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Bonus #59 - Celi Arias | Otter.ai

Bonus #59 - Celi Arias

Ellen Yin43min

Producer

00:00

The following is a sponsored episode.

Ellen Yin

00:09

Hello friends. Welcome back to the show. I'm super excited to be joined today by Celi Arias, a scaling expert and strategist who has had a 25 year track record of founding coaching other businesses and scaling her own seven figure business. Celi, welcome to the show.

Celi Arias

00:25

Hi, thanks for having me.

Ellen Yin

00:28

So for our listeners who are new to you, I would love for you to give a quick introduction to who you are before we dive into your grown ass business framework. And I know we had a conversation prior to recording around you know 2025 seeming to be a season of a lot of changes and and pivots, and how scaling really is so personal and and requires that that personalized lens. So we'll get into all of that, but first tell us a little bit more about you and your company.

Celi Arias

00:58

Yes, absolutely. Well, I have been an entrepreneur since I was about 11 years old, and I find that most entrepreneurs probably have some kind of story where they can remember as a kid wanting to fix something or solve a problem or do something differently. So if that's you, you probably were always an entrepreneur, and you can just give yourself permission to be so and and enjoy your life. But I have been either founding businesses or I've been a CEO to tech startups. I've been a marketing director, I've been a head of sales and then a head coach for a coaching company, before founding my own framework, the grown ass business framework.

Celi Arias

01:37

Because people ask me, like, why did you do that? And why did you build it? And I was like, well, it's founded on 20 years of mistakes, so you're welcome. I hope to help you avoid 20 years of mistakes in business. But also, I found somewhere along the journey of coaching entrepreneurs for about seven or eight years that you do need a custom strategy for you and your vision and your goals. And you also need to address your mindset. If you're going to be in the founder seat or the CEO seat, you have to understand the difference between when something is strategy and when something is a mindset problem.

Celi Arias

02:17

And so I created a framework that addresses both that actually untangles them so we can understand them separately, and then we can put the pieces back together.

Speaker 1

02:25

Super

Ellen Yin

02:25

Super juicy. So let's delineate that for a moment. And actually, I remember this when I was on your website, that piece really standing out to me, because you're right. I think a lot of times people try to solve strategy issues with mindset work, or vice versa. Solve mindset work with strategy. So tell us, how can we decipher for ourselves which camp we fall into when we're faced with a hurdle that we can't seem to overcome?

Celi Arias

02:51

Yeah, well, you just made me so happy. You just made my day like she gets it. You get it? I always say, look like I'm a certified mindset coach, and I love my mindset coach and mentor, but your mindset work is not going to fix a broken pricing model. Right mindset work is not going to necessarily fix if your business isn't profitable, or how to hire the right people and train and on board and create leaders on your team. Right?

Ellen Yin

03:20

Exactly.

Celi Arias

03:21

There are some things that are actual strategy, right, pricing models, business models that set you up to scale. If you want to scale, having an exit strategy from day one, having a clear vision of what business you're building, not somebody else's business, like I don't want to build your business Ellen, because maybe it doesn't serve me and my life and my goals, right, right? So those are all strategy things.

Celi Arias

03:44

Now, when I find myself in my feelings about something, maybe I got a string of no's. Maybe people aren't opening my emails and my click through rate isn't what it used to be. That's probably a mindset thing that I need to address, because business most often isn't about me, and it means nothing about me. It's just business metrics, numbers, tweaking, learning, taking in the data, learning from the metrics, pivoting, playing, experimenting. It's a game, and a lot of times we make it about ourselves, and when we make it about ourselves, it makes us less able to work the strategy and write those metrics and work the data.

Celi Arias

04:26

So I just I found, over years that the more I can teach my clients, okay, amazing, great question. That's a strategy question. Let's figure that out. Let's break that apart. Or, okay, amazing. I want you to notice that that's a feelings question or a belief question, and that has more to do with you and kind of the backpack of history that you bring to the table. The more we can separate that, the faster and easier your business grows.

