Finding Hidden Money In Your Business: Successful Systems with Mara Whitener

Have you ever fallen into making a big investment in your business only to discover that it didn’t actually help you?

Investing your time and energy in the WRONG things can leave you even more confused about what you need to find that sweet spot where you’re ENJOYING how you make money!

In this week’s episode of the Creative Magic Club, join me and systems expert Mara Whitener who has the golden touch for building 6 & 7 figure businesses.

You’ll learn the importance of:

➡️Asking deeper questions about WHY things don’t feel good and get clear on the REAL reasons you’re avoiding making the moves that will lead to results.

➡️Understanding how to customize what you’re learning in the way that’s unique to you and your business instead of making yourself wrong for not liking the way someone taught you to do things.

➡️Troubleshoot what support you and your business actually need so you can make the changes that will save you time, money and stress, instead of adding more to your plate unnecessarily.

I also share how I have navigated building back-end systems in my business with many meltdowns along the way!

And Mara shares how she helps her clients to discover 5 to 6-figures in hidden money in her clients’ businesses!

You’re going to love this episode. 

Website: www.whitenerpros.com

Freebie: https://whitenerpros.com/missing-money/

Connect with Mara on LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mara-whitener/

Write a sales post to attract your soul mate client using you astrology chart with my FREE 5-part training series! 

In a 90-minute private coaching intensive together, we’ll focus on the most important changes you can start making in your messaging to attract more paying clients into your offers. During our time together we’ll make sure your offer is actually targeted at the kinds of clients you REALLY want to be working with, we’ll tighten up your messaging (or write it from scratch if we need to), and we’ll map out a feel-good launch plan to start filling it up with amazing clients. 
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Chapters

• 1:43 Empowering Entrepreneurs With Custom Strategies
• 12:06 Optimizing Business Strategies for Success
• 23:28 Building Systems for Business Success

Transcript

Speaker 1: 1:43

What's up? This is Sarah Mack, and welcome to Creative Magic Club. Together, we'll discover inspirational stories of creative entrepreneurs living out their dreams, doing the work they are most passionate about and building wealth in magical and fun ways, While building a six-figure income. As a writer and coach, helping other women to launch their dream businesses, I've connected with so many incredible people and seen it proven again and again that you can thrive financially doing whatever it is you are passionate about. I am here to share life-changing strategies for mindset, making money and reaching more people with your work in a business and life filled with creativity, freedom and fun. Hi everyone, welcome.

Speaker 1: 2:31

I am so excited to introduce my special guest today. I have with us Mara Whitener. She's a seasoned entrepreneur, systems expert and passionate business puzzle solver. With over 20 years building and scaling companies, Mara brings precision and proven methodologies to unstick growth challenges. Having built and sold several six and seven figure firms, Mara understands firsthand what it takes to transform vision into reality. Her superpower is designing fully custom operational systems the missing piece to level up your business, and her systems empower you to take on more clients, save money and focus on what you love. Hi, Mara, thank you so much for joining us.

Speaker 2: 3:11

Hi, thank you for having me. I'm excited.

Speaker 1: 3:14

Yeah, super excited. So, okay, what's story Like how did you get into doing this work?

Speaker 2: 3:21

It's interesting, I've always had an interest in business, ever since I was a teenager, and so I've just continued that interest.

Speaker 2: 3:29

I ran an insurance marketing firm straight out of college and met my husband at that point in time and realized there was a little more to life than kind of working in corporate. So I left determined to figure out what it is that I was meant to do and went on this entrepreneurial journey and I turned passions into businesses and they all kind of took off from the gate. Until the last business I had competitors. I had other people reach out to like how do you do this? And I came to realize I started working with them to help them figure out the pieces in their business. I began to realize what came naturally to me. To put together the pieces behind the scenes to run your business effectively and profitably and streamlined didn't necessarily come naturally, and so I kind of had a wake up moment and I really enjoyed helping other business owners put those pieces together. So I sold that business in 2020, dedicated my time, full time, to doing this, and I've never looked back since.

Speaker 1: 4:40

That's amazing. So what are some of the most common things that are like people are failing at or not getting, or that are getting in the way of people having smooth operations and succeeding with their business ideas?

