From $50 to $10,000,000: The 5-step Framework You Can Use to Scale Your Business

Read time: 5 minutes

What does growth mean to you?

Whenever I hear people talk about growth, it often seems ambiguous. I hear words like “more, bigger, or better.” And while these are important and meaningful, growth requires a calculated approach.

It demands big-picture clarity with an understanding of the micro-steps along the way.

Clarity and strategy, not luck.

There are two dimensions of growth: optimization and scale

These need different modes of thinking.

Optimization is a relative measure, while scale is an absolute measure. It’s the difference between cutting costs to increase profits (optimization) vs. adding a new revenue stream (scale). The impact of optimizations will diminish over time.

After 4 years of operating my one-person business, I’m starting to see the diminishing returns of optimizations, which prompts the need to plan for scale.

Yes, as a one-person business, you’re doing everything to start, but it doesn’t mean you must do it all forever.

One of the most effective ways to plan growth is by learning from successful business models and adapting them to your skills, goals, and style. This post will lay out the framework of how Ship 30 for 30 owners are scaling a $50 accountability writing group to a $10,000,000 digital writing empire.

If you have been reading my work, you know I’m a student of their course. They were my accountability partner to combat my perfection and helped me start to write online. While their course is highly valuable, their strategic and thoughtful approach to business is worth learning from.

It starts with this:

Scale requires planning, so get clear on the high-impact areas

To see the bigger picture, you sometimes have to break apart the components and write it all out so it’s obvious what you need to do.

99% of business owners won’t do this because they are too stuck in the day-to-day or don’t know how to think strategically. These are vulnerabilities. If you want to scale your business and be here long-term, you cannot only rely on luck; you must plan.

Use this 5-step framework:

Step 1: Lay out your profit centers

These profit centers are what drive money to your bank account.

They are the products and services that can stand alone within your business model. If you have multiple services that are connected or feed each other, then count it as one profit center. For example, a web hosting service with basic and premium subscriptions has one profit center.

You may only have one (and that’s fine).

Multiple profit centers might look like a service business with 1:1 consulting, a low-ticket digital course, and a cohort-based advisory group.

The goal is to identify what you have in your business model, not judge yourself on what you do or do not have.

Step 2: Identify core functions for each profit center

There are 5 core functions in each profit center.

• Sales – acquiring customers

• Customer Success – ensuring customer satisfaction

• Operations – the infrastructure behind the scenes

• Fulfillment – executing and delivering value to customers

• Marketing – gaining attention and visibility

Not all core functions are required for every profit center. So your task is to go through each profit center and answer the following question:

“Does this profit center need [insert core function]?”

When you are done, you’ll have an inventory of important roles to fill to operate the profit center:

“I need X person to do Y core function for Z profit center to operate.

Step #3: Identify who or what is filling each core function

When it comes to “who,” I mean people to fill these core functions.

This will be a combination of the owner and employees in a multi-person business. In a one-person business, it’s you (and the strategic partners you’ve outsourced work to).

But it doesn’t need to be a person to fill roles; technology (i.e., software) can fill the core functions.

For example, you may not need a salesperson to close consulting projects but still need high-quality leads. So instead, you can build a lead magnet and use paid advertising to amplify the sales funnel and increase lead generation.

Identifying gaps and bottlenecks in each profit center will help you see what’s hindering scalability. Early in the business, the owner(s) will handle many core functions. But over time, if one person has many core functions across profit centers, it will cause bottlenecks.

Bottlenecks prevent scale.

Step #4: Reduce bottlenecks and maximize leverage

Real scale happens when you free yourself from handling every aspect of your business.

To do this, replace yourself. Your goal is to see fewer names in core functions across profit centers. Ideally, you want one person (or software) to fill each box.

Replacement happens gradually, so you should assess the following:

“What core function do I hire or outsource for first (or next)?”

There are two approaches to maximizing leverage:

• List the functions from highest to lowest based on revenue generation — and replace the lowest. This will typically follow this order:

  • Operations

  • Customer Success

  • Sales

  • Fulfillment

  • Marketing

• List the functions from highest to lowest for the time needed relative to output — and replace the lowest.  

  • This won’t follow a typical pattern because it’s based on your priorities and level of skills.

    For example, running the finances & operations of my business is straightforward. It doesn’t take much time, and I have a high skill set. Whereas sales is a bit more time intensive for my skill set, I’ve taken steps to replace this first (even though it’s a high revenue driver).

Step #5: Find the key lever in each core function

The Pareto Principle is used to identify high-impact activities and avoid low-impact ones.

It says that 80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts (i.e., the 80/20 rule). In each one of the core functions, one lever drives 80% of the impact. So for each core function (for each profit center), ask yourself:

“What key lever must I push/pull to have a real impact?”

This matters because the key lever is what you are hiring/outsourcing for and determines the function’s success.

For Ship 30 for 30, the key lever for marketing function is the newsletter.

• The newsletter drives subscriber engagement and growth

• Those subscribers drive the majority of new customers

• Those new customers fuel revenue for the profit center

• The newsletter provides ongoing value to all customers and keeps them in the ecosystem (extending customer value).

The key lever.

Scale your thinking by leveraging the doing

As a business owner, your value lies in your thinking and decision-making abilities.

While it’s essential to be hands-on in the early stages, real growth happens when you scale your thinking by leveraging the doing. This requires planning and strategy.

Here’s how you can adapt the lessons here to your one-person business model.