PODCAST - why your lms, education platform, or tech stack may be costing you profit
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Today on the show, I'm gonna share with you why your LMS education platform and tech stack overall may be causing you profit, and I'm gonna share with you my three-step process of how to fix it. Before I get into the three reasons why your tech stack may be costing you profit, I wanna ask you a simple question.
What is the purpose of technology in the first place? To simplify what- Is already working. [00:02:00] This may be the most important thing that you learn today in this episode. When we're looking at technology and I'm consulting any business on what their tech stack needs to include, and specifically, I empower businesses to harness and leverage education as a tool to drive adoption, so to bring in more customers, customer acquisition, and to increase retention, retention from the standpoint of retaining customers longer and retaining top talent.
Well, when I'm looking at an organization, the whole reason why companies hire me out as a consultant in the first place is because when I look at a business, I'm looking at ways to increase revenue while decreasing expenses, or decreasing expenses without decreasing revenue. What I've been able to do is help organizations from solopreneurs all the way up to S&P 500 companies find profit in their business while [00:03:00] harnessing the power of education.
I've helped S&P 500 companies save millions of dollars while growing their businesses by millions of dollars per year, and I've even helped small business owners save $100,000 in a week. And that's why when I look at an organization's tech stack, I've uncovered with my clients that there's really three main reasons why your tech stack may be costing you profit.
And the first one is very simple, and it comes back to the definition of technology as a whole: to simplify what's already working. Well, what I find is some organizations, maybe this sounds like you, invest in technology too soon. When we're looking at the whole purpose of technology in the first place, and when we're looking at investing in anything in the first place, what our goal is is to invest in something that drives a return.
When I think about this, I think of the profit equation. Profit equals revenue minus expenses. [00:04:00] Well, I like to change this equation a little bit. While profit equals revenue minus expenses, what I like to do is turn this minus sign from expenses into an arrow pointing at revenue because what we're really looking at when we're looking at expenses is things that we spend money on in our business that drive revenue, that drive a return.
So when we flip this minus sign in- into an arrow, what we're really also doing is changing expenses into investments. And when we change expenses into investments, we're also actually can really change revenue into return. And then we drop this arrow down, and what we're looking at is the return that we get.
Is caused by the investment, which means that profit is really just ROI, the return on our investment. So when we're investing in technology, we're investing in it to get a return. But when we invest in technology too [00:05:00] soon, which I see organizations do, and the hard thing about it too is when we're investing in technology, I find that some organizations are over-investing by 5 to 200x in one software.
And why this occurs is because what we're taught is that we need to spend money on things to get a return. We are taught to expend, which is what expenses expend money, when what we really need to do is come up with a strategy first, get the right pieces in place, start executing the strategy before we invest in something.
We can also harness the power of free trials and trying technology for free for a short amount of time, and investing in programs and people that can help us get the most value out of the thing, out of the technology before we even spend a dime. This is what I do with my clients is if you were to work with me, we would first look at your [00:06:00] business, define the ROI that you're looking at getting, look at the ROI of your customers and what they're looking at getting, align these two ROI circles, which is part of a bigger concept I teach called ROI Pie in my Plug the Profit Leak, which is my live multi-day group coaching experience, and I invite you to grab your ticket for in the show notes or in the description below if you're watching this on YouTube.
This is your ROI This is your ideal client's ROI, your ideal customer's ROI. Where it overlaps is what you need to focus on. Where it overlaps is where we need to look at a strategy and then the right tools to drive ROI. So once you and I are working together and we define ROI for your company, then we're gonna look at how do we get the ROI?
And then we're gonna assess if investing in specific technologies is going to get us there. Is it gonna get us a return? [00:07:00] And if it does, then we'll invest in it. If you're finding that your tech stack is costing you profit, it might be because you invested in technology too early. Number two, you may not know how to maximize the value of your technology, of your tech stack.
This is also why when I pair anyone with the right technology, the right education technology for their business, I don't just give the recommendation. I make sure that you get a free trial of the recommendation, and I also give you one of my programs that is literally built to help you maximize the value of the technology.
So if you are looking, if you are at the right time and it's not too early to invest in technology, and you want to find out what the right technology is for your business and your goals related to leveraging education as your competitive advantage, I recommend that you check out my e-learning platform finder.
It is linked in the show notes and in the [00:08:00] description below on YouTube. Or you can go to www.elearningpartners.com/epf, and in a matter of seconds, I'm going to pair you with the right technology, the best fit technology that is going to save your business 5 to 200X what the alternatives of these technologies are.
In addition, you are going to get a free trial and a program to help you maximize the value for you and your business. This is extremely important. When you are investing in technology, when you are evaluating technology to invest in, you need to have a plan on how to maximize The value. So what I do whenever I'm looking at a new technology to invest in, which I am investing in a new technology right now, a technology to help me be on more podcasts.
Well, I've put a lot of thought into the technology before even getting it going. I've also already put a strategy in place of how I'm gonna use the technology, and I'm getting my team trained on the [00:09:00] technology. I'm actually working with the technology company, doing multiple onboarding sessions and really having them help me get the most value out of the technology.
It is in their best interest for me to get value out of the technology so that I can keep paying for it, so they can retain me as a client. This is very interesting for you and your business. When you're looking at serving your clients, your customers, you need to make sure that they can get the most value out of what you're serving them, what you're selling them, what you're sharing with them.
