Natalie Williams (00:00)
Hey creators, welcome to the Level Up Creators podcast. I'm Natalie Williams, head of revenue at Level Up Creators, and I'm taking over as the host for today's episode.

Today, we're diving deep into our MRR Accelerator program, a seven month journey designed to help creators like you build predictable, recurring revenue without burning out or sacrificing your creative vision guaranteed. I'm joined by Level Up Creator CEO and MRR Accelerator lead consultant, Amanda Northcutt, who's going to walk us through exactly how the MRR Accelerator helps creators develop scalable business models, automate their systems, and finally break free from the feast or famine cycle that plagues

so many in the creator economy. Welcome, Amanda.

Amanda Northcutt (00:41)
Hey Nat, nice to have you taking over the hosting duties here. It's awesome.

Natalie Williams (00:47)
Whether you're a course creator, coach, consultant, or content creator looking to monetize your expertise in a more systematic way, this episode is going to give you the inside scoop on a program that's already helping creators transform their businesses. So grab your notebook because Amanda's about to drop some serious value bombs. Let's level

Amanda, let's start with the basics. What exactly is the MRR accelerator program and what makes it different from other business coaching programs out there?

Amanda Northcutt (01:15)
Yeah. So the MRR Accelerator is sort of the brainchild of our work that we did last year in 2024 with Amanda Getz, where we took her from 10K MRR to 50K MRR in seven months. And I hear my grandmother's voice in my head saying, if I had a nickel for every time somebody asked me, Amanda, or Amanda Getz, like, my gosh, how do I get that level of help? I want in on that. I would have retired by now. And so would have Amanda.

We built a program based on what we did for Amanda, except it is even more organized. And that was a pretty well-organized, heavy-hitting program. And we have developed what we call the MRR method over the course of the almost two years that we've been in business here at Level Up Creators. And that is the culmination of my 22 years in recurring revenue and the rest of our team's over 100 years of experience in

business and so we have brought all of those skills and expertise and wisdom to level up creators and we put it all together into the MRR method and it really takes your business from A to Z. So no matter kind of where your business is at whether you're just starting out say you know you maybe you're a director of something director of marketing or VP of marketing or CMO or something like that or anything in the business world

and you're maybe ready to exit the corporate world and do your own consulting or group coaching, or you've heard about this creator economy thing and you want to get going. The MRR method is designed to take you from whoever you are, wherever you are, whatever your level of expertise is and experience and what you want to do moving forward and the types of people that you want to work with and build a demonstrably stellar multi-five figure MRR based business to not just replace your corporate income, but we're talking about like

three, four, five, six X what you're making right now as an individual creator, consultant. So the MRR method takes you all the way from strategic ideation and a 10 year vision and

It's designed to take you step by step in a very methodical way to the realization of that 10 year vision. And it is a fairly linear path with some, you know, a little bit of meandering and there's a lot of specificity and like unique elements that go in for each individual accelerator participant. But by and large, we have kind of cracked the code on how to build a business that earns monthly recurring revenue and we are bringing it to you.

Natalie Williams (03:51)
That's right. Let's get into the details a little bit more. Can you walk us through what's included in the seven-month program? What kind of resources, support, and guidance do participants receive?

Amanda Northcutt (04:00)
Yeah. man, I don't think we even have time to like answer that question. You get a full fractional team. You get, you know, my $100,000 a month team as your full fractional team. And so this is like, I am your fractional CEO and CFO. Natalie is your, you know, fractional CRO, chief revenue officer. We've got chief technical officer and operations. And I mean, we are bringing everything that you need. It's kind of like the perfect marriage between all business operations.

marketing, sales, customer service, customer success, technology, product and service, development and delivery, expansion revenue, all of the entire operational metrics part of your business, creating a voice of customer machine, basically, that you feedback into your marketing. And so it's just this virtuous cycle of MRR that we're building for you. And there's lots of pieces of that, right? But the kind of main takeaway is we are taking you through this step-by-step process.

step-by-step process, and so you get tons of deliverables, vision, mission, values, goals, your strategy, your product ladder, product development tables. We really get into the weeds of who your customers are, what you're bringing to the table for them, what solutions to those specific customers, painful, pervasive problems are you uniquely positioned to solve, and then what's the vehicle we're gonna use to solve them. help you.

really nail down and define your methodology and how to deliver that effectively toward the end of value outcomes and transformations for your customers. So of course, we're talking about ICP. We're doing voice of customer interviews. We're doing surveys. We're doing polls. We're learning as much as we possibly can so that we're not building businesses in the dark, because that is the beginning of the end of all business is when you work on something behind the scenes for months and months or years and years, and you say, ta-da, here's what I have, without validating that with an audience. So there's a lot of

