How to Reach Your First $100K in Business and Why It Matters - EP # 247

In this episode, Maggie shares why reaching your first $100K in business is about more than revenue. It is a leadership milestone that changes how you see yourself, how you lead, and how you grow your business.

She breaks down what often keeps business owners stuck below $100K, including lack of clarity, inconsistent strategy, limited support, and treating the business too much like a hobby instead of something real.

You’ll also hear how the Diamond Effect Group helps business owners build the mindset, structure, and consistency needed to grow with more confidence and less overwhelm.

If you are serious about building a sustainable business and reaching your first $100K and beyond, this episode will give you a powerful new perspective on what it really takes.

To learn more about the Diamond Effect Group and join, go to Maggie's website here https://www.stairwaytoleadership.com/diamond-effect-group

Transcript

[00:00:00] What if your first hundred K in business is not really about the money? What if it is about who you become on the way there? Because yes, of course, making more money matters. It gives you breathing. It gives you stability, it gives you options, but what I really believe is that your first a hundred K is also a leadership milestone.

It is the moment where your business stops feeling like a hopeful idea and starts becoming something real and tangible.

And here is what I have seen over and over again in business. So many smart, talented, hardworking people stay stuck below a hundred K for much longer than they need to or never reach it. Not because they're not good enough, not because their business cannot work, but because getting to that first hundred [00:01:00] K requires a different level of leadership, consistency and intention than most people realize.

And trust me, once you cross it, everything changes, your perspective changes, your confidence changes, your business changes, and that is what I wanna talk about today. So stay with me.

I do really believe that your first a hundred K is a very important milestone, not because it means you have made it not because after that, everything is just magically easy and all the problems go away. But because it changes how you see yourself and how you see your business.

Usually by the time someone gets to that point, they're no longer just hoping that the business will work. They have built real skills, they have built resilience. They have learned how to market, [00:02:00] how to sell, how to serve their clients at the highest level, even when there's volume of those clients how to make decisions and how to keep going and practically.

Yes. It also matters because it gives you more resources. It gives you more breathing room. It helps you get out of that survival mode that you're constantly in before that milestone. And you're no longer at a point where every decision feels heavy when every month feels like pressure. And of course, once you're more resourced, you start thinking differently.

You start leading differently, you see more possibilities. And I wanna share with you a couple of personal stories that got me to believe that. I remember when I first came to Canada as an immigrant, someone told me that once you make a hundred K, even in your [00:03:00] career working for somebody else, life just feels different. You are more resourced, you're less consumed by just paying the bills.

You have more capacity to think about your future, your growth, your career, and what you really want. And that always stuck with me, and I never forgot that. And my first salary in Canada was 37 and a half thousand dollars. I was working as a bilingual. Facilities help this agent taking calls from tenants and occupants of different buildings, reporting different issues from simple things like I forgot, uh.

I forgot a key to my office and I'm locked out too. We have a major flood or there's a major issue in the building and there's an emergency, and it took me more than 10 years to get to just over a hundred K in my corporate career. And that was not just 10 years of coasting. That was 10 years of hard work.

Very often, long hours, overtime. Learning, stretching myself, taking on more [00:04:00] responsibilities. Sometimes even before I was promoted, before I was compensated for it. Growing into a leader, and when I finally crossed that line as a senior manager, I realized something very important.

I realized that it was not just that I was earning more, it was that I had become someone who could create more value, more value for my employees. More value for my department. For my company, I had more perspective. I was more skilled. I was a better leader.

I had more ability to solve problems creatively and help people move things forward faster. And then later after my burnout, that realization became even deeper because I started to see that if I could create that much value inside a company, [00:05:00] maybe I could create even more value outside of one, two for myself by building a business.

And that's where a new chapter started for me, as many of so then when I started my business, I was not starting with a salary. I was actually starting with zero. I had zero income, zero clients. Very quickly, I realized I had zero network I could tap into because I wasn't networking much as a corporate leader. I was an immigrant and after my divorce with my first husband, I also lost a social network that I built in the beginning of my stay in Canada.

I had zero audience. I wasn't present on social media at all, so I just had an idea. Yes, I had some experience and skills and the desire to build something [00:06:00] very meaningful.

Very meaningful to me, while really a desire to make an impact with my skills for a bigger impact. That's what I was doing in my corporate career, but I had to start building from scratch. And for the first two years I was building my business on the side. So I was probably giving it 10 to 15 hours a week while still working full-time, demanding job, and doing my executive MBA on the side as well.

