Transcript:

00:00:00 Casey: In this episode, I’m going to count you down into Q4, which is the most important time  of the whole year to really go hard as a fractional CMO.  And I’m going to share with you the four different types of fractional CMOs so you can kind of identify which type you are  and what you need to do to get to the next level. Let’s go.

00:00:18 Casey: Marketers of the world, why do we work hard to solve small problems?  Why do we reinvent ourselves and our clients over and over and why are we giving away marketing strategy for free?  With advancements in AI, we’re all seeing the marketing department shrink from the bottom up.  And companies need you to serve them as their fractional chief marketing officer.  It’s time to solve bigger problems and bring home a bigger paycheck.  It’s time to create the lifestyle we deserve and to make a greater impact.  This is the Fractional CMO Show, and I’m Casey Stanton. Join me as we explore this growing industry and learn to solve bigger problems as marketing leaders.  The Fractional CMO Show is sponsored by CMOx,  the number one company to teach you how to attract,  convert, and serve high paying fractional CMO clients  on your terms. 

00:01:15 Casey: Hey, it’s Casey. Welcome back.  Let’s dive right into it. So I’m just landing home after being on the road here for, ooh, about  four weeks I’ve been traveling. As you might have heard in a previous episode, my father  was sick,  so I flew out to  be with him in the hospital. He passed away. And then I flew home,  I grabbed my wife and kids, and we drove up to Michigan for the funeral and then spent time with the family. And then we trekked back and we just enjoyed a  couple of days with the kids, making great memories in the Poconos. And I’ve got this great photo I’m really happy with… My kids in a jacuzzi in you know, the primary bathroom of this cabin that we rented  with  so much bubbles like bubbles 

00:02:01 Casey: My son has them on top of his head. It’s probably a foot of bubbles on top of his head and they’re just so happy  so we made some good memories on the way back  and I’m happy with how the funeral went. It was very well attended by the whole town.  It was packed upstairs in the church. Packed downstairs standing room only they pulled in 25 chairs from the neighboring church and people were turned away and they got to watch my dad’s from their car, live streaming it. So that was  great. Yeah,  it was touching to be home.

00:02:32 Casey: But I’m back  and I’m ready for Q4. Like I’m ready for Q4. So let me tell you why, why Q4? I mean, you get it, right? Like inherently you understand Q4 is the time to be a fractional CMO. It’s like, this is when businesses are saying, we had a good year. We need to really focus and finish the year strong and have a great 2026 or they’re saying we had a bad year and we need someone to come in who’s a killer when it comes to marketing and They need to build the marketing strategy and lead the team and we have to have a really great 2026 like they need this stuff to happen That’s you. That’s the opportunity in front of you. 

That’s you.

00:03:09 Casey: But here’s the problem, there’s four types of fractional CMOs and I want to tell you what they are so you can self-identify and see where you are and see how to get to the next level. So the first one, simple, it’s dreamers.  Dreamers. Just dreamers. Are you a dreamer? Are you just like playing along? Are you just like pretending that this podcast is Netflix and you’re consuming this information and you’re feeling like you’re getting smarter, but you’re taking no action to actually get you measurably closer to having high paying clients on your terms so that you can deliver great value to them and have a lot of fun and make a lot of money along the way.

00:03:44 Casey: Like if you’re just dreaming about this and saying, maybe someday, what if you’re a dreamer? And that’s okay. Like dreaming is a stage, to manifest things, we need to dream about them first. And I like this idea of like  the notion of Western magic, kind of like this  ability to create something in our mind and then go after it and get it. So like, yes, dreaming is a component of getting what you want, but it is just the first component. There are things that are required,  namely commitment. That’s it, commitment. Dreamers are not committed to the thing.  Oh, maybe someday I will, they say.

00:04:23 Casey: But then they don’t take action today. They don’t figure it out. They don’t like go and talk to strangers today  or  ask a buddy like, hey, do you know anyone who’s doing X, Y… they don’t try. They’re not trying anything. They’re just like putting together all these things in their head.  And this is kind of a weird tangent, but dreaming is tough because you dream about this thing  and then  when the reality comes, it’s just different, right? When you dream about that margarita, what it tastes like, it probably tastes a little different. 