Here's our hypothesis, which is based on a massive qualitative and quantitative data set.

with live fire like in the marketplace to make sure that our ideas are validated or if they're not and we need to make adjustments, we're good to go. But we are building brand guides. mean, full brand suite, logo, colors, gradients, lockups, fonts, everything, full on style guide. We're building custom AI tools for each of our creators depending on the needs of their specific business. We're building websites, we're building funnels, we're setting up all of the tech, we're building standard operating procedures for

every single function in your business that we touched or built on your behalf. You get a custom notion instance. I mean, my gosh, it's kind of like unreal when you look at it that like, the hell are we doing this in seven months? And the answer to that is because our team is the best in the world at this. like, it is inimitable. One of my favorite words. You cannot replicate it and you can't have my team either. This is the only way to get them. So there's also this really amazing cohort.

element to the accelerator program. And so the five folks that we have in our first cohort meet every Wednesday morning and myself or Natalie or another special guest like Amanda Goetz will facilitate the learning of and discussion of a specific topic that will ultimately help these accelerator participants be amazing CEOs. So not only are we sort of giving like the fish, if you will, through the accelerator and the planning and building and implementation,

and demonstrable like efficacy of the business. We're also teaching each of these participants what the hell to do once you graduate from the accelerator. And we're not building businesses to where these people are tethered to us forever and inextricably tied and reliant upon us for everything. We're also giving the fishing pole and teaching you how to fish and make decisions based on your strategy and decisions based on what your numbers.

are telling you and make decisions versus macro and micro economic factors and internal and external factors. And that I think is a really big part of the special sauce. You also end up with this mastermind of people that we have very carefully curated to your strategic business and personal advantage in this group.

Natalie Williams (08:10)
Yeah, and just the conversations that organically happen there amongst themselves as they're all in the same kind of phases together. It's been really, really cool to see and see all those kind of start unfolding. And speaking of the participants, we know not every program is right for everyone. some what makes someone an ideal candidate for this MRR accelerator, who will thrive in this environment?

Amanda Northcutt (08:20)
Yes.

Yeah, you're absolutely right. This is not for everybody. It's a big commitment. It's a big deal. And we have to make sure that we're structuring our program for excellent group dynamics and for success because we offer a five figure, like multi-five figure monthly recurring revenue guarantee for each and every one of our participants. And so we do the vast majority of the heavy lifting, but you have to carry out the plan. You have to kind of follow the instructions that we agree on at every single stage. It's not like we're like,

Go spend $25,000 on ads and let us know how it goes. Good luck. Like, absolutely not. We agree on a plan every single step of the way and are building the business of your dreams. And so this is right for subject matter experts in particular. That's really our bread and butter and who we work with best. Because we can take your subject matter expertise and help you deeply, deeply understand who your best, most likely customer is.

and the value outcomes and transformations that you can provide for them through the delivery of your methodology, typically through consulting, group coaching programs, one-on-one coaching, whatever the right mix of income streams is for you. I know we're gonna talk about investment later on, but it is a significant investment, but it is the most secure investment you will ever make. And a lot of people have called me...

crazy for a couple of our own participants in the forthcoming interview series as a result of this. We're like, this is the craziest thing I've ever seen in business. so we have to make sure that we are choosing people who are going to work with us and understand the value in what we're providing and understand that we're going through a process and that all of the icky nasty bullshit guru marketing that you see that's like six figures in six weeks, it just.

It's repulsive and disgusting to me that people do that and prey on people who are desperate to get out of their jobs or feel like they've tried everything that they are supposed to do and that they think the course that they are going to buy is going to make them wealthy when in fact you're just making the person who made the course wealthy. So I like to put my money where my mouth is and let people know that we're really, really serious.

and that this is a partnership and that building a sustainable business that builds monthly recurring revenue where you are providing recurring value in exchange for recurring money requires a very specific and intentional way of working. And seven months, frankly, is really freaking fast. is unbelievably fast. This is like rocket fuel for the right business.

Natalie Williams (11:12)
Yeah, and one thing our listeners are probably wondering about is what happens after that seven month program ends. Is there ongoing support or a community that continues beyond the program?

