prompt you just in case you are like, okay. And then it'll go hey take the quiz.”
Heather: “It will have links to all of your socials and all of that. What do you like to hang out the most on socials?”
Marley Majcher: “I really love being on Instagram, although I haven't been on it as much lately. I think I'm going to be back to being more on Instagram and YouTube, because I love making my business YouTube videos.”
Heather: “Marley, thank you so much for being on the show today.”
Marley Majcher: “Thank you so much for having me good for you for just encouraging people that they can do it. And numbers are not evil and horrible.”
Heather: “No, not at all. Thanks so much, Marley.”