00:04:57 Casey: From this hometown that I’m from, Northern Michigan, Sutton’s Bay,  we have this great pizza restaurant called Roman Wheel Pizza, classic. I’ve been going to Roman every time I’ve been home forever, like all throughout middle school, high school, know, back from college. Now when I go back with my family, we get a Roman Wheel. But it’s changed. I used to die on the hill that Roman Wheel was the best pizza in the whole country. And it was. They changed something. It’s just different. So I dream about it, but the reality is different. Okay? 

00:05:26 Casey: So the thing with dreamers is that they dream about this outcome, but they don’t really know the reality of it. And the reality is different. Dreamers lack commitment. So if that’s you right now and you’re saying, yeah, I’m a bit of a dreamer, I’m really not moving forward. I’m doing a little bit here and there. I’m listening to the podcast. Maybe I read your book, Casey. You know, I’ve been working on a website for the last three years. Like whatever. If you’re not actually like taking action and like going to win a client, you’re kind of dreaming, right? And again, it’s okay. But the way that you go from there to where you want to be is a commitment. And what is a commitment?

00:06:02 Casey: It’s a declaration of independence. I received today on my drive home from the Poconos, a message from someone who listens to my podcast. I should pull up her name just to call her out. It was just like such a sweet message to get. know, where we stayed,  the only place to get food around was Wawa. So this morning I went to Wawa to get some coffee and some breakfast for the family.  And I got this message from a woman named Alicia. And Alicia wrote to me and said, just that she’s loving the podcast. And then goes on to say that I’m just starting out. I’m full-time employed and working through it  with my boss because my employment contract says I can’t have outside business activity, but I plan to amp that up in the next 30 days and leave my position if I need to, because I know this is where I want to go. 

00:06:52 Casey: She’s dreaming, but she’s putting, she’s getting things in motion so that she can win. And that’s awesome. So first it’s the dream. First it’s the clarity. Is being a fractional CMO the thing for you? And if the answer is yes, then action is required. And imperfect action is good. There are folks that come into the accelerator that have sold their first client and that’s kind of how they’re able to afford the accelerator. They’re like, I know Casey, you can accelerate me, but I want to go win a client first.  And they’ll win a client, but they’ll win the client with poor boundaries. They’re going to like over-deliver for the client, be underpaid, be super stressed about it. Be in this tactical role. It’s kind of tough for them.

00:07:34 Casey: And that’s okay. At least they’re taking action. It’s imperfect, but at least they’re taking action. Oftentimes just a few minutes of just like me chatting one-on-one with someone can help align them so they win the client in a way that really works for them long-term.  But any action towards the goal typically is good action. So commitment is what’s needed. I think of the Declaration of Independence. I live in Philadelphia, right? I’m back here in the cradle of democracy downtown off Market Street, like it’s Market in whatever, six, I kind of always get confused. It’s right around there, Market in six.  And it’s the house that Thomas Jefferson had where he wrote the Declaration of Independence. And it’s like a meaningful place.

00:08:19 Casey: And it’s the kind of place that you go by and you kind of like, it just feels different, right? Across the street is the fashion district. But then there’s Thomas Jefferson’s house.  And you’re like, oh, that’s where it all happened. Like, where we declared our independence from  tyranny, right? From the crown, like we were like, we’re going to a new country. That’s cool. I think it’s powerful. And a declaration is it. It just starts with the utterance of, I’m gonna be a fractional CMO. I’m gonna do what it takes. I’m gonna show up, I’m gonna work hard. I’m going to be a fractional CMO that wins high paying clients that I get to serve, deliver great value on my terms. You have to declare it first. It’s like, it’s as simple as a declaration out loud. You know, when I got married, I spoke my vows.

00:09:01 Casey: My vows are my word binding me to my wife, right? Your vows are your  word binding you to another person if you’ve ever spoke them before. I take that stuff very seriously. Like your word means everything. It’s the only thing that you really have in this world. It’s like your word, your commitment. So if you declare, I’m not just dreaming, I’m actually gonna do this thing. That’s awesome. That’s powerful. Years ago,  when was it? I can give you a date.

00:09:32 Casey: 2005, I went to the Landmark Forum in the Detroit area. I kind of don’t remember where in Detroit it was. It might’ve been in like Lavonia or something, but I was a student at Michigan State and I went to the Landmark Forum and what a powerful event. One of the big things I took away from that, this was like a seminar, it’s like a self-development seminar. One of the big things I took away from it is like, is this idea that you can have anything you want in life as long as you are willing to enroll others in your possibility.