Amanda Northcutt (11:21)
So in addition to the kind of group facilitation and long-term relationships there, we definitely do offer what we call the MRR growth team, where we are running growth marketing experiments and we're also managing your tech stack beyond the accelerator. But that is fully optional. But then that is the way to continue with the full fractional team and to have a team who knows what you're doing, knows what they're doing, has an extraordinary degree of like intimate familiarity with your business since we will...

we will be the ones who built it. And then we're working on shared quantitative data. And so like the proof is in the pudding, the results are right in front of you on if the work that we are doing on your behalf is worth the money that you are paying to stay on afterward. But we are building these businesses and we are equipping again with both the fish and the fishing pole so that you don't have to, the option is there for sure. We're not gonna leave anybody hanging, but it's not set up to require that and very intentionally.

Natalie Williams (12:22)
Let's talk a little bit about the results now. So how quickly do participants typically start seeing changes in their revenue structure and business as a whole? Seven months is a long time.

Amanda Northcutt (12:32)
Seven month is a long time, no doubt. Not on the long arc of business and the life of your business, but when you are investing probably more heavily than you ever have in your business, monetarily, emotionally, time-wise, that does feel like a lot. And so the accelerator is structured such that if you are already selling products and services, we are going to help you sell what you have better and improve quickly the parts of the business that we are going to keep moving forward.

And one thing that we found to be really impactful early on, I've been doing one-on-one sales coaching with each one of our accelerator participants. And that has already resulted in significant revenue for one of our participants and increased closing rates for others and increased confidence in selling conversations. And that's been fantastic. So that's kind of like the fastest lever that you can pull early on is how can we improve what's going on that is not to the detriment of what we are building moving forward.

So we are laser focused on that. And then there is a section on everyone's audit, which is the first deliverable that our participants receive after the two week onboarding process. And that includes a quick wins section. And so that is delineating very specifically. Here's five to 10 things that you should do right now that are fairly easy to execute. And we will help you execute them that we believe will lead to increased revenue in the short term as we are building for the long term.

Natalie Williams (14:02)
Yeah, and time is precious for these creators. What's the weekly time commitment for participants and how do you help them balance program work with their existing business?

Amanda Northcutt (14:10)
Yeah, well focusing on the right activities and I love this framework. It's do, don't do, delegate or defer. So everything that we do during our work day or life day as it were can fit into one of those four buckets. so helping our participants act like CEOs and do, don't do, delegate and defer tasks so that they are creating leverage when they work, not just spinning their wheels or doing highly administrative work. That is not.

necessarily very productive. We understand at the end of the day that those things have to happen, but are we putting the big rocks in the jar, if you will, first and making sure that the things that actually need to get done to move the business forward are getting done, as opposed to constantly trying to manage to inbox zero and other activities that are never ending and unsatisfying and don't actually get anything done. making sure that we're spending our time in places where it is best invested is kind of first and foremost.

And beyond that, we're looking at a five to seven hour commitment per week, per participant. And that in the first two months really is, first two of seven months of the accelerator, is reviewing all of the documentation that we provide. So all of our foundational documentation is delivered within the first 10 weeks of the program. So it's an audit, North Star documentation, ideal customer profile, voice of customer interviews, surveys, poll questions to ask.

style guides, custom GPT, strategy and product ladder, product development tables, marketing strategy. I mean, it is the play-by-play playbook for your business. And it is incredible. And it goes from that 10-year, know, hard to crystallize, kind of like 50,000 foot view all the way down to, you know, about a 5,000 foot view with the marketing strategy. And we get really into the weeds and start working on standard operating procedures. And then beyond that, we are...

working with our agency partner to get your new brand guide done. And then we're starting to write copy for your website and get your website built, get your funnels all written, get lead magnets created, building your products and services, working on sales, working on marketing, building your notion instance, more GPTs. it's later on, it's mostly your job is mainly as a participant to review our work and give us feedback and make sure that we are directionally correct and continuing to build the business as the MRR method.

process unfolds that we're building the business of your dreams that you love and that we are targeting the customers that you most want to work with, that we are building the types of products and services that you love and will love to deliver. Like we are hoping to build businesses that our clients want to run for at least 10 years after they leave the accelerator.

Natalie Williams (16:57)
And many of our listeners are solo printers. How much of the implementation falls on them personally versus what the level of team helps with?