And one of the ways to do this is through education, through leveraging education as your competitive advantage. So the lesson here is twofold. When you're integrating technology into your business or anything, any new expense into your business, any new investment into your business, you need to make sure that you can maximize its value.
And when you're serving your customers, you need to make sure that they know how to maximize the value you are giving them. And number three [00:10:00] Investing in the wrong technology. This stinks when this occurs, and this occurs frequently. And you know why it occurs frequently? Because what I find is that when you and I get really excited about solving a problem that we have, we have pain, and we see the solution.
And a lot of times we see the solution in technology without a strategy in place, and a lot of times we see the solution in technology without ROI, a return on investment, defined for ourselves. The great thing is that you can stop investing in the wrong technology. You can just turn this off. If you find in your business that you have the wrong technology to solve your problems, or that you have invested in technology too soon, just stop paying for the technology.
Rewind the clock and do what I'm gonna share with you next. But investing in the wrong technology, it's okay to do this. What happens when we [00:11:00] do this, though, is that in order for you and I to show that we didn't invest in the wrong technology, what do we do? We keep paying for it. And this goes beyond technology.
This could be any expense that you're investing in in your business. You may keep paying for the thing so that you don't have to admit that it's the wrong thing. Well, back in business school, we learned about something called sunk costs. Well, sunk costs are costs that we cannot recoup, and no matter how much we spend on the wrong technology, we're never gonna get this back.
So what the whole concept here is is to let go of the sunk costs, because by investing in the wrong technology, you're actually creating another cost, something called opportunity costs. Because you're spending money on something that isn't helping you instead of [00:12:00] spending money on things that are helping you.
Opportunity costs are what you let go of because your energy, your time, and your money is being spent on something else. These are the opportunities you are missing out on. So I invite you right now that if you know in your heart that you are spending money on the wrong technology or the wrong expenses in general in your business, cut your losses so you can open yourself up to new opportunities.
Now, I've already touched on this a little bit, but now that you know why your LMS education platform or technology stack in general may be costing you profit, I wanna share with you how to fix it, and really, it comes down to three things. Number one, I invite you to define ROI for you. And your business.
What are you looking to get out of any investment that you're making? Why are you investing in technology in the first place? Are you [00:13:00] investing in education technology to increase adoption or customer acquisition? This is what one of my clients been working with for four or five years now. It's an S&P 500 company.
They invest in e-learning education technology because they're looking to drive adoption and customer acquisition of their core products that they sell, the software that they sell, and they have had these results, so the investment makes sense. In addition, you might be looking at investing in e-learning technology or any technology to increase retention.
The same S&P 500 company that I work with has invested in technology, invested in e-learning in general to specifically increase customer retention. But you could also invest in it to increase employee retention. What are you looking to get out of the technology? That is the first thing you need to define.
The [00:14:00] second thing you need to define is what does ROI look like for your customers and employees? You may not need to define both of these things, but it's really based on what you're trying to get out of it, and what you're trying to get out of it is going to dictate... So your ROI is going to dictate the ROI that you need to define for either your customers or employees, or really the stakeholders that you are going to be impacting with the investment in technology that you're looking at making.
When we define the ROI for all parties involved in this purchase decision that is impacting these different parties, we are able to align the different ROI circles. In my Plug the Profit Leak challenge, I teach how to use the power of what I call ROI Pie to plug the profit leaks in your business, and it starts with you and your customers and [00:15:00] even your employees.
What ROI are you all looking for? We align that, and then we just make better purchase decisions, and that really brings us to the last piece here. Number three: once you know the ROI you're looking at getting from the technology you're investing in and you define the ROI that, that your other stakeholders are getting, what we need to do- Is create and start executing our strategy without technology.
This is so powerful because remember at the beginning, we defined that the purpose of technology is to simplify. You can execute your strategy without technology, and it's safer from a monetary investment perspective. You can save a lot of money by making sure the strategy works before you invest in the technology.
This is what I have done with this new strategy I'm about to harness the power of technology to execute. I've actually executed it without technology to start, and it's been [00:16:00] successful. So now I am harnessing the power of technology to take it to the next level, to exponentially grow it, and you can do the same thing.
Now, if you're ready to take plugging the profit leaks in your business to the next level so that you can increase your profits by $100,000 or more per year by uncovering the profit leaks in your business, I invite you to grab a ticket to my next Plug the Profit Leak Challenge, a multi-day live group consulting experience where I've had business owners on the challenge find $100,000-plus in profit in just a couple of days.
So join me for my next live group consulting experience by grabbing your ticket in the show notes or in the description below on YouTube, or go to plugtheprofitleak.com to grab your ticket today. I'll see you in the next episode.
Thanks for tuning in to Learning Transformed. Now, if you're designing a transformational learning experience and wanna skip [00:17:00] the overwhelm of trial and error, check out our e-learning platform finder. Just answer a few simple questions and we'll match you with the right platform, plus an extended free trial.
And as a bonus, you'll get free access to a course that walks you through building your learning experience on your matched platform. Click on the link in the show notes or go to www.e-learningpartners.com/e-learning-platform-finder.
I'd also love to hear from you. Leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or drop a comment on our YouTube channel. Thanks for listening, and I'll catch you in the next episode
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