Ellen Yin

04:54

So if I'm understanding you correctly, you feel like the mindset issue can be distinguished by perhaps someone almost viewing any sort of, I guess, outcome that didn't go the way they anticipated or wanted to. If you view that as a personal failing or character flaw or perhaps a limitation on your own capacity that highlights to someone or should, kind of like, ring a bell and say, Oh, this, this is a mindset thing I need to work through, versus, if it's like you said, a more like a tactics driven sort of issue, like a pricing model that needs restructuring. That's kind of how you're helping people figure out which way they're leaning. Did I get that right?

Celi Arias

05:39

Yeah, absolutely. Let's, let's pull up some examples.

Ellen Yin

05:43

I would love.

Celi Arias

05:43

Okay, I'm overwhelmed and burnt out and starting to hate my business and hate my life and kind of resent my clients, right, right? So I'm having a little bit of a business crisis moment of, maybe I need to burn it all down, because maybe I don't like the business anymore, and I'm exhausted by it, and I need to quit.

Celi Arias

06:07

Sounds like an emotion, mindset problem, but actually, a lot of times burnout and exhaustion, what I've noticed is it points more to a broken pricing strategy and a broken offer strategy. If you are booked and busy but you hate your life, we need to look at your offer strategy and your pricing strategy, because you're probably delivering and completing or selling offers that aren't totally profitable for you and your businesses, which is why you feel at capacity and burnt out.

Celi Arias

06:39

So it's actually you may not hate your life and you may not hate your business, but you may need to go back and look at the business model, the offer strategy, the delivery strategy and the pricing strategy. So that's an example of we can maybe feel a certain way about our business and be hating our business, but it's actually that we just built the wrong business model for us, and I see this a lot. When people learn from greats who are great, right? But they copy that person's methodology. They take that box and they try to put themselves into that box, and then they go, ugh, God, I hate this, but it's supposed to work. I'm supposed to want to be a course creator, and I'm supposed to want to and my courses are supposed to sell in my sleep.

Celi Arias

07:29

And what's wrong with me that I don't like this business and my courses aren't selling, and that's when it's like, no, there's nothing wrong with you. You're just operating in the wrong business model.

Speaker 1

07:42

Ellen Yin

07:42

So can you give an example, then, of either a personal realization in your own business when you realized, Oh, I am operating in the wrong business model, or maybe my pricing isn't setting me up for success. Can you either give an example of that in your own business, or perhaps in one of your clients businesses where you were able to help them make those very specific tweaks that made all the difference in how they felt about their business.

Celi Arias

08:09

Absolutely, I'll give you a personal example. I created a business model in my business that feels aligned with my values and with my bigger mission and my integrity, which is I only have a six week business accelerator where we learn the rules of the game.

Celi Arias

08:31

So we learn strategy and tactics and what is the right strategy for you. And then after that, you can go into the gab CEO, which is a six month advanced container whenever you talk to any of my really good friends and colleagues and brilliant coaches, they all say, silly. What's wrong with you? Your next program needs to be a year long mastermind, right?

Celi Arias

08:53

Because that's what everyone is telling us. You need to upsell and then you need to keep them in that year long mastermind forever. That's LTV. That's how you keep making money in your business. That's the model for you. And while I I heard it, and I was like, I get it on paper. It makes sense, but it doesn't align with my values and the bigger mission of my product, the product that I created in the world, if I got really honest about what I created, was I created something that would allow people to become the CEO and strategist of their business.

Celi Arias

09:29

So really, if I'm being true to my business and the thing I created, if I'm being true to myself, I actually created a thing that allows you to not need me forever, right? And maybe that business model doesn't make sense to a lot of business coaches who keep telling me, you have to at least do a year and you have to upsell people into another year and another year. And I get it right. It doesn't make sense, but I needed to change my business to align with the vision and mission of the tool that I created.

Celi Arias

10:00

So that's like a personal thing that I did, which was, I get it strategically. That doesn't make sense, but if I really say, I'm here to create, turn you into the CEO of your business, where you're going to know your sales numbers, you're going to know your sales pipeline, you're going to understand probability to close, you're going to understand your marketing metrics, you're gonna understand systems and operation, like, if I'm gonna get you to own your business like a business owner, and then I want you to be free in the world, then I need to create a business that does that.