Speaker 2: 4:53

Yeah, it sounds almost counterintuitive, but it's. People get stuck with doing what everyone else tells them to do, or what they feel that they should do, or they aren't very clear on what the right thing to do for them is. So a lot of the work that I do is really let's get back to what's right for you, how you're doing what you're doing, and then what you have in place to support that. And it really starts with getting clear on you and your vision first, and you'll find that the clearer you get on that. Then the pieces that need to go into place around you your systems, your processes, your team, how you implement your marketing and sales all those things usually have to shift because they're not quite aligned to you. You're trying to do something that's not right for you, and that is typically the root of the problem that I see a lot of people face, but they're trying to bandaid the symptom rather than get to the root of the cause so good.

Speaker 1: 6:03

I'm curious what your perspective is on balancing like an intuitive approach with that more kind of like systematized approach. Like how do you? Because obviously, yeah, it sounds like the work you're doing with your clients is highly, highly custom and I think you know, as someone who, like, makes a lot of intuitive decisions, I think sometimes there's a fine line between following my intuition but also just avoiding things that I don't know how to do or you know, or like avoiding the hard work of the skill building around things that I don't know how to do or you know, or like avoiding the hard work of the skill building around things that are actually right for me. So I'm curious kind of how you see that play out and the work that you do with clients.

Speaker 2: 6:44

Yeah, no, that's a great question. I feel like I don't subscribe to cookie cutter approaches, even something as rigid as systems or processes in theory can be. I'm very much a custom strategy kind of girl, and that's why I actually integrate using human design in all of my work. It actually lets us tweak those rigid pieces into those that you need around you, and so that's part of how I start to address the intuitiveness is really helping someone figure out so you can follow your intuition, but then the pieces around you then need to fall in line with what is needed for that.

Speaker 2: 7:32

And I would say to those that are avoiding the things that they don't understand or systems are really difficult for me, and I would say to those that are avoiding the things that they don't understand or systems are really difficult for me I don't like learning new things or whatever the case may be. If you're avoiding it, there's reasons behind why you're avoiding it, and so I would encourage people to explore why that is. If it's just not natural to you, that's okay. It can be either a muscle that you have to flex or it's an area that you need to get support in, and if you get the right support, they will help you do both. They will help you learn and flex the muscle to the point at which still aligns with you and then be there to help support the rest of it.

Speaker 1: 8:18

Right, and I think what you're talking about is sometimes like the hardest but the most important insights to come across, which is like doing that deep thinking and asking those deeper questions as to why you're doing things the way that you're doing, so that you can figure out what help you actually need. Because I think so many of us are just like running around on the internet facing up with, like other people's marketing and being like, oh, this is clearly what I need, and, you know, like falling into great marketing, ending up buying a solution and then being like, oh, no, this is not what I need, or like this is actually not working for me at all, and rather than doing that deep work of really looking at, like who you are, what your vision and goals are, what's working, what isn't working, and then, yeah, figuring out like what your best next investment is from that place, do you have any examples of your clients that you think can kind of like illustrate this shift of like? Finding, you know, bringing to light why something feels hard?

Speaker 2: 9:17

Oh goodness, I don't know that. I can pick one example.

Speaker 2: 9:20

I have a lot of different examples, but I mean, that's even something that I speak on is really how to design these personalized support systems for optimal success. And it doesn't just stop at your systems or your processes or your team or you know, implementing your marketing and sales. It's the strategy that has to align to you. All of the pieces around you have to align, and we're too busy trying to get other people's strategies, but what's missing is either they aren't giving you the guidelines to customize it for you and or you don't know how to take that information and customize it to you, and so it's kind of a twofold problem. And that's a lot of what I help kind of pull out and uncover with folks that, yes, I'm the operations systems girl, but has to start with what are you doing and why are you doing and is that actually the right thing? And then all the pieces come from that.

Speaker 2: 10:20

And so I've had clients that have pivoted from running a full marketing agency, because that's what they thought they needed to do and providing all the things and providing all the services, to really figuring out and going deep that their true love was in more of that fractional CMO, fractional marketing director type position where they work with folks holistically on all aspects of their marketing and it made it a much more exclusive agency yeah to, where she was doing the same work but in a way that aligned with her, and it took her business from and she didn't realize that until too late where her agency was starting to lose business because she was not aligned with how it was working.