00:10:05 Casey: So if I wanna be a Fractional CMO, I just start sharing that idea with people around me. Hey, I wanna be a Fractional CMO. Like I’m doing these things to be a Fractional CMO. I’m not asking for help. I’m just telling you, I’m enrolling you in what I’m doing. It’s very, very powerful. And then the world kind of comes to your help to support you. Like the universe is there, like, hey, this person just showed up and they’re like, oh, well, I know someone, you should talk to them. And that person introduces you to someone else. Boom, boom, boom… you know, sometime thereafter, maybe when your first client. It’s about enrolling other people actively in what you’re doing.

00:10:39 Casey: That level of commitment that is so powerful. It’s so important. Anything that you want, just declare it and then just be unwilling to give up. And if I had one secret in business, it’s just never close your doors. You know, if you have a good strategy to go after a market, you want to go help these types of companies as a fractional CMO and like that’s where you’re committed and you know you’re right. Like you just know it because you’re you’ve been experiencing the space, you know,  AI is not going to cop, uh clobber it. uh You just, you just know, like you’ve looked at the data. You’re like, Hey, this is the best guess I have. This is the right thing to do. It’s just about staying in the game and having more reps than everybody else. And luck might come your way and it may not.

00:11:24 Casey: And it doesn’t matter because you’ll do enough reps to get what you’re owed. It’s just like the law, right? The law of like, I work enough  and then a thing happens, right? I do this enough in the gym and the muscle grows. I talk to enough strangers and like trial and test the way that I’m saying what I’m saying. I’m going to win clients. So enrolling other people, having a declaration for yourself is critically important. That’s one. And then two is enrolling other people.

00:11:53 Casey: When you do that, you leave the dreamer stage. So if you’re in the dreamer stage, awesome. When are you going to make a commitment and who are you going to enroll? And the people that you choose to enroll be incredibly, like picky and choosy. Don’t tell everybody this stuff. Don’t tell your parents. Don’t tell your friends who might hold you back. Don’t tell your employers. Certainly don’t tell your employer. Right? Like go build all this stuff up.

00:12:21 Casey: And then maybe one day you kind of surprise them and say, hey, I’m gonna go do this thing. Are you with me or not? Can I drop my engagement down to a fractional CMO thing or no, or, you do that later, but you never start cooking with them  kind of in your presence. You kind of deliver the baked good and say, hey, I did it. Here’s what I’ve got. Here’s what I’m gonna do. You’re on board or not. And they’re gonna be like, oh, whoa, this person has momentum, right? They’re gonna be attracted to that momentum.

00:12:48 Casey: Don’t tell people what you’re going to do.  Show people what you’ve done. Like that’s kind of a tough one here, right? How can you hold that and like have a declaration at the same time? How can I not tell people what I’m going to do, but also declare it, right? So  it’s kind of touchy. ah It’s nuanced. I’m declaring to myself that I’m gonna be a fractional CMO. And I’m gonna share with other people that, hey, yeah, I’m doing this fractional CMO thing. But I’m not going to go around flaunting they’re like, yeah, I’m a business owner. Ooh, I just started up an LLC. Ooh, I’m a real deal. I got a business card or a website or something dumb like that.  Like that doesn’t matter.

00:13:25 Casey: What matters is that you go talk to check writers. So don’t get caught up in the trappings of business. Don’t get caught up. would even say in like  business, like your kind of can get everything set up for you in like one day you can go on legal zoom and do stuff. You can ask ChatGPT and get probably the right answer though. I’m not a lawyer or an accountant. So you know, do what you want to do. But don’t get caught in that. Get caught up in talking to strangers and finding opportunities. I talk to strangers all the time. I don’t turn away stranger conversations. Like if someone introduces me, boom, we’re going to get on a call by and large. And I don’t even know what I want out of the call. I just am curious.

00:14:04 Casey: So I’m just talking to people and seeing what opportunities come up and maybe I have to create a new business. I remember I was in a program around acquiring businesses. And they talked about having a special purpose vehicle and SPV. So this is a  company that you would like  create in advance so that you’d go and talk to someone and be able to acquire a company inside of the SPV. And it just felt like activity and it didn’t feel like results. Results is talking to check writers, talking to people who have problems and not playing the game of like, Oh, I have my SPV. Oh, I have a cool name for it. Oh, I have all of my like,  it’s a Wyoming company. It’s a Delaware company. It’s like, who cares?