Celi Arias

10:32

Exactly. That was extremely helpful as as a example Celi, and it kind of sparked this additional question for me when you said, you know the accelerator that first six weeks about learning the rules of the game, and then you're moving them into the six month gab CEO to really help them fully be confident at the helm. Since you've worked with so many CEOs and founders, I'm curious what is, what is like a unwritten or maybe undervalued rule of the game, so to speak, for CEOs that you feel like not enough people either even know that this rule exists in their business, or they're just not paying attention to it. Like, what is one observation you've had in that arena?

Celi Arias

11:15

I mean, there's so many different ones, obviously, because it just depends on the stage of business that you're in. So I noticed different things at different stages, but if I had to say one thing that I noticed is that we as entrepreneurs and business owners put a lot of pressure on ourselves that we're just supposed to know what to do, and so we have. We're all walking around with this quiet shame of, well, I started a business, and everybody's looking at me to fail.

Celi Arias

11:44

So I have to look like I know what I'm doing, and I have to fake it till I make it. And I have to, like, keep secretly, silently making mistakes until I figure it out. And so what I always like to say is, like, look, are you a soccer player by chance?

Ellen Yin

11:58

I'm not. I feel like I was the only kid who didn't get signed up for some team in elementary school. So anyways, I do enjoy.

Celi Arias

12:04

That's good. So then you're gonna be a perfect example. Okay, great. My story, I'm Argentinian. Yeah, you know Argentina big, big soccer country. I do not play soccer. I don't know how to play.

Celi Arias

12:17

So Ellen, and if you and I were at a soccer game, right? And we were on the field, and somebody would have said to us, get out there, go play. We would be like, Are you kidding? Mortified. I don't know what the positions do. I don't know what the roles and responsibilities are. I don't know what strengths you need to be in certain positions. I don't know how to dribble a ball. Tactics, right? I don't know overall strategy. I don't I just like to watch them play, and like I hopefully Argentina wins, that's all I know. I would never step out onto a soccer field.

Celi Arias

12:52

You would never step out onto a soccer field and expect yourself to be great. And what I often see business owners do is step out into this abyss of this unknown world and put this pressure on themselves to suddenly make revenue, understand marketing, convert leads to sales, and know how to hire and know how to build teams and do all these things. It's like no one ever taught you the rules of the game.

Celi Arias

13:21

That's what I see happens at every stage, whether you are in pre six figure stage, where you really should be focusing on proof of concept and product market fit. I see people in that stage focusing on all the wrong things. I see my seven figure business owners focusing on all the wrong things, right because you're putting this pressure on yourself to understand a game you don't understand, and to get out on the field and, like, be the superstar.

Celi Arias

13:48

So that's what I try to break down. Is like, let's break down the game.

Ellen Yin

13:52

I love analogies, by the way, so you're speaking my love language. Let's focus for a moment on because I know a lot of times, you know, the content out out there can be really focused on the on the pre six figure or even maybe low to mid six figure entrepreneur, but let's for a moment, focus on that other sector of clients that you help those seven figure and beyond entrepreneurs you just mentioned that you notice that they make some key mistakes as well.

Ellen Yin

14:18

Can you highlight illuminate for our listeners, whether they're there at that stage or not, one of those things that hopefully they can avoid, after hearing after hearing this from you?

Celi Arias

14:29

Yeah, I would say that for my seven figure business owners, what typically happens is, there's a stage, there's a little there's a place at every milestone, there's like an uncomfortable shift that you need to make, and what happens is when we hold on to the team or the things that worked before, we're gripping onto our past and hoping that it's going to catapult us into our future, and sometimes at that stage, it's the team that got you there and some of the people around you that got there, if they're not willing to be coachable, and they're not really willing to up level their skills, they may not be the team that gets you to the next stage, if that's where you're looking to go.

Celi Arias

15:11

That's hard. I think that's hard for people to realize emotional, right? And it's emotional, yeah? And it's emotional, and you have to let and it's like, I'm not, I'm not for the like, tech bros of like, hire fast and fire fast. Like, it's not about that. It's understanding when your people on your team are actually not interested in growing with you, then it's time to continue to grow. If that is the desired trajectory of your business. That's a big one.

Celi Arias

15:38

Another one that I noticed in seven figure business owners is, there's almost this sense of like, well, I'm a seven figure business owner and I have arrived, and so they're unwilling to go back and revisit product market fit, revisit sales process, revisit if there's some dropped balls in sales pipeline, because the bigger you get, the more I notice people have gaps in their sales process, and they're dropping leads left and right, and don't realize that they're dropping leads.