Amanda Northcutt (17:04)
Yeah, the team does every single bit of the heavy lifting that we can do. Like at this point, you we can't create your video content for you, but we're writing all of your, we're not, we're not writing. I'll say this. We're not doing administrative work. We're not managing your calendar. That is something that we've talked about bringing into the fold and a future per accelerator cohort. So we'll see about that. We're not writing your social media content or your newsletter or like running your podcasts and doing video editing like your.

personal brand level marketing, we will help you with AI and style guide and marketing strategy, we'll direct those kinds of activities, but those are kind of the four or five things that we specifically don't do. Everything else is on the table. So selecting your tech stack, implementing your tech stack, and we give you unbelievable like enablement and training, written checklists and instructions and video walkthrough.

instructions on, here's what's going on in your kit or your active campaign instance, and here's how your website works and how to update, and here's how to publish your newsletter and batch create your social media content and repurpose your, you know, video podcast content and all that kind of stuff. And so the participant's job is to review our documentation again, give us feedback, make sure we are on point and moving forward in the right direction, and then to carry out the marketing plan effectively.

If you need to create a consulting service specifically, you've got to map out the delivery of that because that falls under your subject matter expertise and not ours. And so we will tee that up for you and help you through it and hold your hand through it. But ultimately, like some of the knowledge has to actually come from your brain and you have to externalize it and organize it. But we are really making you the CEO. Like we're showing you what being a CEO of a stellar team

looks like, but again, you don't need that full team once you're done with the accelerator, unless you're trying to build like hundred million dollar business. Okay. That's ball game. We're typically working with clients who are wanting to make $400,000 to $4 million a year. And so that's a really, really good range. That's another answer to your question earlier or not about who's a good fit, right? So $400,000 to $4 million a year is a really good fit. So that's, yeah.

carrying out the plan.

Natalie Williams (19:28)
Yeah, and you had mentioned earlier that the time commit is usually about five to seven hours per week per participant. Can you walk us through what a typical week looks like for someone in the program? What kind of rhythms we establish for them?

Amanda Northcutt (19:40)
Yeah, for sure. So the main work of the accelerator that our participants are involved in is happening Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And so our deliverables will get dropped on Tuesdays, and then participants will turn those back to us with marked up comments or questions by Friday. So let's say Thursday night. And we have group coaching, at least for this cohort, is on Wednesday morning. And then they get another update on Thursday afternoon. So we're trying to.

be very predictable in terms of here's the rhythm of each week. And each participant has complete visibility into what's next and what our part is and what their part is. And then what's next and what our part is and what their part is with specific due dates attached to each thing. And so we have a phenomenal project manager, Kamber, shout out, who is just crushing it in terms of keeping communication very, very clear, answering questions.

Natalie Williams (20:39)
A lot of creators worry about disrupting their income while transitioning to a new model. How do you help them maintain stability while implementing these changes?

Amanda Northcutt (20:48)
That's a great question. And I keep coming back to the Amanda Gets example because I have legal permission to share that information, right? We have lots of clients who are not Amanda Gets but have kind of similar stories. And she came in to Level Up Creators last year with existing revenue and want to obviously make sure to not cannibalize that revenue or lose it or have a major churn event as we're switching from, know, Kajabi to Mighty Networks or...

switching email service providers or changing up the way the products and services are offered. And so the short answer to that is we never cut off our nose to spy our face. And we're always managing change in a very specific and intentional way. Nothing that we do is haphazard. We're very strategic, calculated, get the full data set, make the right next decision with the information you have at the time. When you get new information, you can update your thinking and your decision. And so we have

framework that works really well and then we use mental models to help us make the next right decision at a return. We're always working in partnership with our clients to that end. And so the exact tactics of how we don't lose existing revenue as we build toward the future vary based on each unique individual and their unique business and their product ladder and offerings and customers and everything like that. And the higher level answer is we have a specific method for that and have

always done that successfully. We've never caused a major turn event or unsubscribe event or anything like that.

Natalie Williams (22:21)
Let's talk a little bit about ROI and some financial considerations and let's address the investment question head on. What kind of return on investment can creators expect and what's a realistic timeline for breaking even and then profiting?

Amanda Northcutt (22:34)
Yeah, so the accelerator price will go up in the near future, but for cohort two will be the same as cohort number one. It's $20,000 per month for seven months. So it's $140,000 total investment for the program. And then each individual, I work closely with each individual who gets an invitation to ultimately end up joining. Anyone is welcome to reach out and engage with us about, you know, raising their hand and saying they might be interested.

And then I will work with them based on historical data, the potential for their business, their current audience. mean, it's a lot of factors that help me offer an MRR guarantee to each individual that is reflective of their current status plus potential plus all the other variables. So without giving away super specific numbers, and of course, we're not going to publish the MRR guarantees for our first cohort or anything,

But so it's $140,000 total. are obviously hoping that we hit that MRR guarantee in month seven, but let's call it month eight. Let's say that your guarantee is, for example sake, and this is on the low end for sure, $30,000 in MRR. So it would take, let's see, 30,000, 60,000, 90,000, 120,000, 150,000, five months to recoup your entire investment in full.