So then when I reached my first a hundred K in business within four years, that was another huge milestone for me, and not just because of the money.

But because it showed me that I could create something real and tangible from nothing, from an idea my brain created, that was magical, and it still is every time [00:07:00] I think about it. I realized that I could build something intentional, that I could take my skills and my experience and my leadership and turn them into a business that helped people that created more value, and I could expand that along with the income that the business generated.

That's why I care so much about helping business owners do the same.

But what I see so often being around entrepreneurs and business owner is that there are so many talented, hardworking, and mission-driven people who stay stuck below a hundred K for way longer than they need to. Sometimes they get stuck and they stay at 20 K, 30, 50, and sometimes they're a bit better off and they're oscillating between 60 and 80 k.

Four years. And for me it's not just because they're [00:08:00] not capable or that they're lazy or not because their business cannot work, but because they're missing a few important things that unless they fill those gaps, they will stay stuck there. Sometimes it's just they're still treating their business a little bit like a hobby or too much like a hobby where they're relying on motivation to stay consistent and keep working their plan and their strategy

instead of processes, habits, and systems. They think that somehow the more successful business owners, they're motivated a hundred percent of the time, and that's not true for us. Human beings, motivation never lasts. It's like 50 50, 50% of the time is there and 50% of the time is not there. But those who cross a hundred K line and.

Multiple six figure [00:09:00] and seven figure line created the structure and system and environment for themselves when they keep going, even when it's hard, even when motivation or inspiration is not there. Sometimes I see business owners doing a lot. But not in the right order, or it's not strategically chosen.

Sometimes they're just not clear on what their vision is, who their ideal, profitable lifetime client really is. So then their messaging. And marketing is not what it could be. Their conversion rates are not what they could be. They're getting too distracted because they don't have clarity to focus on the meaningful things, right?

And sometimes they're just simply trying to do [00:10:00] too much alone, not believing that there can be a different way to get to where they wanna be, or not even believing that a hundred k and beyond is possible for them. So that's where I see business owners struggle the most. It's not an effort, but often in clarity, strategy, support, and consistency individually or a mixture of all.

When you cross a hundred K line, a lot of changes. I've seen this over and over again in my own life and with my clients, that when you cross that line, it's like a whole new world opens. Imagine it's just like climbing a mountain when you are at the bottom trying to get through the trees and through the forest.

That's like how. Halfway onto the mountain, you don't see much, right? You just see trees in front [00:11:00] of you. So that's like you trying to figure out your day to day.

So it's just like you're trying to figure out your day-to-day things, right? You're solving immediate problems. You're wondering how to sign more clients today, how to maybe be a little bit more consistent, how to stop second guessing yourself. But then once you get out of the forest and start climbing and getting higher and higher, suddenly you can see so much further out

and your perspective gets so much wider, you see more opportunity, more possibilities. Start trusting yourself more because you look back and say, Hey, like I've gone so far. You realize through that process, you are also capable of more than you thought.

That's why I get so excited when my clients reach a milestone. I can see the transformation in their eyes, and yes, I'm [00:12:00] happy for the revenue, but more than that, I'm happy for that expansion that happens with them as humans, as leaders, like I remember. My client, Gloria, when we started, working together, her therapy business was about 80 k and she was mainly, the main therapist there.

She had a couple of contractors and maybe a va, and she was so overwhelmed that she couldn't even see getting past the a hundred K line. As we started working together, and we got there pretty fast. But with that, she developed some critical skill sets. I could just see the confidence that, she grew and the clarity that she gained so much so that within three years she grew and expanded that business to over 20 or 30 contractors serving thousands of families.

Helping [00:13:00] kids with their speech challenges and generating $750,000 plus in revenue.

And this is exactly why I created Diamond Effect Group. I always wanted this program to be foundational. I always wanted this program to be a foundation for a serious mission driven, ambitious business owners who are still in the earlier stages of their business in terms of the revenue, but I already thinking long term.

Maybe they have a job that they're still working and they want to leave. Maybe they started the business as a hobby, but they know they want it to become something more serious and something real, something that they can make more impact with. Maybe they.

Or maybe they've run their business for a while, but they were just tired of the up and down [00:14:00] cycle and working so hard and still not crossing the line. Or maybe they just know they're not building this for a few random sales here and there, but they want something sustainable.

And I built it for people who do understand that getting to a hundred K, it's a first step, and there's a life beyond that, but it does require something different, right? You can't be wishy-washy about it. You cannot treat it casually. And you cannot only work when you feel inspired. You need to develop skills.