Celi Arias

16:06

But there's almost like, well, I'm too good to go back to the basics, because, like, I'm here now. But what I've found in seven figure businesses, and I've consulted for eight and nine figure businesses, like, even my nine figure business, they don't love that. I'm like, but can we? Can we just, like, go back and fix this one little thing that you guys have never had time to fix, because here's the thing, we're all building the plane as it's taking off and flying.

Ellen Yin

16:32

Yeah.

Celi Arias

16:33

You're bound to miss some things or do some things good enough, and that's great. That gets the plane in the sky, that's amazing. There's something wrong with that. And then there's a time where you have a little bit more revenue to play with to now, okay, go back and fix that key funnel. Go back and fix that sales process that's leaking leads. It's actually a lot of times not about more offers and more funnels and doing more it's oh my gosh.

Celi Arias

17:03

If we could go in with a wrench and tighten every stage and really get the team to own the metrics of every state like this is where my geeky brain goes like, oh, we could just clean that up, and then you could get your conversions up to 60% and what would that look like without having to create anything new. And the other thing is, like, my seven figure business owners, that sounds horrible to them, because they're like, I want to create new. I don't want to be bored.

Celi Arias

17:31

But a business strategist is like, let's clean that funnel until it's the most efficient converting funnel ever. Right? So those are the things that I think at seven figures, it's like, I get it. You don't want to be bored. I get it. You want to create new if that's really your strength. And what you want to do make sure that the team you have at this stage are the kind of people like me and Ellen who geek out about going back and really cleaning up each stage of a sales process or a client journey, and tightening it up so much that your leads aren't being dropped, or that your clients are like, oh my gosh, this was the most seamless onboarding experience ever, right?

Speaker 1

18:13

right,

Ellen Yin

18:13

Right, very illuminating, and such a great reminder that the essentials, the foundations of your business, You're never too beyond to, you know, circle back to those, and refine those an interesting term product market fit. So this is a term that is very native right to the tech space, which is obviously your background. I think that a lot of a lot of business owners who kind of were brought up more in the expert based business model. So coaches, course creators, speakers, that nature, product, market fit is not a terminology.

Ellen Yin

18:49

Again, speaking of the rule of a game, it's not, it's not a it's not a concept that we are well versed in. And so I would love to get your insight on how do you help both yourself and your clients qualify product market fit. What, what makes something a yes versus a no? How do you what are the metrics or things that you're looking at to determine that, and how does it apply in a space like, like educate, online education, or expert based business models, separate from how a tech company or maybe a consumer brand might determine product market fit?

Celi Arias

19:26

Yeah, totally, I do approach it mostly for service based business owners now, but you're right that that awareness comes from having tech experience. And so I do teach it in a really simplified way, which is the simplest way to think about is, is, and I know everyone will relate to this and go, Oh, I kind of hate her right now. But just bear with me when you like, talk about the type of coaching or service that you do, does the person in front of you go, Ooh, I think I need that. That's when you know got Product Market Fit baby like if you're able to go, you go to a dinner and you're talking to somebody that you kind of already know is probably a person you'd love to work for.

Celi Arias

20:11

If you are able to describe what you do in the world, whether you are a health coach, a therapist or a copywriter, if you're able to go to that person at dinner and talk to them about what you do and how you are unique in the space, and how you solve a problem if you're able to do that. And the person goes, Oh, my God, I'm so glad we're sitting together. I actually should talk to you about my business or my health needs or my mental health, or right if you get that moment, you're like, ding, got it now, if you're sitting at an event, a networking event, a dinner or whatever, and you kind of fumble around talking about what you do, which, by the way, we all do, so don't feel bad, myself included, and the person kind of goes, Hmm, cool.

Celi Arias

21:00

You don't go Product Market Fit yet. That's my, like, layman's way of explaining it. Do I break product market fit down into five parts, and it's like a whole framework. But sure, the point of what product market fit is is that I didn't just create something in the silo that I wanted to create because I thought it would be fun. Right product market fit, whether I'm let's say I'm a health coach. Means I created a product, a training, a methodology, that actually solves a particular person's problem in a way that I can deliver it to them to get them a result.