Speaker 2: 11:13

And so you start to see the sales start to dwindle or they start to plateau and most people think, oh, I need to go revamp my marketing and I need to revamp my sales, maybe, maybe not. So we were working together and realized what she was doing and how she was doing was not aligned and we made a complete pivot. We reorganized everything, reset up her offers to something that aligned a little bit better, immediately bounced right back a whole lot less overhead and a whole lot more profitable than running a full agency. So it's really about getting clear she found a whole lot of cash that she uncovered in that experience.

Speaker 1: 12:05

Yeah, that's amazing. I went through something similar. I started building a copywriting agency and then I went for it because I knew I didn't want to write and spend hours and hours and just taking on more clients and doing more and more writing because I wanted to write more for myself. So I was like, oh yeah, I'll hire some writers, and then I realized that more of my work then became like acquiring the clients, handing the clients off, managing my writers, and I was like this isn't fun and that's what led me to to start my coaching business. But I have okay, I have a really good question for you.

Speaker 1: 12:34

I know there's a lot of other manifesting generators in this audience like me, something that I've been thinking about, because I know as manifesting generators, probably like a lot of creative people identify with just constantly desiring to evolve right and like wanting to do new things because we love to create and we love to go in a completely different direction.

Speaker 1: 12:56

And I was talking to one of my coaches about this recently and she raised the idea to me which I love, which I'm sure you'll have some great insights on, in that you can kind of systematize the way that you pivot so you don't have to like run into, oh, suddenly this isn't working anymore, I'm burning out or the clients aren't buying, and it's like a emergency pivot. I'm curious, like what you know strategies or recommendations you have for people who know that like there's probably not just one thing that they're going to be doing forever, what are some ways that we can kind of notice the signs of when we're ready for a shift and how can we set ourselves up for smooth transitions without necessarily like losing our income in the process?

Speaker 2: 13:41

Yeah, it's funny because I do a lot of work with manifesting generators and that is constantly the but. I have this idea and then but I'm tired of that one, and now we're going to run here and it's a beautiful thing. What I caution is making sure, when you do want to pivot, it's the right pivot, so making sure you kind of do that inner work and is is. Is this truly what I'm, I'm meant to pivot to? So there's step one that I'm always going to start with. But this is where I go back to if you have the right pieces and people, if you have the right pieces and people so I think people is going to be an important thing to have around you If you have the right people and the right automations and or systems in place, pivoting becomes a whole lot easier. So I'll give an example. I'm actually not a manifesting generator, but I do pivot, and I just had a pivot two days before my master class this week and totally different offer and a different way to deliver it, and all I did was make it very same concept, just a different way to deliver it. It felt much more aligned and contacted my team Okay, this is, this is. We need to change language on here. This is how I'm going to deliver it. Change my schedule and we just boom, boom, boom. Change those few things all set up and done in less than a day and I'm ready to pivot and I'm ready to go. People is is is a good um.

Speaker 2: 15:19

I don't want to say starting place, but one of the things to surround yourself the right resources, whether they're on your team or resources that you can tap into for different things.

Speaker 2: 15:30

If setting up landing pages is not your thing, make sure you have the right resource to pull from right those pieces that you have. Make sure, if you want to do a last minute pivot, it's not going to cause you frustration Remember you guys are manifesting generators Remember it's not going to cause that frustration to pivot. So if landing pages frustrate you and having to make changes on those, then you're going to need to find a different way to pivot or have the right person that you can call on to say I need to make this change and I going to need to find a different way to pivot or have the right person that you can call on to say I need to make this change and I don't need to think about it, you handle it and then you guys can move right on pivot and move on. Same thing with systems. We have the right systems in place. Set up a new cart, change the language, all done, put it where it needed to go Again a few hours we were set up total pivot.

Speaker 1: 16:23

Right and just knowing, like, what are those key things that bring results in your business and, yeah, I think, having good questions around. Well, what actually do I desire to change? Because sometimes I think we feel like we need to burn it all to the ground when actually we just need to make some slight changes that makes it more fun for us, or, yeah, it gets rid of some of the frustrations. Yeah, I love that. So tell us about how you help people find hidden money in their business. I know that's one of your superpowers.