00:14:43 Casey: Who Go talk to check writers. And then when a check writer’s like, yeah, I will hire you and pay you this amount of money, then say, oh sh*t, I’m gonna pay the expedited fee to whoever the accountant is that you wanna go with to go get everything set up. Do it that way, all right? Quit getting lost in the game of being a business owner, all right?  Because you’re not a business owner. You’re just a dreamer. All right, who are the second group of people? So the first ones are dreamers. Second ones, those are dabblers. Dabblers, they’re just dabbling. Dabblers are dangerous. 

00:15:17 Casey: I remember when I was a dabbler, my God,  I’ll tell you about it. So this must have been 2010 maybe, 2011. I went to my wife’s kind of family friend’s house and this guy had just sold his company. He had a successful SaaS company and just exited it for some good money. And I looked up to him a bit and we were just like having dinner. We’re just hanging out at their house. He’s like, what are you doing? It’s like, I’m doing this fractional CMO thing. I was like, and I got a client and it’s awesome. He’s like, cool, what are you doing? Like, how are you scaling? Are you going to build it? Are you going to sell it? What are you going to do? I was like, yeah, here’s my plan, dude.

00:15:53 Casey: So I’m just gonna like get another client and then pass it to another CMO and then just start stacking that up. It’s gonna be awesome. I’m gonna make like millions of dollars overnight. He’s like, I don’t think it’s gonna be that easy. I was like, what do you know? Turns out it wasn’t that easy. The problem is that I was just like, I didn’t understand how the world worked. I was dabbling and thought that my limited experience was enough to propel me to be able to solve all these big problems and win all this business and hire all these CMOs and do all this sorts of stuff. I was wrong. I was a dabbler. I hardly had any kind of proof that what I was talking about would work. 

00:16:33 Casey: Dabblers are people who are agency owners, but kind of do a little bit of the work themselves, but then also do some fractional CMO stuff, and then also have another company where they make hot sauce. Right? Those are dabblers. Dabblers are doing a little bit of everything. Probably for like their dopamine.  Super fun.

00:16:52 Casey: It’s like super high dopamine, very  intellectually stimulating. Everything’s different. Ooh, I can like do this whole new thing. I can apply it to this idea. They enjoy that stuff. I like that. Like I get that,  but that’s not how you make wealth. That’s not how you actually get great at what you’re doing. Think of like any sports person. I don’t follow sports, but they’re known for one sport, right? They’re not known for being the best at every single sport.

00:17:20 Casey: They’re only focusing on the one thing. Now Michael Phelps thing is like, just be the swimmer. The Tiger Woods thing is like, just be the golfer. Like they’re not trying to be compete in different arenas, even if they’re kind of even similar. And before you say Michael Jordan, I’m pretty sure that was a gambling thing, right? All right, so  I think that  dabbling  makes sense  and it is absolutely a  ceiling  on your ability to earn money. Hands down, to enjoy life, hands down.

00:17:50 Casey: Especially if you’re more of a traditionalist like me, which is like, want to get married, want to have kids, want to own a house, want to travel, want to go on vacation, want to live that life.  If you’re the kind of person who’s like, you know what? I don’t want that stuff. I just want to grind and work. Work is my passion. I love that for you.  Awesome. Then dabbling, maybe because you have more capacity. I have limited capacity.  How many days did I work in the last month? Like in the last four weeks?

00:18:18 Casey: I worked two Mondays, maybe three Mondays, and then some Slack, maybe like 30 minutes of Slack a day. That was it. And then yesterday I  did maybe an hour of calls and that’s it. Yeah. I mean, very limited work that I did. It’s because I’m focused on so few,  but so  big of problems.  I don’t have to focus on a lot of different things like, my Shopify site, oh, my SSL, oh, my purchasing partner, my vendor, my 3PL, I don’t have to deal with all that stuff because I just simplified my life to only do the fractional CMO stuff.  And that’s what you can do. You can take all of that ceiling of complexity, all that fun stuff. You’re like, oh, ChatGPT, I can get an agent to do this. I can hire someone off Upwork to do this.

00:19:05 Casey: You can,  but I think you should simplify. Just simplify it down. And maybe this is coming off the heels of me listening to Benjamin Hardy’s new book, The Science of Scaling. Great book. I always tell you, here’s like one of his things is like, just focus on doing less  to the more affluent folks. Like it’s so simple,  just do less difference, like different things, and just do it just for the affluent folks. And like that’s really going to propel you, you know, stop working with the people that are annoying, low paying, etc.  He talks about raising your floor. 