Celi Arias

21:38

So the product, in itself, speaks to a person. So it's I got the right person with the right product that gets them a result with messaging that I know how to speak to them, and I know how to speak to the product at a price point that's right for them and that's right for my business. Pricing is a two way street. It has to be right for my business to be profitable, and it has to be fairly decent pricing for the client, and eventually, in a business model that I can deliver over and over and over again. So what that means is, in a business model that ideally could scale, that's product market fit.

Ellen Yin

22:15

I love the simplification of you know, really looking for those lean in and light bulb moments right from from how people react to the way that you describe things. Is there ever a scenario where a product, let's say, sells really well, actually, but you feel like it could be almost like the opposite. It's like a false indicator of product market fit, like maybe it sells quite well, but it actually isn't product market fit, and you describe what that looks like?

Celi Arias

22:47

Absolutely, I think we there's an example happening right now in our industry where you have a bunch of people who are not AI experts, who are selling some AI product because it's trendy.

Ellen Yin

22:59

Great and timely example. Continue.

Celi Arias

23:02

Think about that. Now here's what gets interesting. That happened around 2018 19, 2020 as well. When the online business, especially because of COVID, had a boom, people were maybe selling business coaching, but maybe they didn't really have a background in business coaching, right? It sold at a time where there was a market trend going up. They were good at marketing. They sold, and now today, they're having a hard time to continue selling something that they're not truly expert in, for example, right?

Celi Arias

23:35

So that's what I'm seeing repeat itself with, AI, it's I'm talking to colleagues and friends who have other expertise and specialties, but it turns out that they might have created an AI bot for themselves, and then they're like, I created a webinar to my AI bot, and so many people were interested in paid for the webinar, and now I'm thinking, Maybe I should just sell this. Like, Oh no, it's 2020, all over again.

Celi Arias

24:02

Do it right? Because you're going to make money now, because you hopped on the wave of a trend, right? But it's hard to write out that trend if it's not actually in your soul, it's your expertise, it's your thing. So that's an example of sometimes, yes, sometimes businesses skyrocket because they're in that right moment in the market, and then they don't know how to keep riding that wave, and then they plummet, and then they don't know what happened. And that's where we get into this interesting phase where we're in right now, where people are going, gosh, what used to work doesn't work, right?

Ellen Yin

24:41

So good. So good. That artificial demand inflating right people's perception of of what works and what doesn't. So speaking of this idea of, you know, things that used to work maybe don't work as well anymore, or don't work at all anymore, you you have the unique vantage point of getting to see behind the scenes of a lot of businesses outside of just your own. What are some of the things that you are noticing are changing or going away entirely in 2025 and if you even want to relate some of these things back to your own grown ass business framework, I love to hear how you're thinking through these things in relation to the the work that or the framework that you help your clients apply?

Celi Arias

25:26

Yeah, I think that's a great question, and this is what I work through with my clients all the time. And I'm gonna say something that people aren't gonna expect because I know people are gonna expect me to go, this isn't working anymore, and this isn't working, and don't do this in 2025 right? But the truth is, it's like, yeah, five day challenges are still working for some people, and for some people they're really not, yeah, right?

Celi Arias

25:52

And social media is working for some people, and for some people it's really not. So like to me, I'm like, yay. We're entering the era of like old school business again. So yay me. I'm excited. This is where I have fun, because I literally might have 10 clients in my advanced program at a time, and each of them is executing a totally different marketing strategy for them, right?

Ellen Yin

26:14

Yes.

Celi Arias

26:15

And so I have a person who does five day launches, and why does it work for her? Because it works for going back to product market fit. The first part of product market fit is who's your person? That person that she speaks to and her service speaks to a more beginner online person who's looking for things on Facebook. That person is willing to sit in a three day four day five day challenge. My person is not so it wouldn't work for me, but I can't be that coach that rules out and says, Oh, that doesn't work anymore.

Celi Arias

26:49

Well, I literally have a client that it works for because it aligns with her audience and where they're at in their journey. I have another client who we've removed all social media pressures from her, and all she does is goes to three major industry events a year. That's it. Wow. Can you imagine that your whole Lead Pipeline comes from attending three to four major events a year and just making sure that wouldn't work for me because I'm an introvert.

