Luis Scott is the Managing Partner at Bader Scott Injury Lawyers, where he represents people who have been injured or disabled in severe accidents. He is also the Owner of 8 Figure Firm, which provides consulting services and insider knowledge to national law firms. As Bader Scott’s managing attorney, he handles over 150 employees and contractors and has led the firm to be recognized by the Atlanta Business Chronicle as one of the fastest-growing businesses in Georgia.
Luis has received numerous awards and accolades, including Super Lawyers’ “Rising Star,” The National Trial Lawyers Association’s “Top 40 Lawyers Under 40,” and the American Institute of Legal Counsel’s “10 Best Attorneys in 2017” for workers’ compensation.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- Luis Scott’s advice for setting business growth goals
- The importance of optimizing your product or service and exceeding expectations
- How to acquire and manage talent
- Why you should focus on personal and professional growth
In this episode…
According to the Small Business Administration, there are 32 million businesses in the US, but only 1.6 million have reached $1 million in revenue. So how can you scale your business to seven figures and beyond?
Sustainable business growth starts with a goal. Yet, many entrepreneurs place a one-year time limit on their growth goals, leading them to feel discouraged and surrender before they achieve them. Luis Scott says to set your boundary for a few years so you can focus on the growth itself rather than the time it takes to get there. Once you have a clear, practical goal, Luis advises honing and optimizing the five Ps of business: product, people, production, and personal and professional growth.
Join Luis Scott in this episode of The Guts and Glory Show as he talks about scaling your business to $1 million in revenue. He also discusses how to set business growth goals and the importance of focusing on your services, people, production, and personal and professional growth.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
Sponsor for this episode…
This episode is brought to you by 8 Figure Firm.
Co-founded by Luis Scott and Seth Bader of Bader Scott Injury Lawyers, 8 Figure Firm helps transform your law firm into a 7-figure or even 8-figure firm.
After their own law firm scaled from $3.5 million in revenues to $30 million per year in revenues in just two years, Luis and Seth started the 8 Figure Firm to share their strategies and help other law firms achieve exponential growth.
Visit www.8figurefirm.com to receive a consult call and start scaling your business today.
Episode Transcript
Luis Scott 0:00
Even if it takes me two years, even if it takes me three years, even if it takes me five years, I’m going to make a million dollars everyone wants to work with. And for someone they enjoy being around. When I think about leading a life of significance, I don’t think about money, I think about all the people that can be changed by the impact that I’ve made in their lives. Hey, guys, my name is Luis, and welcome to The Guts and Glory Show, I’m glad you are joining us. Really excited to talk to you about today’s topic. And I think it’s something that a lot of people are probably very interested in. And that is, how can I grow my business to a million dollars and beyond, because this is the big thing, if you can get your business to a million dollars, that means that you are making personally at least six figures or more. And that is life changing money for you and for your family. And so I want to help you get there. And a little bit about my backstory as it relates to building million dollar businesses, I have built several million dollar businesses in the past, and I’ve done them with relative quickness. But I want to stop there and tell you that you don’t need to set your sights on building this million dollar business in two months, three months, four months, you know, a year, even though that’s what I’m going to teach you today, because here’s the thing, there’s a lot of gurus out there, a lot of people out there who are going to tell you that you can build your business very fast. And they’re usually trying to sell you some sort of product or some service that is going to help you build that business fast. But the reality is to get your business to the next level to get your business or to get yourself from no business, to a business that truly earns seven figures in revenue, it takes a tremendous amount of work. And I think trying to do it fast could be a recipe for it failing in the future. And so I want to walk you through kind of some of the lessons that I learned and some of the lessons that you can take into your own business that can help you propel your business. To the next level, I have a good friend of mine, who has a business that for many years did about $50,000 in revenue, and over about a year of time, they started implementing some of these principles. And in a matter of a year, they transformed their business from 50,000. To they just recently told me they did just under $700,000 in revenue. So it’s absolutely possible. It’s just a matter of taking some key lessons and putting them into practice. And it will absolutely change your life in every single way. So what do I want to address first, the first thing is the horizon for which you believe that your business should be should should be achieved. You know, I think this is a really big problem. In our society. You know, we have Instagram, we have all kinds of social media channels where people are making money fast, they’re making a lot of money fast. And the reality is making 1015 