Leah Gervais:

Hello, everyone. Welcome back to the show. Don’t mind my dog Ruby in the background. She’s like on one, it’s just part of the deal. That is where we’re at right now. Where we’re going to demystify all the crazy sales numbers you hear on the internet.

So we hear people all the time, talk about how they had a five figure month, a 6-figure month, a six figure day, a six figure year. And, and beyond we hear people talk about multiple five figures, a 6-figure month, having a million dollar business, having a six figure business.

And there’s really so much ambiguity around these incredible claims. Oops, sorry about that. Particularly, I think there’s a lot of question around the like lack of transparency that comes with it. Like where did that money come from?

What in the business did they sell to make that kind of money? Is that their profit? Is that their, um, is that their revenue is that their sales is that their gross, there’s so much around this that we just don’t have answers to.

And I think that the lack of information there really can make people feel like they’re not doing something right, or like they are, you know, behind. And that’s why I wanted to kind of demystify it. So I share my income quite a bit online. It really has helped me, uh, personally see what’s possible when other people do that.

So I enjoy doing it as well, but I really try to be transparent about everything that goes into it. And if you still wanna learn more about the details of like what our operations costs are and things like that, then be sure to join our 6-figure month event that we’re doing a week from today, it’s totally free.

You can sign up for the link in my bio. It’s gonna be awesome. And I can go even more in depth there than I’m going here. Um, but I still find that sometimes these numbers can actually make people feel less inspired and more behind than it can make them feel inspired. So that’s what we kind of wanted to debunk today.

Um, in fact, I had a client the other day who I happen to know because I’ve worked with her for a while. She’s she’s new, a newer entrepreneur. And she said, you know, I just can’t imagine making six figures in a day, like, or in a month, even like, what does that even look like? How does that happen? And I happen to know that she had, uh, bought a house a few years back, renovated it and sold it and made a six figure profit on it.

So the day that she sold that house was a, was, was a six figure day by so many people’s definition. So I think that that’s the kind of thing that makes us feel inferior is when we have this idea that people are waking up in the morning with $0 in their bank account and then going to bed at night with a hundred thousand dollars in their bank account and not being a six figure day, that is typically not what’s happening.

When people say they’re having a six figure day for so many reasons, even if there was a six figure day where they made six figures in cash, there’s still wire transfers. There’s still amount of times that it takes for bank to transfer things.

Um, the day that you make a sale. And my definition of making a sale is when the contract is signed and a deposit is paid is typically not the same day that the money comes into your bank account.

So then you’re kind of splitting hairs toward like, well, did I make six figures on the day the money came into my account or did I make six figures on the day I signed the contract, this is where really ambiguous, and why I wanted to kind of talk about it because everyone’s going to have different, different definitions.

So let’s just start from what I think most people are talking about most of the time when you are scrolling Instagram or social media, or you’re listening to a podcast or whatever, and you hearsay someone say I had a five figure month, or I had a 6-figure month or at had a six figure year or had a seven figure year.

I have found that most times they are referring to how many sales they made in a specific container. So if they had a five figure month, that would mean to, and this is the definition I typically use as well. If I use something different, I specify that, um, that typically means that in the course of a month, I made 10,000 or more dollars worth of sales.

Now to meet a sale, goes through when a contract is signed and when a deposit is paid or it’s paid in full. Now, the reason that I think it’s helpful to use sales as the barometer, or kind of like the, the currency in which you talk about how much money you’ve made or in which we listen to how much money other people have have made is a few reasons.

Mostly it’s because it’s kind, it’s the cleanest. If you talk about how much I know for me anyway, if I were to talk more about how much cash I made each month, that is a little bit harder to deconstruct and decipher because the cash that I’m making every month is coming from weeks ago, months ago, even years ago, contracts that were signed, then it’s coming from monthly recurring revenue.

It’s coming from payment plans. It’s coming from subscriptions. It’s coming from payments that are now just going through after a deposit was paid three months ago, but they’re actually igniting this month. So to me, there’s so much lack, less clarity around that, and it can feel like, okay, cool, you made a hundred thousand dollars of cash this month, but how much of it did you even sell this month?

Where did that money come from? And that explanation is just a lot more complicated and a lot, I don’t know, just, I think, grayer to get into. And I, so I think that that is what most people are talking about.

So just keep that in mind, because here’s the thing. If you make five figures of cash in a month, or I’m sorry, five figures of sales in a month, meaning you had $10,000 worth of contracts signed in a month, that does not necessarily mean that you’re seeing $10,000 from that right away at all.

In fact, you’re probably not. Let’s take an example here. Let’s say someone sold a $10,000 coaching package. Their, their payment plan was $2,500 a month for four months. Maybe that’s what they sold. And from that contract, they therefore made five figures in sales.