Celi Arias

27:21

So again, that strategy, as much as I came up for it, for someone and she is on her way to a seven figure business, it wouldn't work for me because I'm an introvert. You get me at a networking event and I'm the girl on the corner pretending to be busy on her phone.

Ellen Yin

27:38

No shame, yes,

Celi Arias

27:40

She is the person who can, like, go. She just went to Summit. She actually got into a sales like, lead creation conversation in the hot tub with someone. And I was like, half off to you. How do you do that? If I tried on that strategy, I would fail, like, comically, me trying to talk business in a hot tub with people is like comedy. If you're an introvert, you get why that would never work, right?

Celi Arias

28:08

So what really is going to work for you, especially with the growth of AI and automation, and everyone's gonna be everywhere and everyone's gonna have content everywhere, is actually figuring out your unique roadmap that aligns with your personality, your business's vision, what is the marketing and growth strategy for that?

Ellen Yin

28:31

I love the nuance. I love the context here, because I think this will be a breath of fresh air, honestly, for our listeners, because there are so many loud voices saying, ditch this. Try this instead. Do this type of work. Don't do this. And you're right. Every type of strategy can work for different businesses. There is no one size fits all. And similar to fashion, right? Trends are also cyclical, so things that seem very outdated, like, I know in 2025 a lot of people are like, the webinar is dead. Like, don't do webinars that seem so old school. So bro marketing, so whatever.

Ellen Yin

29:06

But to your point, I know lots of people that are actually still thriving in that model, or have made slight changes to the way it's delivered, and it still creates a wonderful experience. And so you it is so specific to each person. So I love that you bring that, that layer of nuance into how you answer that question, because I think there's there needs to be more nuance in these conversations that were we're having as business owners.

Ellen Yin

29:31

So kind of circling back then to your, your own grown ass business framework, or your gab framework, as you call it. Can you just high level preview what that looks like to our listeners.

Celi Arias

29:44

Absolutely I like my goal is that I'm actually secretly my secret mission is I'm creating strategists all over the world. I'm teaching you how to be the strategist of your own business. So the framework is based on the principle that if you could, you. Early stages. If you could, as the founder, afford to hire your ideal C Suite team, you would, right?

Ellen Yin

30:08

Yeah.

Celi Arias

30:08

In a dream world, I'd have a COO a CMO, a CFO, and I would just be the founder, showing up, speaking, teaching my frameworks, making content and coaching my clients, and that's it. And I wouldn't deal with even though I come from ops, I wouldn't deal with ops and systems and marketing and sales and all that, right? But I can't afford my dream team, right? So the framework is based on, okay, well, then let's understand, what are the key things that we need to measure and know in each department if I were to hire a CMO, a good CMO, a good CMO, wouldn't jump into just making me content.

Celi Arias

30:49

Absolutely not. And this is where we get mixed up, because we hire marketing virtual assistants, and they're like, calendar, right, right? It's like, no, a good cmo would first go, let's take a step back. Do we have product market fit?

Celi Arias

31:05

Right? And you can say that however you want to say that, have we done voice of consumer interviews? Do we know our people? Do we know their desire, their deepest desires? Do we know their pain? Do we know how to speak to it? Does the Pro, like a good cmo would actually take a step back and think through all this stuff?

Celi Arias

31:18

So what I've done is I've created this framework that makes us go through what are the key things that each department head would own in the most manageable and doable way for you, so that in the beginning, you understand what lives in the marketing department, what lives in the finance department, what the CEO actually owns, so that you can actually swap out hats, and then it helps you under there's like, it's a it's based on a whole control center.

Celi Arias

31:49

So there are metrics in every single department, which you would love, yes, right? So like, what are marketing metrics? And what should I be metric measuring, what is my conversion rate in my marketing and what is my conversion rate in my sales process and sales pipeline, what is probability to close, and what's a real sales pipeline look like? So it's all there, but the ultimate goal is that you also go, oh, the day that I'm ready to hire a marketing assistant, I already have done voice of consumer interviews, and I've created message and I have this, like messaging matrix that speaks to my people, and I've already implemented a very simple marketing plan that has worked, so now a marketing assistant or a marketing director can take that and actually run with it.