And that's assuming you're starting from zero. Obviously, if you're starting at 10 or 20, we want to take the delta. But if you're starting at 10 or 20 or 30, you're guaranteed to be much higher. But we're looking at a 2, 3, or 4X. Even if it's revenue, even if you have $15,000 in revenue, we might guarantee you somewhere in the neighborhood of $40,000 in MRR. So not only are we transitioning that one-time revenue marker to recurring revenue. And I don't think we've mentioned this to this point. We guarantee...

the guarantee that we offer you, it's black and white in the contract. It's a very mutually, it's a very equitable contract, the way that it's written. It's very clear what our part is and what your part is and what happens if someone does not perform. And in the event that we do not hit your MRR guarantee, we continue to work with you in the same capacity until we do. So you get to keep my full fractional team until we hit your MRR guarantee. This is a, you can't lose.

kind of a situation. So long as you are carrying out the plan that we have mutually agreed to, and you're attending group coaching, you're doing the homework, and in that five to seven hour a week window, you're good. Your guarantee stays intact and we are going to get you there.

Natalie Williams (25:19)
Are there any additional costs participants should be aware of beyond the program fee, things like software, team members, and other resources?

Amanda Northcutt (25:26)
Yeah, that's a great question. Other fees potentially incurred are nominal and typically associated with your tech stack. So if you're using ActiveCampaign and need to be paying $99 a month to ActiveCampaign, you've got to pay that. That is your tool. There's a very specific reason for why tech and tools are not included in the price and why you create your own account and we don't create an account and have a parent's account and then house all of our

child client accounts under the parent level of account. I feel like that is unethical and that makes it impossible for you to cut the cord when you want to cut the cord. And so we keep everything, it's like a good fences make good neighbors kind of a situation. So you have your own accounts, your own ad accounts, and you completely own them and you do pay for those separately. But our tech stacks that we recommend typically run from 300 to 1300 about.

per month on the higher end. There are a few exceptions to that. then otherwise paid ads would be in addition to, but we don't love paid ads here. We love partner marketing here. And so we are, if you have to pay to play for some partner marketing opportunities and we've recommended that you do it, there's probably a damn good reason for it. And there's a strategy behind it and a way to measure it. And so that's really our go-to first. And partner marketing is the highest effort.

marketing activity and it also yields the highest rewards. And we're seeing this over and over and over and over again. There's all sorts of research. We emphatically do not have time to get into today and psychology and neuroscience on why that works. But we are trying to run businesses at 40 to 60 % net profit margins after you pay yourself, that is to be super, super, super clear. And so these are very high margin businesses. We're not gaming the system at all.

Natalie Williams (27:23)
And one thing we often hear is my business is different or my market is too saturated. How do you customize the program for unique business models while still leveraging proven systems?

Amanda Northcutt (27:33)
Yeah. So the MRR method or administering the MRR method is kind of like building a house in a lot of ways. so the home building process, I'll say in the Western world, because that's the world in which I'm familiar, follows a very similar process, right? You have the site, you make the site plan, engineers come out, you got to figure out all the, you know, wastewater and freshwater and gas and electric and all the things, right? And then we're going to

lay the foundation, assuming it's a slab foundation, and we're gonna build the, what do call it, like the frame everything up, and then the sheet rock, or then the wires and the cords go in the wall, and then the sheet rock, right? And on and on on. But how the house ends up looking can be drastically different from one person to the next. But it's the same framework and conceptually the same steps. So that's what the MRR method is, and it is built for a tremendous amount of agility.

And so each business that we're building is extremely unique and special to the individual for whom we are building it. And that is really, really important. So I'm glad you asked this question. We are not doing like cookie cutter businesses, right? This is not like a new planned neighborhood where there's three different house types and that's what you get, right? There's only three types. This is like a high-end.

custom home gated community kind of houses that we're building. And so the process is just, it's built for agility. So while we're following the same broad strokes and steps, everyone in the cohort, like what is in their strategy and product ladder, what is in their marketing strategy and their Northstar documentation is all drastically different, but it's the framework that works across the board.

for every type of business that wants to earn monthly recurring revenue, which if you're in business and you don't want to earn MRR, I'm not sure what's going on with you, but this is not the podcast for you.

Natalie Williams (29:37)
Starts in a different place maybe.

So for those who are thinking I'm not ready yet or I need to grow my audience first, what do you say to them?