They technically then did have a five figure sales month, but cash from that sale was only $2,500. So do you see how this can be a little bit confusing and even slightly misleading? If we’re not all talking the same language here on the flip side, if you have made five of those sales for that coaching package in the past few months, then you’re bringing in $15,000 in cash for that month.

So it’s very hard to kind of decipher how much people actually are making, how much of it is going to them and how much of it is just contractually sold. It’s hard to decipher what actually goes into, say, a 6-figure month.

So, like I said, for the most part, keep in mind that most people are talking about the amount of sales they’re making, not the amount of actual cash that’s coming in the bank sometimes for us. 

Anyway, sometimes the amount we make in sales is much higher than the amount of cash we make, because if we’re promoting something, if we’re selling something high ticket and we sell a lot of them, that’s when we’ll make one or $200,000 in sales in a span of 30 days.

But from those sales, we’ll see about, you know, we’ll see usually a few multiple five figures of cash, which is still a nice chunk of change.

That’s still something I’m really proud of. On the flip side. Sometimes I have months where launching isn’t my priority, or we’re not selling anything new, or my coaching is sold out. And instead I’m really focused on my clients or doing something behind the scenes for something upcoming.

And so our sales months will be really low that month, but our cash will be really high because we’ve stacked in that recurring revenue. We’ve stacked in those payment plans. We have ourselves set up so that we’re not relying on those sales, like a hamster on a wheel every month, wondering where your next sale is coming from.

So it depends on the chapter we’re in and I encourage you not to get it to attached to your monthly revenue because one month doesn’t paint the picture for the bigger business growth. I know I had to really do some mindset work to get out of that cycle myself.

I had a lot of worth attached to how much money I made every month in sales, which could totally lead to burnout because if you’re just focused on selling, selling, selling, where’s the room for delivery. Whereas the room for customer service, where’s the room for the actual product that you promised your clients.

That’s why I’m not trying to shame anyone here. I really am. You know, never try to say negative things on my platforms. Um, but I wanna be transparent in my business coaching style, the, the entrepreneurs that are releasing new things every single month is not a style that I person personally would teach or coach.

If that’s working for you, that’s fabulous. I’ll by all means, take what’s working for you and run with it. I think you can make a lot of money doing it, but the amount of delivery that needs to happen for you to create something new every single month, and that needs to go behind the scenes to make it high quality feels unmanageable to me.

Now, the other thing that could be sacrificed there, maybe you’re saying, well, I’m doing that, but I’m not working as much as you’re thinking is the quality being sacrificed.

That’s not something I’m willing to sacrifice either. So just food for thought, don’t, you don’t need to get caught up in selling something new every month. You don’t even need to get caught up in what your sales numbers are.

Every month. All you need to know is the chapter you’re in. And if it’s contributing to your overall vision for your business and your life, not just how much of your money you’re making, but that you’re actually happy. And that you’re finding a worklife balance. Now, some things to look out for. Um, so if you kind of, what I do is kind of treat everyone’s sales or everyone’s number reports as sales.

And I expect that they are also referring to either a contract being signed or a deposit being paid or whatever their version is of a sale. Everyone’s gonna have a different version of that.

That is not really worth deciphering on your own. The only thing you really wanna get again, out of people sharing their numbers is if it inspires you. So if it inspires you to see that someone in this span of 24 hours or in a week or in a month got enough contracts or enough deposits or enough verbal yeses, whatever their definition is of contract or of, of a sale.

Again, mine does inquire or does in, uh, require a contract, um, you know, find inspiration from that, but don’t let it daunt you all that much because everyone’s going to have a lot of their own definition that you simply just don’t know, and won’t be able to decipher.

And the things that you can look out for to see if it’s different or one is people will say I had a $80,000, whatever, you know, kind of word you wanna use or whatever number you wanna use cash month.

So that will mean that’s how much they made in cash. That does not mean that they made that much in sales that month. That does not mean that they made any sales that month and good for them, if that’s the case, right? That means that they have stacked their revenue and stacked their income, such that they don’t need to make new sales every month.

They can have that coming in from work they’ve done in the past, still making them money, super inspiring. Um, but just do keep that in mind that, you know, if you have followed that person on social media, for example, and you’ve seen them on the beach of Tahiti for the whole month.

Now they’re saying that they’ve made $80,000 that month, and you’re wondering what kind of voodoo magic system do you have going on behind the scenes, where you’re making $80,000 in sales without doing anything?

See, that’s where we can get into that trap of what does she know that I don’t or what does he know that I don’t, why can’t I be on vacation, making that much money without actually selling anything?