00:19:40 Casey: Dabblers do everything because they can’t lose that $500 a month newsletter that they have or the $2,000 a month client that takes 20 hours of their work a week, you know, because like those things are paying the mortgage. It’s like those people are struggling because they never have the spaciousness to relax and kind of see things. Dabblers are dangerous. If you’re dabbling, you have to commit to yourself that you’re going to do something for a while. And then you have to put guardrails in your life to allow you to do that.

00:20:14 Casey: Now listen, I’m a dabbler  by nature. How many toys do I have in front of me as I record this? I have a new radio coming, a new ham radio. If you’re a ham radio person, it’s a Flex 8600M, super excited. I just got this in the mail, just as I got home. It’s a Morse code key that fits into my phone. I’m so excited to be able to do Morse code contacts remote from my phone on my radio talking over.

00:20:42 Casey: High frequency, you know, bouncing off the ionosphere. Sounds really cool, right? And I have to limit when I do that stuff. I have to just package that up and limit the time that I do it, like literally schedule it. Because if I let myself, I would just play all the damn time. I’d play with so many things. I’m currently working on a purchase order with a company in China to purchase a part because I have an idea I wanna make something, right? I have all of these ideas, all these things I wanna do, all these projects, yet I just have to just… limit the time that I could spend on those. And I have to spend the majority of my time solving the biggest problems that make the biggest difference to businesses that bring me in the most money. So dabblers have to have that commitment. I’m not saying you have to change fundamentally who you are, but I am saying, I guess for lack of a better word, like you got to grow up. You got to say, hey, I got to cut all this stuff that’s not going to be the thing, and I got to do the thing. And I got to spend most of my time doing the thing.

00:21:39 Casey: And I don’t mean you have to do the thing like 80 hours a week, right? Like you can’t watch TV at night. Like you can do whatever you want. But I think when you’re working, your brain needs to be focused really just on the same set of problems, just making the outcomes bigger and bigger and bigger. That’s how you’re going to scale your income, uh scale your prestige, your power, your ability to make impact. It’s way better. All right, so those are dabblers. If you’re a dabbler, cool, I get it, me too. But you got to create limits in your life so that you can stop dabbling and go hard. 

00:22:13 Casey: What’s the third level? So again dreamers dabblers and now builders who’s a builder? Builders are awesome builders come into the accelerator and they’re doing 10 grand a month 20 grand a month 30 grand a month Oftentimes they can’t get to 30. That’s like a limit for them because they’re building just what I would say would be like they’re building against what’s best for them and their clients. And they think what they’re doing is best for them and their clients. I’ll give you an example. Builders will come in and they’ll be strapped with project managers. They’ll come with a project manager attached to them. And they’ll say like, yeah, when I go work with clients, like I bill a certain rate and then I pay my PM out to do the project management. And that sounds supportive to the client. 

00:23:02 Casey: And certainly it’s easier on the start because you don’t have to like find project management capacity for the client. But the downside is, that  now you have like this big wait where you have to go and hire these people for you and pay them and time off and maternity leave and paternity leave and everyone just generally wanting more money all the time. I mean, that’s a natural thing that people want.  And you have to deal with that yourself. It’s way different if you deal with that with  a client’s budget. I’ll share an example. We’ve got this CMO in the accelerator. He’s in boardroom. Love the guy. Super smart. Just a really, just a smart, sweet guy. Great in his industry. And he has a PM  thinking about him specifically. And he shared recently on a call, he’s got two PMs and they’re both working something like 10 hours a week each or 20 hours a week each or something like that.  

00:23:55 Casey: And one wants more money. And every decision he’s made up to that point has absolutely made sense. Like you could look at it be like, oh, if I bring in this PM, then I can do this work for this client. And it makes sense. You’re like, yes, that’s a good decision. In the moment, every decision he made was a good decision, like a chain of good decisions. Yet he found himself in a bad position where now his PMs are effectively asking him for an annualized salary of a quarter million dollars. It’s crazy. Yet I’m saying that everything he did was logical and it was.

00:24:33 Casey: When things are logical, you would assume they would take you to a positive logical  outcome. But in his situation, it took him farther away than where he wanted and actually built a business where he had  significant limits on his ability to earn. And he has a lot at stake. The thing about being a fractional CMO in the method that I’m talking about here, is if you do it right, you’re doing it in such a way that you’re in complete control and 95, 97, 100% of the money that you charge to a client goes into your business, into your pocket.  