Amanda Northcutt (29:49)
We built a multimillion dollar business in 18 months and I have under 3000 LinkedIn followers and like no really other social presence. And so I just want to remind everybody that social media is really new. It's really, really, really, really new. And while it can act as a major strategic advantage to your business, if you leverage it in the right way and you've attracted the right people and you have a customer journey mapped out and a beautiful bow tie funnel and all that stuff, it can be

Natalie Williams (29:54)
you

Amanda Northcutt (30:18)
to an enormous advantage to you. And obviously, larger audiences allow for usually brand deals and sponsorship. So that is another sort of income category that we can bring into the mix. And we can figure out how to earn MRR with brand deals as well. Like we don't do the one-offs. That's not fun. And it's a waste of time. So if you have more followers and a large email list, that's helpful. But business has been running for a very long time without social media followers.

that cannot be the metric that determines your success or not in business. What will determine your success or not in business is if you are able to identify the painful, pervasive, urgent, expensive problems that you are uniquely equipped to solve for a specific subset of the population and how well you deliver that value outcome and transformation to that specific subset of the population. And then pricing it correctly is obviously very important too.

But that's all that business is. It is an exchange of, you know, usually money. Now we're not like bartering for sugar and salt, thankfully. But it's an exchange of money for a solution to a problem and not for a course or a membership or a mastermind or a group coaching program or one-on-one consulting for a solution. All those things I just listed are just the vehicle to get someone from one place, from point A to point B. And that is, I mean, that is the essence of business. It is people providing solutions for...

Natalie Williams (31:24)
yet anyway.

Amanda Northcutt (31:45)
the right audience and being able to replicate that success over and over again. So if you are an expert and you've got money to invest, typically our clients are 40 to 65 or so years old. They're looking for kind of the last major push in their career and they're ready to invest in themselves. And this is a damn good place to do it and it's a very safe place to do it. Obviously our incentives have to be aligned here because

We have to hit our guarantee. And so if you aren't sure, please reach out and we'll talk to you. And if it's not going to be a good fit, I'm going to let you know. Remember, I'm not the snake oil salesman who, you know, once you buy something, I'd be like, bye, good luck. You bought my course, you know, don't let the door hit you on the way out. Like we are partnering with you. We become your team. I am working me personally, very, very, very closely with you. I think I use this word maybe with you, Natalie last week.

is it is an unfuckable situation. We're very serious about who we take on. And so if you get an invitation to this accelerator, my God, you should probably take it because we are very, very picky.

Natalie Williams (32:45)
Thank

Yes, I'm very confident.

implemented your systems?

Amanda Northcutt (33:09)
The only one I can share about is Amanda Gutz, but I mean, that's huge. She's a single mom of three, went from 10K MRR and spotty revenue otherwise to she bought a house outside of Miami and this is her first house ever. And she shared her age, so I'll share it. She's 39. And that is really freaking exciting. She has financial security. She has recurring revenue. She has a business that she can count on. It's not something where she's...

Natalie Williams (33:12)
Mm-hmm

Amanda Northcutt (33:36)
chasing people down left, right and center to hopefully get the next deal because she has predictable, scalable, reliable revenue. And she has products and services that she can just keep adding people to, again, recurring revenue in exchange for recurring value. That's Amanda's phrase. I really like that. So I stole it. Thank you, Amanda. Don't have to keep launching products over and over and over again. It's so exhausting, but rather,

Again, continue to provide more and more solutions for your existing customers and attract like-minded people who really, really need those solutions to their urgent, expensive, painful problems. So that's kind of the biggest one that we can share, but I will say that that is not a unique use case. Just that our clients are, I guess, a little bit under the radar. We've got multiple clients that have over a million followers and things like that, and so we have different arrangements about what we can share. But otherwise, you can...

read testimonials and see the other kind of work that we've done.

Natalie Williams (34:37)
So without naming names, can you talk about some of the common mistakes you see creators making before they join the program?

Amanda Northcutt (34:44)
Yeah, there's a couple of really big ones. We wrote a newsletter on this a couple of weeks back. I'll see if I can remember it. yeah, OK. So when we talk about a bow tie funnel, I can't get into all that, especially if people are listening and not watching on YouTube. But this is your top of funnel. This is where people find you. This podcast is probably someone's first interaction with us. Social media, for sure. Your website can act as a top of funnel source, a partner marketing effort. This is sort of like a

dating app where you're looking at different profiles and then you run across, they run across yours and like, okay, that's a top of funnel source, I guess for relationships. So let's say somebody runs across your LinkedIn post because the algorithm served it up for them. They really liked it, they end up following you. The biggest first problem that I wanna speak to is that creators sometimes forget to capitalize on that.