Speaker 2: 16:59

It is. This is one of the one of my most favorite side effects of what I do. So when you go through the process of really saying I want to make my business fun and easy to run and I want to fall back in love with my business, it's a lot of the work that I'm doing with folks. By the way, a lot of people are going through some big shifts, whether you're manifesting generator or not.

Speaker 2: 17:27

It's a season. A lot of people are refocusing. But when you're committed and you're ready to say, I want an easier way to do things, I want to be able to grow, I want to be able to make a bigger impact, and we dig deep to try to find all of those right pieces and address gaps that are there and make things streamlined, make things easier and so that they 100% align to you, what happens is not only do you get a whole lot of time and freedom back, not only do you get a whole lot of time and freedom back, so you really enjoy what you do, you're excited about it again. You optimize and you streamline. How you run your business means it runs cheaper.

Speaker 2: 18:18

There is a whole lot of cash people are sitting on right now in their business and it's not just pulling out your expense report and finding the subscriptions that we forgot we had and canceling them. That's part of money that's just sitting there to find. But to find all the hidden money there's these nooks and crannies that really, when you look at your business as a whole and how it all works together, is where all of that money comes from. And so I just did a master class this week and I've got a free guide for you guys to start that journey. And it's the three biggest places that I go to. First, to find hidden money. But I walked folks through one of my clients that started out. We found $12,000 up front in money that she was wasting and that turned into almost $300,000 in savings in a matter of a few months. Now she's traveling to visit her grandchildren. She's working a whole lot less. I mean, who wouldn't want hidden money and more time and freedom? And it can happen, and it can happen for anyone.

Speaker 1: 19:26

That's amazing. Yeah, I feel like our business, especially when it's online. I mean, I'm sure this is true of every business, but like it's kind of like a closet, like you need to continually declutter it and just you know it. You know. It's like where are all these like yeah, random subscriptions, or like think habits and things that you're just doing? Or it's like, oh, if we put this new shelving unit here, or like move this drawer over here, like I don't have to take these 10 other steps that I'm like taking every day. And I'm curious, if you have a system around like, how often do you kind of like spring clean and check in with these types of things in your own business?

Speaker 2: 20:03

Because I'm operationally nerdy. We look at them all the time. I have quarterly planning meetings with my team. You know I have a mentor and a coach that I work with. So you know when I'm because, again, I'm also a CEO I'm the visionary I get frustrated, I throw things out and don't always take the time to revisit, but I try to put in place. I have my manager help me continually revisit. And one thing that I do and I try to do it once a year and I would highly recommend this to anyone. So if you guys have ever remembered the term of secret shopping and you think about it in retail, oh, someone's going to go secret shop and then give feedback on the service they received.

Speaker 2: 20:51

Guess what? You have customers and clients too. Your client experience and journey is the single biggest eye-opener into how your business runs. You can tell system inadequacies, process inadequacies, team all of the pieces. There are tons of details in what that customer experience is.

Speaker 2: 21:19

It's actually one of my favorite things to do when people will let me do it here, onboard me, make me a client, send me all the emails, put me through all of it, everything I want, all of it, and then I'm going to tell you exactly where the gaps are, because what we think our clients are experiencing sometimes is not really what they're actually experiencing. And I have people pick holes in my client experience because I'm on the other side going, but we're sending this information out and I write this email and they're supposed to receive this and so it's all good. Right, but until we take a look at it from the perspective of our client on an everyday basis, we really don't know. So I always encourage people to do that on a regular basis. If you're game to do it more than once a year, that's awesome, but if you are a manifesting generator, you have a lot of products, you switch gears a lot of times. I would highly suggesting do it, do it more often.

Speaker 1: 22:23

Yeah, I love that my VA has recently started doing that for me, which I love. Okay, I have another burning question for you when, where do you keep like a map of your business, of like all of the things? Is there like a particular piece of software, or like a giant notebook, or or like what helps you to kind of just really get like a bird's eye view of all of the aspects of your business?