20 $30,000 quickly. Seems like it’s easy, especially if you go on social media, everyone’s doing it. Everyone’s driving an exotic car, everyone’s flying private at least that’s what pulls up on my, my feed. Maybe I’m the only one maybe it’s because those are the kinds of things that I searched. But I see a lot of exotic cars, a lot of boats, a lot of private jets, and a lot of vacations, a lot of to loom trips. And I started asking myself, I mean, am I doing something wrong? Or is Is this just easy to do? You know, because it seems like it’s just so easy to make business and earn business and live this incredible lifestyle. But what I want to tell you is when you’re when you’re starting off on your journey, or maybe you’re in your journey, and you’re just still trying to reach that seven figure mark, you need to set your horizon longer than a year. Now, I know that’s somewhat counterproductive or counter the what I’m trying to teach you because I started off by saying, you know, I’m going to try to teach you how to grow a million dollars in that year. But you need to set your horizon longer than year. And the reason I say this is because as the year goes on, as you start developing more business, one of the things that you’re going to find yourself doing is counting down the days, you’re going to be counting down the days, you’re going to be saying man, I only have three more months, and I’m not to million dollar status, and therefore I’m not going to make it and what ends up happening is as you count down the days, you start becoming more disenchanted disenfranchised with this belief that you can actually do it. You know, if you start off the year, and you go, I’m going to make it in 12 months, I’m going to make a million dollars, which is possible, by the way. But if you start off saying that success is only making a million dollars by the end of the year, you may find yourself six months in not be halfway there and think that you can’t make it not realizing that there is a process by which you can have instantaneous and exponential growth. And you may be giving up before you see that instantaneous exponential growth. And so I want you to set your horizon longer or longer than that. And so instead of saying I’m going to make a million dollars in a year, which may be a good goal, say I’m going to get make a million dollars period. Even if it takes me two years, even if it takes me three years. Even if it takes me five years, I’m going to make a million dollars. And that way, even as you search for that goal, because one of the things that I do as a consultant is I create goal setting for companies and for for owners. Even when you set that goal, the goal cannot dictate your happiness, the goal cannot dictate your joy, the goal cannot dictate whether you are going to stay committed to your plan and to your vision, the goal is merely a goal. Now, some people are gonna say, Well, you know, you gotta burn all your chips, you, you need to go after that goal with full fervor and, and and, you know, do whatever it takes to make and and I do agree with that, I do agree that you have to do whatever it takes to reach that goal. But at the end of the day, what matters is that you reach the goal. What matters is that you go through the process of disciplining yourself and your mind to actually achieve something that, frankly, is very difficult to achieve. And that is a million dollars. Recently, I did a presentation I was out in Phoenix, and I was talking about how there’s 32 million businesses in this country, according to the Small Business Administration, and only 1.6 million reach a million dollars in revenue. But then in perspective, 1.6 million of the 32 million businesses reaches seven figures and revenue. And it gets even worse, only 600. And some change 640,000 reach 10 million and revenue, set your horizon further out and be willing to go through the difficulty of building this this type of business, this type of organization that can in fact, change your life. So the first step to building a million dollar business is setting your horizon further, and making the commitment that the goal is worth pursuing, even if it takes longer than a year. So I think that that’s step one. I think the second thing, and it’s the four focuses that I want you to, to put a lot of attention to when you’re building your business, the first focus is on the product or service. I think that this is absolutely critical to achieving your goal. I remember when I first launch the my first law firm, on my own, I had launched my own law firm. And I wanted to go out there and I wanted to build a million dollar business, which I did in my first year I was on a million dollar run rate. Before I partnered with my with my business partner today. And one of the things that I did is I focused on the product, which was my service. And if you’re in a service based business, I consider that a product. If you’re in a product that’s a tangible product. And I understand that there’s a difference in in those definitions. But I call the service a product and I focused on the product, how could I deliver How can you deliver the greatest product available to you. And to the client, you want to have a very strong focus on the product. The product is what sells and you want to make sure that the product is something worth selling. Like I see a lot of people they put out a product, and the product is garbage. You see this a lot in restaurants, I go to a new restaurant and I like I like supporting local business and local restaurants is I’m a big foodie, I love to show up to a restaurant and support the restaurant. I