attention that they're getting on that new follow. And so that's great. Someone's follow you, they like you, there's some momentum there. And so how do we capitalize on that momentum? By immediately putting an offer, a free solution usually, in front of this module who really likes you already. And so we want to increase affinity, the no trust and like factor by offering a lead magnet, right? Like this is a guide, this is a live webinar, it's a top 10 list, it's...

a free mini course, email drip course or video, whatever, or your newsletter, if you have an email newsletter. So it's getting people from a top of funnel to the middle of the funnel. And we define the middle of the funnel as you have someone's email address. You own the lead, you have permission to spend a little bit of time with them in their inbox, right? Unless they unsubscribe. So getting people from Tofu to MoFu is a big problem. And then of course, after Tofu and MoFu comes Bofu because could we get more ridiculous with the acronyms?

Natalie Williams (36:39)
Thank

Amanda Northcutt (36:40)
Bofu,

the bottom of the funnel. is people have the highest intent to purchase at the bottom of the funnel. And how do we get them from the bottom of the funnel to actually buy something? Right. And so there's a significant disconnect between people on social media that we don't have their email address and then people in the middle of our funnel where they maybe we've had their attention for a while. We do have their email address. They're getting our nurture automations. They've taken advantage of our lead sources. They probably checked out our website, our sales page.

Maybe they've even put what we're selling in their cart and then abandoned their cart, right? And so there's very specific tactical measures that you can take to increase conversion rates of folks who are at the bottom of your funnel and accelerate momentum from the top of your funnel to the bottom of your funnel too for people who are like, my gosh, I've got to have this thing, right? So that's the second problem. And the third problem is once you get a customer, how are you going to keep that customer?

Don't just sell things that get you one-time revenue, like a course, for instance. Instead, is there group coaching or one-on-one coaching or something that is, there's a continuation long-term, because you're continuing to bring value to the table and they're continuing to pay you month over month or year over So, getting people from the top of the funnel to the middle, the bottom to the right side of the funnel, which means they've purchased something, and then paying the most attention in your entire business.

to the people who have already purchased something from you because they are exponentially more likely to purchase something else from you, like getting into a recurring revenue product or service than someone who has not purchased from you before.

Natalie Williams (38:22)
Yeah, so let's start kind of wrapping this up a little bit. If listeners are interested in learning more about the MR accelerator, what's the best way for them to get started? Is there a waitlist for the next cohort?

Amanda Northcutt (38:32)
Yeah, we have like an interest list. So you can go to [MRRExcelerator.com](http://mrrexcelerator.com/), which will be in the show notes and description, and then read all about it. We're in the middle of updating that page. And so hopefully it will be awesome by the time this podcast drops, but all the information is there. And it's more substance and style, but we're good with that because we are more substance and style, Because I don't like smoke and mirrors, right? So it's very straightforward.

Natalie Williams (38:54)
stream.

Amanda Northcutt (38:58)
So check that out. You can also follow me on LinkedIn. Shoot me a DM if that would be helpful, if you want to have a chat. And we'll go through a little bit of initial conversation via email or DM. And if it initially seems like a good fit, then we will get on Zoom together for a half hour and then see if it's still a good fit or not and then have another discussion. And it's a very simple process on the listener's end. We've got it all dialed in on our end, so you don't have to worry about that. We'll take care of you.

Natalie Williams (39:27)
So it's the final piece of advice you would give creators who are on the fence about applying for this program.

Amanda Northcutt (39:33)
Hmm. Yeah, there is kind of a I forget where I read this anecdote, but it was a while ago. It really, really stuck with me. I mean, probably read this 20 years ago. It was a story about like a 40 year old person. Of course, you know, 20 years ago, I was 20. And so that seemed ancient. And here we are. And I really want to be a doctor. I've always wanted to be a doctor. And this was like an engineer or something. You got to go back and get all of the prerequisite classes and undergrad capacity.

and then go to medical school and then do a residency. You know, it's like a decade or so long process to become a full MD here in the States. And so I think the person in the little story ended up like waiting and then their 50th birthday came around like,

still really, really want to be a doctor. And it's like, dude, you should have started 10 years ago and then you would be there now. And so I would really challenge everyone to think about like, what is actually giving you pause? And is it your mindset? Is it your belief or lack thereof in yourself? Are there people that are around you that you allow to have the most insight into your life? You know, the people in your inner circle, are they bringing you up or are they tearing you down?