Well, in that case, look critically and see that they’re sharing that they brought in that much cash, meaning they might have not sold anything, which again, good for them. You know, everyone deserves a vacation, but if you’re letting yourself believe this lie, that they have some perfectly, you know, formulated funnel or they have a huge sales team.

Or they have a huge well oiled machine working from that, for them behind the scenes that allows them to make that amount of sales while they’re on vacation. But that might not actually be true at all. They might might, they might make all their sales themselves. They just did it before.

They just did it a few months ago. So now that money is coming to them, right? So just looking critically at what you’re making these numbers mean, what you’re assuming, and especially getting critical about where you’re making it mean someone else has a secret that you don’t and therefore you must buy from them because any good business coach will tell you that there is.

No, the secret is taking action. That’s the secret . You can pay people a lot of money for whatever secrets they’re telling you, whatever vortex they’ll get you in or whatever the secret is taking action and good coaches support you in taking action.

They don’t give you a secret. They’re not selling you something that you don’t already know. The other thing to look out for is, um, when people talk about how much money their business has made, and then don’t include any, um, parameter or timeline under which that happened.

So there are people that will share that they made a, they have a million dollar business, or they have a seven figure business. And what they won’t disclose fully in that sentence is that they made that million dollars over the span of four or five years.

And there’s absolutely no shade in that either. That’s still extremely impressive. It is very rare for a business to last that long to make that much money. A lot of people throw in the towel. A lot of people lose momentum.

It’s still very much something to be proud of, but it’s another chance where if you’re not critically thinking about what people are telling you, you are going to potentially fall into the trap of what do they know that I don’t because how are they making a million dollars a year, um, doing something that looks similar to me?

Well, maybe they’re not making a million dollars a year. Maybe they’re making closer to $250,000 a year doing what you’re doing, and maybe that’s close to what you’re making. And that is okay. That is still way more money than a lot of people will make in their lifetime or in, in a year in their lifetime.

Um, but just making sure that it’s not, you know, being misinterpreted by you, uh, or let on falsely by someone. I, I don’t think people are trying to be malicious when they’re trying to share their income or their numbers.

I think like me, you know, you wanna hope that people are doing it because they’re hoping it shows people what’s possible and it’s showing them that what they do work. So that’s why we share my income. I know how much it’s helped me. And I know that I would not have had the courage to quit.

My job had the courage to go into debt, had the courage to get up every single day, time and time again, I still get up early in the morning to work on my business. I have a nine month old and I’ve been doing this for six years and I still have that commitment because I’m continually upleveling and showing what’s possible and seeing what’s possible.

So that’s what you wanna get out of this number conversation. You do not wanna fall into the, the trap of shiny object, the trap of what do they have that I don’t. Those are things that lead your brain into a place of lack, into a place of fear.

And that’s where you’ll make decisions that aren’t really in your highest interest, but that are really just almost out of fear. Like if I don’t do this, I’m never gonna figure it out.

Or if I don’t do this, then they’ll forever know something I don’t. And so I wanna invite you if this is resonating with you, you might know that I have two spots open for one-on-one coaching right now. And it’s for the woman that doesn’t is not looking for a secret sauce or is not looking for that shiny object that she doesn’t have.

It’s for the woman who is ready to become her own shiny object is ready to shine so bright that you no longer notice what other people are doing or worry about if you’re not doing enough or worry about if you’re doing it wrong or all those other inferior thoughts that come when we assume someone else has something we don’t.

My approach is action rules and action comes from a good mindset. If you want to work on your mindset. And then if you wanna take informed and inspired action from it, I am your coach.

I don’t wanna say the G word guarantee because I don’t ever like to be the one guaranteeing your results. I want you to guarantee your own results, but at this point in my business, all of my one-on-one clients, all of them, I’m trying to think if there’s any exceptions that I cannot have been making multiple have had multiple months of five figures, both in cash and in sales for a while.

Now, some of them years, it depends on how long they’ve been working with me, frankly, but I’m at this point where I know how valuable working with me is, and I’m literally moving mountains in my business to be able to share it with more people.

And only these two spots are, are all I can manage for the rest of the year, because I really give so much to my one-on-one clients. I look at their stuff every week.

I make sure I I’m supporting them every single week. I get on calls with them every week. I only do calls about one, one day a week. So it’s very finite time, but it’s very, very valuable.

And it is really about shifting away from this idea of what do other people have that I don’t and finding that within yourself and taking the action that you are either afraid to take, or you’re not sure to take, or you don’t know to take, or you need to think about differently in order to take so that you can achieve what you want.