Speaker 2: 22:48

So I tend to house mine in a project management software and I know a lot of a lot of folks that do so. I use ClickUp in-house with my team of folks that do so. I use ClickUp in-house with my team and we have all of our SOPs documented in a section so they're easily accessible. We have our planning meeting notes. I have spaces that I just dump content, ideas I mean they're my personal, just like dump zone for everything. But everything is really in there. It's my to-dos, it's all of the things, and then I do have a CRM attached to it as well.

Speaker 2: 23:28

But utilizing a system like that and having most everything kind of a business headquarters is going to be easier than having it housed in five different places. Even if you choose to use a Google folder, it's free, that's fine, and you just have documents within it. How's everything, how you do what you do, all the systems that you use, all of that stuff. My manager actually we walked through an exercise of documenting everything documenting bank accounts that I use, documenting passwords and access to everything, documenting how I do what I do, even if my team isn't involved. So in emergency situations, she knows to get a hold of my husband, you know, so that your team fully knows what to do in any situation. You know I'm going to be in Bali for three weeks in November. They know what to do, they know how to handle things. I don't really need to be involved, which is a great, great feeling. I'm going to go host a retreat and help other folks get clarity and put the right structures in place.

Speaker 2: 24:44

Yeah, I love that yeah.

Speaker 1: 24:46

It's like freedom really is on the other side of CLIA systems.

Speaker 2: 24:51

It is, it is. It is. So utilizing click up's a good one. You can do it in asana, you can do it in trello. There's creative ways to do it in even some free systems, so you don't have to have anything super expensive. But it's it's just developing that, that place that works for you.

Speaker 1: 25:11

Yeah, I've recently started using Notion.

Speaker 1: 25:14

These types of software are like absolutely not intuitive at all to me and like I find it takes me a really long time to to get to grips with them and it's a kind of like a one system at a time process for me and like baby steps.

Speaker 1: 25:27

And then, yeah, I come up against that wall of frustration of like, oh, I'm trying to do this thing and I don't know how to do it in this software, and like this is making me cry. And then I ask my VA to show, make a little explainer video and be like this is what I want. Can you show me how to do it in here? And kind of like, get someone, yeah, someone who's good at it to teach me. But I think that's such a great, you're inspiring me. I'm like, okay, now we're committed to using notion, I should really commit to moving everything over there and just, yeah, organizing it in a simple way that it feels usable yeah, I would say make sure your frustration is not, it is just in the I don't know how to use it, not with the software itself.

Speaker 2: 26:13

Right, sometimes it may just not be an aligned software, like if you continually hit a frustration wall. There might be a different solution. But yeah, if you've committed to going that direction and you identify that it's not a natural thing to you, then I wouldn't continue to beat the unnatural wall.

Speaker 2: 26:37

I would go to your VA first say I want to do this and before I hit that frustration wall which tells me I'm not aligned with doing what I'm doing, teach me how to do this and if you find that easier, that hey, I can ask them a question. They're going to send me a video back. I can watch the video and now it feels better, like I don't feel that frustration. Then that's a great aligned way to have that process ironed out.

Speaker 1: 27:06

Yeah, I've tried all of the different software platforms out there and realized that it is in fact me that's the problem.

Speaker 2: 27:16

I understand now. If we just commit to a different way of doing things, maybe don't continually beat that wall, yeah, no, own this about yourself and just have the right help and ask the question to the right place, it's's going to feel a whole lot easier.

Speaker 1: 27:32

Yeah, no, I've come a really, really long way as well. You know, it's like, yeah, that one thing at a time, with the help of my VA handholding me through creating the systems in my business, and I'm like, no, I'm definitely in a very different place to where I was, you know, when I started my business. So it can be done if anyone out there. Sometimes you just have to go through the deep breaths and crying it out until you figure out how to get the help that you need with all of these new you know new ways of being in the online world when you're doing business.

Speaker 2: 28:05

Yeah, it's it. Systems doesn't have to be especially for the highly creatives. You know that's a lot of who I work with and there's a lot of resistance to documenting things or doing systems, or they just don't even want to visit it. And I get it. I mean, I'm a systems girl and I don't even always want to visit it. That's why I have a team so they help me visit it on a regular basis. But it will hinder you and will hold you back the more you resist and the more you don't face it. But it also doesn't have to be a frustrating or angering journey. If you get the right help and the right people to help you set it up, it can. It might be new for you, Sure, and maybe a little uncomfortable, but it doesn't have to be. Um, trigger your human design. Red flex.

