135 | The economics of selling products with Michelle Loretta, Sage Wedding Pros

Remember your high-school economics class? Okay good, because today’s episode is going to be nothing like that. Today we’re making numbers, margins, pricing and market metrics fun with Michelle Loretta, a business consultant, financial strategist and founder of Sage Wedding Pros. Before launching her own business, Michelle worked as an accountant for Deloitte, sales and marketing manager for DDLA and merchandiser for Coach. Since then, she’s applied her corporate and entrepreneurial expertise to wedding businesses worldwide and launched herself onto the live-event space as a frequent speaker at professional conferences.  Through Sage Wedding Pros, Michelle also produces her own next-level summit known as The Be Sage Conference. I have had the privilege of attending twice, once as a speaker, and it truly is an amazing program. For those of you who don’t want to miss it, Michelle’s next conference is coming up in Austin in February of 2020.  On today’s episode, Michelle and I talk about business planning, the economics of selling products and how financial decisions in your business affect your operational plans. We promise, whether you’re creative or business minded, this episode will inspire you to start drafting all of your next big business plans.  ON TODAY’S EPISODE: Michelle’s journey and background  What inspired her to start her own stationery business How blogging evolved into hosting workshops Benefits of getting your business plan on paper Reframing your financial goals as business milestones The economics of selling products Trading margins for volume  Considerations for pricing physical vs digital products Common mistakes made during go-to-market  Tips for pricing your products  Numbers. Numbers. Numbers. What’s up next for Michelle & the Be Sage Conference   KEY TAKE-AWAYS:   “Everyone has a backstory that we weave into the businesses we're creating and in that way we can help one another.” - Katie Hunt    “The wonderful thing about the traditional business plan is that it really forces you to look at all aspects of your business, not just the ones that come comfortably.” - Michelle Loretta    “You can't make a marketing decision without thinking of the financial aspects. Every financial decision links to an operational and marketing decision.” - Michelle Loretta   “Every decision needs to come back to how does this fit with the overall goals, the overall focus.” - Katie Hunt    “When you're selling direct to consumer, that’s one  thing, but moving from 5,000 to 15,000 orders you have to ask, ‘do I have an operational structure that can support that?’  - Michelle Loretta   “If you price it too low, you won’t make any money on your products. If you price it too high, you'll price yourself out of the market and nobody's going to buy. So you really need to know your personal numbers.” - Katie Hunt    “Pricing is actually a marketing decision. It's not a financial decision. It's a marketing decision that you test financially.” - Michelle Loretta    “Knowing what your numbers are doing is so critical from season to season, month to month, quarter to quarter, year to year.” - Michelle Loretta    “It's hard to be good at all things. My recommendation is create your first channel, and then only after you’re profiting and you're thriving with it, expand into the second channel.” - Michelle Loretta    “If you're not happy with what you're earning, that's the red flag that you need to be aware of. That’s when you need to boost profit margins by 2% to 5% in the next year.“  - Michelle Loretta    “You need to know your margins, you need to create benchmarks. You need to try to best your benchmarks.”   - Michelle Loretta    LINKS Conference: besageconference.com  Website: http://www.sageweddingpros.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SageWeddingPros Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sageweddingpros/ Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/sageweddingpros/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/SageWeddingPros   SPECIAL OFFER:  3 Free Months of Gusto! Gusto makes payroll, taxes, and HR actually easy for small businesses. Fast, simple payroll processing, benefits, and expert HR support all in one place. Gusto automatically pays and files your federal, state, and local taxes so you don’t have to worry about it. Plus they make it easy to add on health benefits and even 401(k)s for your team.  Those old-school, clunky payroll providers just weren’t built for the way modern small businesses work. But Gusto is. Now is the best time to get set up for the new year. Don’t wait.  Proof to Product listeners get 3 free months of Gusto when they run their first payroll. Try a demo and see for yourself at http://www.gusto.com/proof SUBSCRIBE To subscribe on iOS, go to the iTunes page and subscribe to Proof to Product. On Android, you can listen using your favorite podcast app.  WRITE A REVIEW Writing a review on iTunes will help other product based business owners find Proof to Product as they are working to up level, scale, and build profitable and sustainable companies. FOLLOW PROOF TO PRODUCT Follow Proof to Product on Instagram for the latest updates. JOIN OUR EMAIL LIST If you'd like to receive more information about our upcoming episodes of Proof to Product including show notes and information about our guests, head over to www.prooftoproduct.com and sign up for our email list.   SHARE Be sure to share Proof to Product with all of the product based business owners that you know!    ABOUT PROOF TO PRODUCT: Proof to Product is hosted by Katie Hunt. Since 2011, Proof to Product has worked with thousands of product based businesses to help them up level, scale, and build profitable sustainable companies. You can find our show notes and additional resources at ProofToProduct.com. If you like what you heard today, please head over to Apple Podcast to leave a five star review and subscribe. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next week with a new episode!