You need to grow your leadership. You need consistency and support together. Now, being serious about it or being focused doesn't mean you can't have fun. We have a lot of fun in the group, and that's what this group is all about.

So now I have run this group for a few years and I have [00:15:00] clients in there who joined me. Like Robin, when her business was at about 30 k and she had multiple things going on. She wasn't sure what to focus on. And through the process we went together and not only she streamlined. Her services as to what she offers and who she worked with.

But over time, she grew this business to over 150 k plus, and she keeps growing despite the fact that, there were also personal things that were happening in those years, and we managed through that

and I helped her. With that to go through inevitable things that life throws at us while still not abandoning her business. As I have seen clients cross that line and really see what helps people move forward. I have refined the diamond effect process and I have distilled it into three [00:16:00] simple words. Connect, convert, and continue. Connect is about deeply understanding. Your people, your ideal, profitable lifetime clients, not just surface level ideal client work, like their demographics, age, and gender and where they live, but really understanding what they're going through, what they want, what they're struggling with, how they make decisions, what's important to them.

Because when you understand your people deeply, your messaging gets stronger. Your content gets stronger. Your marketing gets stronger, your offers get more valuable, and you can charge fair, good prices, and your ideal clients will pay no questions asked. Convert is about learning how to move people from interest to decision, right? So how to [00:17:00] communicate your value clearly, how to create offers that solve real problems, how to sell in a way that feels natural and aligned in your confident about it, and then continue is about consistency.

Because a lot of people can start, actually, anybody can start and people get excited when they start. That's totally normal. We all do. But then when motivation fades and it will, when business gets slower, which it might happen, right? Or the economy is cyclical, and when the results are not instant, or they don't show up as fast as you wish.

Then people often lose momentum, and that's why the continue part matters so much. Because sustainable growth is not built on [00:18:00] motivation alone. It's impossible to build it on motivation alone. You need to build in on process habits, leadership that gives you the ability to keep going. When things get hard, when things get slower, when you're not as motivated or inspired.

And I could give you multiple client stories here because Diamond Effect Group is filled with amazing entrepreneurs. My ideal clients in there, but.

One that's coming up to me right now is Stephanie, the Excel expert who came to the group when she was still working at her very cushy part-time job. She was making good high five figure years, working three days a week for many, many years in the company. And, but she wanted to have a business where she could travel and she [00:19:00] could do what she loved without a buzz over her head.

And her husband was already retired, so she wanted to have that flexibility, but she was scared. She didn't really believe that her business could grow to that point. So she came into the diamond type group and shortly after she build enough. Revenue and belief and trust in herself that she quit her job a year and a half in advance.

And not only that, within a year or so, she started traveling while working.

So she made that dream come true. And this year she's on track too.

And this year she's on track to reach her biggest, hairy and scary and audacious goal yet, and I'm so proud of her. Came to coaching week after week. We coach her through her mindset and the strategy and consistency and continuation and juggling the [00:20:00] increasing client work with the need to market and sell still in her business.

And she's just a shining example with many others in the group. What's possible when you get. Support. When you get focused, when you're clear. When you get skilled, and you are a leader of your business. So if you are listening to this right now and something and you're saying, yes, this is me. I want you to hear this.

You do not need to have everything figured out, but you do need to decide that your business deserves to be treated like something real, not a hobby. Okay? That's where it starts. And then if you know you're serious about building a business. That will get you to your first a hundred K and beyond with clarity, more confidence, less overwhelm.

Then the Diamond effect group is for [00:21:00] you, and I'm here to support you,

and this work matters to me so much because I know what opens up for people when they get there. I know how much changes. For you inside of you as a leader for your business and ultimately for those around you.

And I can't even describe the feeling when I see, when my clients see how much more becomes possible for them when they're on the top of that first mountain and they see all that new perspective in front of them.

And that's why I truly believe that so many talented business owners are meant for more than just surviving in their business. They're meant to build something that not only supports them and their families and grows with them, but something that creates real impact in their communities and in [00:22:00] the world.

So if you are ready. I would love to invite you to join the Diamond Effect Group, and if you are not ready yet, I hope that this episode gave you a new perspective on what that first hundred K really means. It's not just a number, it's a doorway. And maybe it's your next one. And if you wanna join the Group, go to stairway to leadership.com. Choose Diamond Effect Group in the menu and you can book a free consultation from there. Looking forward to chatting with you. Bye-bye.