And you can have your six figure month, your six figure day, your six figure, whatever it is that you’re kind of, you know, craving or seeing and getting triggered by, or getting excited by, depending on what happens to you. When you see these numbers and you are ready to create that for yourself,

The first thing is to step away from the idea that you can’t do it, or that it’s too hard for you, or that these people know something that you don’t or any of those others’ emotions that start coming up. When we see these huge income members and immediately assume that there’s something wrong with us for not doing that.

We’re so close here so far. We don’t know how to get there, all the other sort of like opposite reactions that actually should be happening when you see that type of thing. And if you’re ready to shift out of that, and if you’re ready to, instead of being the one, consuming it, creating it, then this is free you.

And if you’re still not sure about me, that’s cool. I understand you should sign up for my free event a week from today. If you’re listening to this, it is on Monday, the 19th of September called 6-figure month party.

It’s gonna be a true party. It’s kind of a bummer I don’t drink champagne anymore. Maybe I’ll bring some, some Virgin bubbly or something, cuz I really want it to be fun and expansive and high vibrational and a reminder of what is possible for women.

When you do have this approach of there’s not something that other people know that I don’t, there’s nothing shiny that I need to chase except my own inner light, because it is what’s guiding me. It’s what’s stronger than anyone else’s and I am simply looking for the permission, the courage, the guidance, the coaching to get there.

To get to that 6-figure month. That’s what I’m here for. And that’s really where you’ll all help you shine. So if you have any questions about the event or coaching, feel free to message us or email me. You can email me at leah@leahgervais.com.

But otherwise I hope that this gave you guys a really clear kind of look from the inside into what people are actually talking about when they say how much money they’re making.

And we didn’t even get into the profit issue, um, how completely, you know, unclear it is, how much people are spending when they talk about how much they’re making, I can touch on it briefly, I’ll touch more on it, on our, at our 6-figure month party.

But I honestly don’t think it’s a good use of your time to obsess over people’s profit margins. You need to know why you wanna make the profit margin you want to make and run your business. Accordingly.

There will certainly be people out there who have seven figure businesses and are making and are actually only making $50,000 a year for themselves. They’re spending $950,000 a year on their business. But I, I personally don’t think that’s something to shame anyone for.

If their mission is to get to $10 million and they are using hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to grow using Facebook ads or Instagram ads or Google ads or growing their team or whatever, then all the power to them. I think that the tension comes when we are at a profit margin that feels out of our control and on accident rather than intentional.

So if someone’s making $50,000 a year, but spending $950,000 a year and they don’t know how they got there and they’re really frustrated and they want a smaller or a much larger profit margin, that is that, you know, that’s not a fun situation.

And, and I can understand how that would feel out of integrity, but there’s no need to shame someone for having a small profit margin. If they have a clear reason for why they want a small profit margin.

I personally, as I got, I, I would say it was 6-figure month when I started really having a much bigger profit margin, um, and definitely was able to feel that financially in my life, I started doing all these short term savings accounts. I paid to furnish my apartment. We live across the street from central park. You know, it was really able to enjoy a lot of that, which I’m so grateful for.

But I know when I was making 6-figures, I had no interest in having a high profit margin. I had no interest in making half of that, or even less, more, less than half of that myself. I wanted to spend as much as I could other than paying for basically my need to live, which isn’t cheap. 

Cause I live in New York city, but I paid for what I needed to live. And I put everything back in my business because I wanted to grow growth was my mindset. Now you might be at a place where growth is not your number one priority, and it’s more about comfort. It might be more about like your actual lifestyle or saving or investing and diversifying your money in another way. 

And that’s fine, but that’s a choice you can make regardless of how much money you’re making. So I just wanna clear that up because I understand the frustration feeling like, well, I know how much people are bringing in, but I have no idea how much they’re spending and it’s making me hard.

It’s making it unclear for me to understand, you know, what I should be shooting for. And that’s really, again, not a question you need to be asking other people. That’s an inward question. That is a question where coaching comes in and you can really evaluate what your priorities are and what is most in service to you and your business and your family and your life.

Um, there’s some people that make a lot of money and have really high profit margins. And a lot of those people then choose to move to states where there’s no income tax because they don’t wanna be taxed on that. So it’s very nuanced. It’s not worth deciphering for anyone else except yourself, what you want. And that’s something I could work with you more directly on.

All right, everyone. I hope that you found this helpful. I hope to see you at our 6-figure month event. If you’re not signed up, please do via the link in my Instagram bio. Um, or it’s in a lot of our emails. I’ll also put it on my website and I hope that this gave you a different perspective.

So you can move forward with inspiration as you consume things online, but really give you the push to start being the one, creating those high months instead of consuming and just watching others do it. Cause it’s waiting for you. All right, I’ll talk to you soon. Have a great day. Bye visionaries.

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