Are you with people and spending time with people and being mentored by people and following people on social media and listening to podcasts who are several steps ahead of you and who are giving you the confidence to move forward or is the opposite true? So I would challenge kind of where that, I would call it fear is coming from, because this is a big thing and it can feel scary, but we all feel growing pains when we're kind of becoming that next leveled up version of ourselves. And I think that's a good thing.

So tap in and think about why you might be feeling that way. But really, again, if you're a subject matter expert, you're 40 or so plus years old, you really know your shit, and you've tried a bunch of things and maybe they failed, or you just wanna start in the right way. A number of our clients saw what happened with Amanda Getz and we thought we were just gonna pour fuel on the fire of what was already sort of burning for her.

But instead we ended up going back and reworking her entire strategy and product ladder and kind of got like three months behind, if you will. Really was a fantastic three month investment. But other people then have seen that and come to us and been like, okay, I'm ready to start. Can we please build the thing right from the beginning? And it's going phenomenally. mean, we do have one client, I won't say their name, but they left their corporate job. They were an executive, did really well and are

rushing it as a consultant. mean, the demand for them is so unbelievably high, they can hardly keep up. And so now it's more about setting personal boundaries because the work that we've done together has been very, very effective and really, cool to watch. don't know, Natalie, can you think of anything else, any other factors for criteria or what might be holding people back?

Natalie Williams (42:35)
No, I think one thing that kind of keeps going through my mind, one of our participants said in, think in the group coaching call, they were talking to one another and they said, if you can't bet on yourself, who can you bet on? And I think that everybody really related to that and just felt that intrinsically to know that they're putting in the effort, they're taking the chance on themselves. And it's going to be just a beautiful journey to watch all unfold as we, as we help build that, build that all up for them.

Amanda Northcutt (43:00)
Yeah, I'm glad you said that. This is a calculated risk and we're de-risking it significantly. Again, if you get to the point where I invite you to the program, you should probably take the invitation because the guarantee is there. You can have your lawyer review it and everything. is a little bonkers. And once you're in, you're in. This is a cohort model and you have a contract. You sign the contract. You're in, so you've got to be really fully committed. So I've interviewed each of our participants that will be...

and those interviews will be released as part of this series. And I asked almost all of them how they ultimately ended up making the decision to join the Accelerator. And each of them talked through their specific process of talking to their spouse or partner and their best friend or their mom or their dad and their brain trust. And most of them talked to.

current or former clients of ours. Of course, you want to do your due diligence. Like what does it actually like to work with these people? Do they do what they say that they do? And that's all a really, really important part of your process. Obviously, figuring out the money is an important part of the process. But with the guarantee, this is, I mean, it's just an unbelievable investment. This is what I wish I had when we had started this company, because we could have gotten to that multi-seven figure run rate in like half the time. If we had, or less actually, if we had had this kind of

program. so, you know, I think the best businesses are started and built when someone is solving the problem that they have. And so this is how we built our business and this is how we're building businesses for all of our clients. And frankly, with when we partner with the right people, which we do, it works.

Natalie Williams (44:43)
Is there anything we haven't covered that you think is important for listeners to know about the MR accelerator?

Amanda Northcutt (44:48)
Oof. That's a great question. I hope not, but I'm sure we have forgotten a few things. I think it ultimately is going to come down to, yeah, but is it right for me? And heat our advice here, please, and kind of how we're describing our ideal customer profile for the accelerator. But if you're not sure, just reach out. I won't bite you. And so we can have a really nice, casual chat. And it has to be a very, very, very mutual.

fit and everybody has to be very excited and not have hesitation about moving forward. And if either of us do, we won't and that's okay. No harm, no foul. Glad to make a new friend. yeah, that's it. But if anybody does have questions and you could drop questions in the comments or DM me, I'd be happy to make additional sort of like FAQ video series if we miss anything here today.

Natalie Williams (45:39)
Great. Well, Amanda, thank you so much for breaking down the MRR Accelerator program for us and our listeners today. I know our listeners have gotten a ton of value from hearing exactly how creators can transform their businesses into predictable, scalable models with the right support and systems.

If you're listening and you're ready to escape the feast and famine cycle to build monthly recurring revenue into your business guaranteed and join a community of serious creators who are leveling up together, head over to [MRRExcelerator.com](http://mrrexcelerator.com/) to join the wait list for our next MRRExcelerator cohort. Spots are limited and based on what we've heard today, I expect they'll fill up quickly. Again, that's [MRRExcelerator.com](http://mrrexcelerator.com/) to learn more and apply.

And don't forget to subscribe to the Level Up Creators podcast for more episodes with actionable strategies to grow your creator business. Until next time, keep creating, keep growing, and keep leveling up.