Our guest is Susanne Mariga, a CPA, tax coach, chartered global management accountant and certified Profit First accountant. Today, we dive deep into entrepreneurship and the processes that you have to employ around keeping your money. Susanne gives us a clinic on how to keep your money with a method called “Profit First”, how much money you should spend on owners’ pay, and why you need to create the “illusion of scarcity” in your business.
Learn more about Susanne and her journey at reiclarity.com!
“Profit has to be intentional, the bottom lines have to be engineered before you even start your business.”
03:47
Susanne started working in her father’s CPA firm as a bookkeeper at age 14. She fell in love with the financial world and went on to become a certified public accountant and Profit First accountant.
Susanne shares the Profit First method that she uses in her business and coaches other business owners. Profit First is a cash management system, not an accounting system. It’s designed to force intentional profitability and intentional owners’ pay.
How the Profit First method works:
- As humans, the more we have, the more resources we’re going to use. That is why profit has to be intentional and accounted for in the business. The first step is to figure out how much money you want to make and then re-engineer your strategy backward.
- You have to create the “illusion of scarcity” by creating different bank accounts inside the business. These bank accounts are for the revenue, profit, owners’ pay, tax obligation, and operating expenses.
- Only use the operating expenses bank account for your expenses to avoid overspending.
For a healthy small company with under $250k revenue, around 70% of the revenue should go to owners’ pay and 30% for operating expenses. By the time the company reaches about $10M revenue, only 35% should go towards the owner.
“Minority business owners, even the ones that make 6-7 figures in gross revenue oftentimes do not even take home $100k.”
24:31
Susanne is very passionate about helping minority entrepreneurs succeed in their businesses. She recently wrote a book to help and educate them called Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises.
Susanne wants to empower business owners not only in the US but worldwide. That is why $1 for every book that is sold is going towards a scholarship for sending girls to school in Zimbabwe. Within the first 30 days of launching her book, she funded 22 scholarships.
“The reality is that growth only happens intentionally.”
41:27
At the end of the episode, Susanne picks an action step from the REI Clarity Framework that is the most valuable to her. This is “Find the Money”.
According to Susanne, finding the money for investing starts with your purpose. Define what winning looks like for you and what your end goal is. Then work backward and budget for the things that are important for you.
Mentioned in the show:
- https://susannemariga.com/
- Susanne Mariga – Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises
- Profit First Masterclass
- Her LinkedIn
- www.shineinsurance.com/reiclarity
Learn how to grow your portfolio and reach incredible success the right way! Visit us here for everything you need to know: www.shineinsurance.com/reiclarity.
Special thanks to Susanne Mariga for taking the time to share so many great insights with us
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