Celi Arias

32:33

Or, you know, worst case scenario, I know what a marketing assistant should know, or should ask like, if I am to hire a sales person for my team, I want them to understand sales conversion, right, right? I want if I'm going to hire a salesperson to represent me, not only do they need to understand my messaging and understand how to sell my product, but they better be somebody who's driven by that sales pipeline. They better be looking at the people in the sales pipeline, what stage they're at in sales, and they know which follow ups are of higher value, and they understand that as a company, the CEO has a 55% conversion rate, but maybe the salesperson has a 35% conversion rate.

Celi Arias

33:16

So therefore they need to do a little extra work, because they're right now they're at a 30% conversion rate compared to the CEOs at 55% I got to work a little harder, like, if I'm going to hire a salesperson, I want them to be thinking this way. So what it ultimately does the methodology is meant to train you to sit in front of a soccer field and go, Oh, yeah, pass me the ball I can play, right? Right, yeah, and that that's what I don't think, as a former head coach of another business company, that's what I don't think business coaches do enough of is like, actually empower the business owner to run and own their business.

Ellen Yin

33:57

100% I feel like, I mean, I'm obsessed with this Celi. First of all, I just, I just want to say that if you're listening to this episode right now, I would really go back and rewind the last five ish minutes and literally jot down every question that Sally posed in in this, you know, example, run through of looking at different department heads and and the processes and metrics that they're kind of keeping tabs on.

Ellen Yin

34:22

Because I really think to your point that as as a CEO, the quality of your questions and your ability to know what to ask and how to actually hold certain roles accountable for performance really determines the the momentum of your entire business, right? Because, exactly like you said, like, if you don't know even what you're looking for, then how could you possibly hire someone hold them accountable to the performance of that role that you yourself are not familiar with?

Ellen Yin

34:51

And I just got to say, like, speaking of product market fit from earlier, I felt this like lean in moment, hearing you talk about your gab framework, because I don't know why it never occurred to me in this way until I heard you say it, but I do think the most pressing issue of most founders who are just honestly scrappy and good at marketing and were able to sell something so their businesses kind of like ran faster than they actually had the skill sets equipped to handle I've felt that many times in my own business, I guess I never really thought about how so much of it comes down to we don't have a way to sort through the mess of all of the hats that we wear, often as solo founders or small team business owners, and so because there is no clear delineation of any department or roles In the way that a traditional, maybe well funded business has the luxury of doing from the beginning, it does create so much confusion.

Ellen Yin

35:48

And I've definitely experienced this time and time again in my own business, and especially as someone where operations is not at all my strong suite. And so hearing you talk about it like even if it is just you doing all the work, and you have no other person on your team, you still have to be able to identify and distinguish between the different lanes of the work that you're doing and separate those out.

Ellen Yin

36:11

So anyways, I'm just singing your praises, because I think that, in and of itself, is so profound, and I really hope that our listeners saw that same kind of clarity from the last five minutes.

Celi Arias

36:23

Yeah. I mean, if I always like my my coaching style is I'm like, you tell me the answer. Because my goal is that you walk out of this program asking the right questions. Because a lot of times we're asking the wrong question, and we, when we ask the wrong question, we go down the wrong rabbit hole. Right, right, so. But, and then, if you have a question, okay, you tell me what department does that live under, and what metrics are we measuring or not measuring, and what are we doing in that department or not doing to solve that problem?

Celi Arias

36:57

And and look, I'm a former coo but now, as a CEO and visionary of this business, I had to hire a me, and I always joke with this person. I went and hired somebody who I one day, I was like, last year, I was like, God, I just wish I had a Celi in my life. I just need a Celi. And then I made this joke that I was like, well, there's this person online who's, like, one of my business besties, who I was, called her my brain twin.

Celi Arias

37:23

And I thought, well, I should just hire my brain twin. And I literally hired her to be like, you have full reign to tell me, No, Celi, stop that. Don't do that. Not right now, because when I sit in the CEO seat, suddenly I want to try all the things and do all the things and build the next thing and the next thing, and next thing and and do this and like over deliver for my clients and do like, right? And so I had to hire somebody to tell me stop that.