mean, it’s something that that my wife and I like to do. But it just amazes me how many times I show up to a restaurant. And it is not a good product, it’s not a good restaurant, you get in there, there’s not a hostess, it looks like the restaurants a little bit dirty chairs are everywhere, they’re the service is not great, the food is not great. If you’re gonna have a restaurant, you got to have the best food on the planet because there’s so much competition in the restaurant game. And the same is true, if you’re gonna have a service, whether you’re cleaning carpets, I need somebody to come clean my carpets at the house, it’s something that we do on a routine basis. And if you’re getting your carpets cleaned, or if you’re maybe plumber or or, or professional services, you’re a dentist’s your lawyer, whatever it is that you do your product has to be phenomenal. You have to put strong focus on the product, a product is everything. The product is what is what elevates your business above other businesses. And here’s the secret to success when it comes to the product. Most people do not focus on the product. And I know this because when I talk to my competition, whether it’s another law firm or another consulting business, or I look at restaurants or or anything, people do not focus on the product. And so that is a huge opportunity for you. If you know there’s a need in your community. If you know there’s a need anywhere that you’re living for a particular service or product, focus on the product and it will automatically it will automatically instantaneously it will elevate you from other people, and so put a strong focus on the product. The second P is focused on the people. Focusing on people is so critical. When I started my law firm, the first thing I did is I needed to hire people and I didn’t have a lot of money. I wasn’t like some people that I know who have benefited from selling one business and then starting an other business, I was in the middle of a business divorce, I was in the middle of a personal divorce, I didn’t have a lot of money. But what I did want to do is I wanted to focus on people. And so the little money that I had, I started hiring a couple of people, not the best talent on the planet, but the people that could generate the type of service that I wanted. And so I went out and hired two or three people, as soon as I started generating some revenue, despite the fact that I needed the money, I needed to live I needed to survive. And so if you want to have a thriving business, not only do you have to focus on the product, but you have to focus on the people. Now, if you can afford the best people on the planet, what kind of people do you get? Like, who do you hire? If you if you can only afford 10 to $12 an hour? Well? That’s a great question. Because the answer is very simple. You hire people who are looking for transitionary jobs. Now what do I mean by that there are some people who don’t know what they want out of life. Sometimes a lot of younger people who are willing to put in a lot of work in order to figure out what it is that they want in life. So find people who are in transition, you know, one of the things that I was able to do is I was able to find some part time, people who were in transition, they weren’t sure if one of them was specific, wasn’t sure if they wanted a full time job or not. And so I hired them. And I was able to get them on a cheaper basis, because they understood we were a brand new law firm, they understood that there wasn’t a lot of revenue to go around. And they were just kind of looking for some work. In the meantime, another thing that I did is I hired some college students, they couldn’t put in 40 hours. So they were willing to work for, you know, 1520 hours, that was totally fine. So you want to get creative with the people, you don’t want cheap labor, you just want more valuable labor, which is, which is people who are willing to work, who have the desire to work, who have the desire to put in the work, but are not looking for high pay. And there’s nothing wrong with that. Because you’re you don’t have a lot of money, right? You just started your business. But you want to focus on quality people in the second part to focusing on the quality of people is not just what you pay for them, but that they need to be value centric people, you have to have values for your business. So if you have values for your business, then you can find value centric people, people who adhere to your values, and some of the values that we had, that I’ve carried on both in the law firm and into the consulting business is being a person of high moral character. Being a person who is willing to commit to being generous, who is willing to commit to being kind who’s willing to willing to commit to personal growth, those are the things that set you apart is having the right people, the third P, the third piece that you want to focus on is you want to focus on production. Now, this is different than the product and the service, this is different than the people. But this is delivering on what marketing has promised. And this is really important. When you are developed developing your product, when you’re developing your service, you must be sure that whatever you’re marketing, whether it’s on social media, whether it’s in referral, that the thing you deliver, is in fact, in line with what you’ve promised. And this is very, very critical. Because so many people, especially in the legal space, I think about lawyers who say, I’m gonna get you the biggest settlement that you could possibly get, I’m gonna get you the best customer service, I’m