00:25:12 Casey: Maybe you have a pass through entity and you actually literally take it as a distribution. It’s not about you having PMs. So builders are great. Builders are awesome. We’re getting more builders. Like there’s more builders than ever before. These are the people at the 10, the 20, maybe the $30,000 a month level. But they have problems in the business that are limiting them on their ability to go beyond that. And I’ll tell you the difference between 30,000 a month and like 45,000. At one level, it’s like 15 grand, right? The difference between 30 grand a month or let’s just say it’s the difference between 20 grand and 40 grand a month. What’s the difference in the business that you have for that?

00:25:54 Casey: By and large, people who have $20,000 a month fractional CMO practices are working their butts off. And people who have $40,000 a month businesses, which is twice the amount of money, they’re working a lot less and they’re a lot more chilled out. And that’s because they have a different mentality. They’re drivers. They’re the people that are like building a business that makes sense  and they’re able to drive growth because they have good systems in place.

00:26:24 Casey: And I want you to know if you’re early on  in this process and you’re a dreamer,  know that there’s a wrong way to do things and most people do it wrong.  And what happens is they reach levels of complexity where they can’t get beyond it because they like locked in these clients and these clients are taking advantage of them. Although contractually the client’s just executing the contract, but the CMO is upset or whatever. These things compound and the fractional CMO finds themselves in a position to never be able to expand beyond where they’re currently at.

00:26:53 Casey: And they just have this dream. Everyone has the recurrent dream. It’s like, if I could have one more client, if I could have one more client that pays me as much as my biggest client pays me, everything would be fine. I’ve said that before. I wonder if I’m saying something that you’ve thought recently. If I had just one more of my best paying clients, everything would be fine. Listen, I don’t want things to be fine for you. I want you to have a system that works. Not so it’s fine, but so you can have  freedom. Like freedom to go kick it in the Poconos.  

00:27:25 Casey: On our drive back, we had a wild drive back. Drove from Northern Michigan.  We stayed in Port Clinton the first night and then… On our way out, we found an African Safari  in Ohio. What a trip. And just to be able to go and hang out, you know? And they’re like, do you want to feed the XYZ animals? I’m like, yep. They’re like, do you want to the price? I’m like, nope. Cause I’m not leaving this memory behind. I’m like gonna bring that one with me.  You want freedom. I God forbid a parent dies in your life or some loved one and you have to do what I just did and just kind of like be gone for a while. You want everyone in your life to be supportive of you.

00:28:02 Casey: You want to take all the space that you need and then you want to come back to work when you’re ready. And I’ll tell you, I’m excited. I’m recording this on a Friday. I’m excited to get to work on Monday.  Oh, I love a Monday. I love just rolling up and working hard. And again, I recorded this on an episode maybe came out last week, like a 10 hour day on Monday. Fine by me.  I’m going to work my butt off every Monday, but every Friday I’m to try to take it off. Right. I don’t really like working Fridays. You know, you’re saying Casey, you’re recording a podcast on Friday. Yeah, I know.

00:28:33 Casey: It’s been a wild month. So those four levels, dreamers, dabblers, builders, and drivers. Let’s talk a little bit more about the drivers. The drivers are the big ones. These are the people pushing hard. These are the people doing $800,000 a year as a fractional CMO, a million dollars a year as a fractional CMO. There’s a couple of ways to do it. One is just to charge exceedingly high rates and or have like reasonably high rates, have upside. So those are the two ways. Like one is you’re just like the most expensive person in the room, which someone has to be. So why not you?  Or you reduce your fee. You still get paid something, but then you get some upside. 

00:29:18 Casey: I just had a member just close this. She’s doing like a solid four figures a month with an enormous slice of  revenue. That comes in. That’s a killer deal. So, you know, like the monthly on it, it’s fine. I mean, it certainly pays her mortgage, her car payment, you know, it’s a good client to have for like 10 hours a week. But beyond that, the upside for her is significant. Like that could easily be a 200, $300,000 a year gig if she’s able to really actualize on it. That’s exciting. That’s what you can do to really kind of get into that driver’s seat. So drivers don’t necessarily have 10 clients. They still might have like three, four, five clients. 

00:30:05 Casey: But they’re in a position with those clients to really deliver maximum value and then get to keep a bunch of that value for themselves, like put it in their pocket, like take it to the bank, know, do what they want to do with it, buy a lake house, whatever. So drivers are the big ones. And a lot of people don’t have the commitment to be a driver. They’re going to get lost along the way. And that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong with staying in the builder stage, getting to 20, $30,000 a month. Probably stuck in the twenties. break in twenties, a different mentality, but to get into that $40,000 a month. 