Speaker 1: 29:01

Yeah, and I think I don't know like I obviously invested so much in my business and learning sales and marketing Cause obviously that is like the number one skill If you don't have clients, you don't have a business.

Speaker 1: 29:12

But I think there was a point where I started getting frustrated with the lack of understanding with backend operations in my business and it was like annoying to me when business coaches wouldn't like give me an insight into how they were doing things around these things, because maybe, yeah, it wasn't like their zone of genius. And finally I did find, you know, I like pushed and hunted around until I started to find people who were would share like their spreadsheets and, you know, like those simple back-end processes that I like knew nothing about wasn't my, my strong suit and I think, yeah, sometimes it's an investment in getting help with that type of thing that, even though it may be, you know, you might not think it would directly lead to an ROI is in that it actually will, because it will completely streamline your operations and then give you, yeah, free you up to actually go and make more money and do more client work and all of those things in your business.

Speaker 2: 30:08

Yeah, and it is a common thing with general business coaches there tends to be a skew towards the marketing and yeah and it it is a common thing with with general business coaches there tends to be a skew towards the marketing and the sales.

Speaker 2: 30:15

And listen, like you said, if you don't have those you don't have a business.

Speaker 2: 30:19

But very quickly after that you can have business and not handle it in the background if you don't address operationally. But it's not necessarily a skill that or a subject that I would say that a lot of business coaches will go deeper into, and so I will partner with a lot of coaches and then I work directly with clients, just bringing that skill because I can also speak to aligned marketing and sales. But then I bring that whole back end expertise to things and can help people understand how to run their businesses better and a lot of what I do I run across folks of well, I've spent thousands with this coach and thousands with that coach and paid for that course and did this masterclass and whatever the case may be, and they're still lost, you know, and a little gun shy and part of what I do is then okay, but we're gonna. We're gonna actually find you the right pieces. If you need a coach, great, we're gonna find you the right one. Yeah, you know, if you need the right system.

Speaker 2: 31:25

you need the right processes. You need the right team or plan timeline of how to bring on a team, whatever the case may be, but part of what I do is actually handpick and match you with the right things that you need, including marketing and sales help, rather than here's where you're going to get the most ROI, rather than you wasting thousands of more dollars because you don't know what the right fit is.

Speaker 1: 31:53

Yeah, such an important conversation. Thank you so much for coming. Please tell everybody like how can they, you know, how can they work with you? What have you got going on?

Speaker 2: 32:01

Yeah, you can always check out my website at whitenerprosecom. It'll give you a little insight on how we work and what we do. Right now. I have speaking of finding the hidden money. People could use some money right now and some breathing room in order to stay alive or grow or do the things that they want to do, and so I am running, for a limited time, custom hidden money intensives. This is actually step one of what it looks like to work with me in a full capacity, but I'm pulling out that hidden money piece. We're going to dive right in. We're going to go through everything and figure out where your hidden money is, and so right now, I am booking those so you can come to my website. Connect with me on LinkedIn. I know we'll drop the links below. You'll find all of the information there. They're $1,500. Give me two hours and some information. I'll find you at least $10,000.

Speaker 1: 32:58

Now, that is a juicy ROI.

Speaker 2: 33:03

Guaranteed, or I will give you your money back.

Speaker 1: 33:05

I love that, amazing, amazing. Thank you so much for coming. This is such a great conversation and, yeah, keep in touch. Everyone, like tell us what are your questions that come up from this, like reach out, let us know how this is landing, if there's anything else that you want us to talk about. We're also going to do um, a live stream series together later this month over on facebook, where we'll dive more into systems, and we'll also dive more into what that looks like with um content and bringing your astrology and just helping you have clear systems for the moves that are going to make you money in your business. So definitely stay tuned for that and thank you so much, mara, for coming yeah, thank you for having me.

Speaker 2: 33:46

This is a really enjoyable conversation and I can't wait um for our series coming up in a few weeks.

Speaker 1: 33:57

Awesome. Thanks everyone. Bye. For more inspirational content, head over to my website withsarahmackcom, and please support the show by liking, commenting and subscribing.