Celi Arias

37:50

Nope, I'm crossing that off the list. I'm putting that down into q4 like, and it makes me laugh, because I'm like she does for me what I literally do for my clients, and teach them right to do so you also, when you understand the different departments and you understand the different hats, you get faster at going, ooh, I really struggle here.

Celi Arias

38:10

And I actually the first thing I need to hire, even if it doesn't make sense, is I need to hire somebody who is going to tell me stop that, don't do that. Not right now, right, right? So, yeah, that's the whole point of the method is, how do I help people become better business owners?

Ellen Yin

38:30

So brilliant. Well, for people who are listening in today and saying, Wow, this is the education I didn't realize I was even missing and that I needed, who is the best person to join the six week accelerator versus the six month. Is it based on stage of business, years in business, revenue standpoint, like, how do you help funnel people into their right place?

Celi Arias

38:54

Yeah, so the accelerator can be for a five figure business owner. I've had a few that have gone through and been highly, highly successful. Like, highly successful, I always say it's for people who are really ready to cut out the noise and cut out the confusion. And like, if you are serious about your business, you're serious about it being profitable, you're even serious about its future.

Celi Arias

39:18

And whether it's I want to sell it, or I want to hand it down to somebody, or I want it to lead me into retirement. If you're serious about it, you need to know these things.

Ellen Yin

39:28

Yeah.

Celi Arias

39:28

So my criteria is like, are you serious about starting to treat your business like a business? And I always find that if you're in that place of like, do I need that course? Should I do that person's thing? Should I do that if you're finding yourself in that confusion, yeah, you need to do this, because it's not a one off. I'm going to teach you how to do this one thing in business. It's I'm actually going to teach you how the game works and how to play the game, and we actually build out your custom strategy in that six weeks accelerator, which is why it's an accelerator, and it's very, very intense. It is not for the faint of heart. It's very intense.

Celi Arias

40:04

And you have to do that first, because I teach you how to use the Control Center and all the metrics, and then the six month program is for the people who then want to keep working the strategy, keep working the metrics, and they want to add on to that mindset, because you can't get into mindset in a six week accelerator. There's just not enough time.

Celi Arias

40:23

So that's how they're separated. It's like, if you want to go deeper on becoming, becoming the CEO that's fully embodied, that's confident, that feel that's like, you know, the face of the brand, or, right, what have you, that's what gap CEO is for. So I'm assuming then that for you it's, it's like a pre qualifier to be able to go deeper with you and GAP CEO, they need to have gone through the accelerator. So you know, you're playing the same game, essentially with the same Yeah. It's like, yeah, when I say these, when I say this number or this data, or when I ask you, what's your conversion rate, you should know the answer now, right?

Celi Arias

40:58

And if you don't know the answer, you know where what you haven't been doing, and you know what you need to go do. I love that, right? So, like, it's really gab CEO is really advanced, and it's really for people who are trying to scale amazing. And are both of these group programs, or is there individual options if people prefer to work in that one on one setting? Yes, there is. They. These are group programs, and there is an individual track, which I have a few people who are like, I'm not a group person, right? And I want and I only have, like, two individual spots a quarter, but I do do individual.

Ellen Yin

41:33

Incredible another great example of knowing your audience and how to best serve them and meet these people where they're at. So Celi, I'm so inspired by our conversation. Thank you so much for sharing. I think this is, I mean, I would put this as like an episode that every entrepreneur, no matter what stage of business, should listen to at least once, just almost as like a checkpoint with themselves, like, how well do I really understand the basics of business?

Ellen Yin

41:59

Like, we kind of just assume that if people have made a lot of money in business, they must understand business, but sometimes you're just particularly talented, like you said at marketing, or maybe you hit the right timing for whatever it is. But that doesn't necessarily mean you haven't overlooked 1,000,001 things as you've been building the plane. So thank you for this crucial reminder. Where can our listeners continue to connect with you and be part of your world?

Celi Arias

42:23

Oh, the easiest, probably Instagram. I'm very easy to find. It's Celi grows business so celi grows business and or, if not, it's very easy to remember grown ass business.com. So.

Ellen Yin

42:37

Great branding. All of the links will be below in the show notes, so make sure you guys go check this out. Thank you again, Celi, for your time, and we'll catch you all in the next episode.

Celi Arias

42:47

Yeah, thank you. This was so fun.

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