00:30:46 Casey: Again, the difference between 40,000 a month and 80,000 a month. It’s finding the right clients. That’s it. The work isn’t different. It’s finding the right clients. It’s just being the kind of person that attracts these better opportunities. So that’s why in the accelerator, we help people do three things. The first one is we help them get sales ready. And that’s to go from kind of dreaming to dabbling, I guess. But really it’s just like getting that commitment and they’re sales ready. Like they know what they’re selling. They know who they’re selling to have an understanding of who they’re reaching out to. They’re starting to talk to strangers. They’re building momentum. That’s the sales ready. Some people, they take a while on that because they’re just kind of dragging their feet. They’re just not ready to commit. It’s frustrating for everybody, right? 

00:31:35 Casey: But we just had a woman, she joined last week and she messaged today in boardroom, cause she’s a driver and she says, hey, I’m sales ready, ready to rock. It’s like, hell yeah you are. Like she’s like, I’m in it, I’m going, I know what I got to  do. Do I even have to ask her how long she spent? Maybe it took her 20 hours and she squeezed it in on top of all the other stuff she’s doing. I don’t know. I don’t care. She’s the kind of person who shows up and does the work. That’s the kind of person who’s going to be successful, right? So sales ready. And the next thing is the road to 10K. 

00:32:06 Casey: The road to 10K is,  I’ll just be honest with you, it’s the hardest thing to do to get to $10,000 a month in recurring business. Yet it’s like turning 21 and buying your first legal drink. Right? It’s just like, everything’s different.  Everything is different. It reminded me, know, kind of when I got to 10K, it’s like a monumental stage of my life. It was kind of like after college, I went on a bicycle trip and my college girlfriend and I flew to Madrid and we had our bicycles and we biked to Rome  And I just remember this sense of like, I can do anything. All right. I’m like, I’m a changed man because I’m in Europe and I’m self-sustaining and capable and…

00:32:46 Casey: It’s like, that’s what happens. You had a moment in your life  when you crossed some chasm. Maybe it was graduating high school or graduating college or getting married or having a kid or like something happened, a promotion. You won a two comma club award, whatever it was, like you got to a level. You got your Eagle Scout, whatever. You got your ham radio license and made your first Morse code contact. Like there was something that happened that changed the way you see the world. Okay. That’s what happens when you get to 10K.

00:33:15 Casey: That’s it. Like that’s what happens when he gets to 10K. We’ve got a member. Oh, I adore this woman. She’s been fighting for a bit. Right? I would say unlucky. That’s what happened to her. I hate to say that. I hate to say that there’s luck that’s involved, but you know,  sometimes you talk to a bunch of people that are super qualified and they’re eager and wanting to say yes. And then last minute something happens. It’s been kind of a wild and tumultuous year when you look at what’s happening with different industries. So what’s happening with AI and then what’s happening with like Trump’s tariffs and all that kind of stuff. Like businesses are just kind of going nuts,  right? 

00:33:54 Casey: Some are up, are down, some are down for a little while, they’re up again, know. Some are on a hiring freeze, some are laying off folks, some are hiring folks. It’s just kind of crazy. So this woman has been working harder than anybody else, I would say, and just going after it. And she’s got this mentality. And it was a week ago today. So it’s the day after my dad’s funeral. We’re at this kind of outdoor kind of bar, you know the place, right? Like where every guy has a big beard, which is kind of like a craft brewer kind of place where everyone’s playing cornhole and whatever.

00:34:32 Casey: And I’m hanging out with my kids. They’re in the sandbox. We’re just chilling. And I get a message from one of our members. She hits me on WhatsApp and says, I just locked it in $10,000 a month client, six month commitment. I’m thrilled for her. I gave her a call immediately. We talked for, you know, 10 minutes or so. And I was like, who are they? Where’d they come from? How does it feel? You know, and she was like, you know, and I was going through this feeling again. This is what she said to me. I’m paraphrasing, obviously. I was just like telling my husband, just like, you know, something’s got to come soon, like this is really hard. 