going to provide the best legal representation, I’m going to get you the best doctors. But when they deliver, when they produce on that they don’t deliver the best, they deliver mediocre legal service, they deliver mediocre medical treatment, they deliver mediocre client service. And it’s so important that you deliver on the promise, and that your production team delivers on the promise that you have made in your marketing. And so you want to focus on the production of your business, whatever that may mean, maybe it’s delivering that service, maybe it’s delivering that that product to the consumer. But make sure that production is efficient, make sure that production is something that is of high value. And the last P is really two Ps. And that is personal and professional growth. So focus on personal and professional growth. And I have a lot of experience with this. Personally, because I’m a big fan of reading. I’m a big fan of listening to things that elevate me, I’m a big fan of YouTube videos, I watch a lot of YouTube videos about how to become better and become greater. And I watch a lot of YouTube videos on how to have a better mindset. But I think it’s so critical that you focus on your personal and professional growth. And I have a challenge that I’ve made to a lot of people. And I’d be happy to hear from you. If you take on this challenge. Send me an email I’d love to hear about you taking on this challenge. And that is the 52 and 52. That’s reading 52 books in 52 weeks now I know a lot of people are gonna say you don’t have to do that. You hear a lot of these, you know, big social media influencers say you don’t have to do that. I never did that. I never went to college. I never read I never did anything you But here’s the problem. The fact that those people are unicorns has nothing to do with you. The fact that they’re capable of growing their businesses without education, professional education, without reading, without doing anything, because they have the grit and the ability to just grind it out, has nothing to do with you, the majority of people will need to go to school, the majority of people will need to read, the majority of people will need to associate to get their mind, right. Because unfortunately, or maybe this is fortunate for those of you who are willing to go through the grind is unfortunately, our minds are constantly under attack, our minds are under attack. And we have a very difficult time controlling our minds. And that’s the key to building a successful business in one year, building a million dollar business is controlling your mind as being able to put it in submission, and being willing and able to then project that out into the world through your business. And so it takes time. For me it took many years, it took 1015 years of reading, reading, reading, associated reading, reading, reading, developing myself to finally become the person that at 35 years old, knew who I was, had confidence in who I was, had had the had the professionalism that I needed to achieve the goals that I have, had had the strength and the mental fortitude to go through difficult times. Because when I was in my 20s, I didn’t have that I suffered from the rejection, I couldn’t deal with the rejection over and over getting rejected and being told no, and a person not wanting to buy your product, it continued to weigh on me heavily. And so it was difficult for me to overcome those things, but not 35, somebody tells me No, and I say next. And before I didn’t have that, and that came through personal and professional development. And that’s where you have to focus yourself on, it doesn’t matter what kind of business you want. If you want to build your business to seven figures, you have to focus on personal and professional development. And the longer it takes for you to learn those lessons, the longer it takes for you to develop yourself, the harder it will be for you to grow your business and the longer it will take for you to achieve the success you want to achieve in life. Now, there are some people out there who are genuinely just they’re talented, they can grow a business without having to do this, again, the fact that Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg built Facebook and Microsoft without graduating college, in the basement of their mom’s garage has nothing to do with you. And so if you use that as a basis for determining what you should do with your life, you’re going to be wrong every single time. And so it’s critical that you focus on your personal and your professional growth, because that’s going to elevate you in the marketplace. So if you want to grow your business to $1 million or more, here’s what you need to do, you need to set your horizon for longer than a million for longer than a year, excuse me, you need to set your horizon for longer than a year, you need to focus on your product or your service. You need to focus on your people and who you’re hiring. So that they’re value centric people you need to focus on your production and delivering what you’ve promised. And lastly, you need to focus on your personal and professional growth. And if you do this, I promise you, I promise you and I can’t make this is not a guarantee. But I promise you, you will be on your way to seven figures. And many of you will do it in a year. Many of you will do it after a year but you’ll get it done. And you’ll do it and it’ll completely change your life, your family’s life and the life of all the people who benefit from your business. So go out there and put in the work. And you’ll see that in the end. Everything is possible as long as you believe