00:35:05 Casey: And I think it is hard, like it makes sense that it’s hard. And she’s like, and then it happened. I was thinking like maybe I wanted to go full-time with someone or whatever, but like then it happened. I was like, yeah, tell me more. She’s like, I closed at 10 grand a month. I was like, yeah, awesome. And I said, would you ever go to a full-time gig now? She’s like, absolutely not. She needed that one. That one changed her. Like in the moment she’s forever changed. She now knows she can go get a full-time job and make $150, $180,000 a year, working 40, 50 hours a week plus travel, know, plus you got to buy all the clothes to be professional all the time. 

00:35:59 Casey: Or she could be a fractional CMO and make 120,000 in her underwear at home with her camera off. Like that’s, that’s the opportunity that’s here. And she’s going to absolutely deliver high quality to that client. That client is not overpaying her. She is incredibly valuable. I think that they’re probably underpaying her. But I have this belief that this quarter will knock on a couple more for her and she’s gonna start drowning in clients and money. And it’s all coming because it’s kind of owed to her. I would say in like the grand scheme of mathematics,  if you talk to enough strangers and if you’re direct enough and you ask enough people for the sale, you’re going to get yesses.  And that’s what she’s doing. 

00:36:21 Casey: So I love seeing those things. I love it when someone comes in and they close a deal, you know, within a week. That happens and it’s super cool. We just had a member, she just shared on the boardroom WhatsApp. She just closed the second client. I learned about this yesterday. It was actually a deal that came to CMOx and then we asked who in the group we thought would be qualified and then we pitched a couple folks and they hired her. So the deal came through us. Obviously I can’t commit to do that for everybody.

00:36:53 Casey: It really depends on your experience and the deal flow that we have, but we do do that, right? And we were able to give her a deal. And she said, when I came in, I dreamed of having one fractional CMO client. I now have two. So she’s like rolling $20,000 a month. It’s a big deal, but she’s doing it right. I think she’s going to slide right past 20, get into 30 and 40, you know, at her current process.

00:37:16 Casey: I think for her, she has a unique opportunity for upside based on her experience, potentially helping businesses run to an exit and then getting an exit multiple. So I think that’s what’s next for her. She’s like, has this huge opportunity to make a ton of money, but again, delivering a ton, a ton, a ton of value. So there’s these four stages, dreamers, dabblers, builders, and drivers. When you get past that road to 10K, you make that first $10,000 a month recurring. Then you get into boardroom.

00:37:44 Casey: That’s our special place, boardroom. That’s where these people who are like doing the work, really grinding it out, really making this stuff happen. That’s where they live, in boardroom. And that’s where we chat. We chat all the time on WhatsApp, messages back and forth. ah If you want my help, I’d love to help you. Just book in a call with my team. Just go to cmox.co slash call and book in a call. Just see if we think you have what it takes. I’ve got a great team. They’re gonna like drill you. They’re gonna ask you questions. They’re gonna make sure you qualify, that we can actually help you. That you’re not just a dreamer, but you’re someone who’s committed.

00:38:14 Casey: It’s okay if you’re early on and you don’t have any fractional CMO clients. Certainly that’s okay. It’s also great if you have a couple fractional CMO clients and you want to get to that next level. You want to be the kind of person who builds a seven figure fractional CMO practice. And when I say seven figure, I mean like you bring in most of that home and put it in your pocket, right? Like you do $80,000 a month as a fractional CMO and you know, before taxes and all that stuff, you’re probably putting 70,000, 75,000 back in your profit account, right? How you want to distribute that, that’s your own business. 

00:38:49 Casey: But like we’re talking  very high  revenue opportunity, income opportunity that I think is  still just the best thing out there right now  if you’re a marketer. So  if you’d listen this far, I’d love for you to just book a call in and see. uh This is the time to do it. This is when companies are coming out of kind of the woodwork saying like, I need a fractional CMO. And I’ll tell you like right now, I just recently closed a fractional CMO client and I’m working on closing another one. So I’m in it with you right now. And I’ll tell you, it is the best time to be doing it.  I’ve got the focus. I feel like I got to enjoy the summer and now I’m like leaning in hard for the fall.  

00:39:29 Casey: My son goes back to school on Monday  and we’re just going to grind this out and have a really strong fall, which is going to put  me and our CMOs in a strong position to be able to lean back a little bit during the holidays and then go hard again in  the second week of January. That’s what we’re looking for. So if you like working, if you’re that kind of person, you like to solve big problems and dig in with clients,  you can be a great fractional CMO. You got to like the work though. If you don’t like the work, go find something else.  Life’s too short,  Go find something else to do.  But if you really love this stuff, you like helping good companies, you like working with CEOs, you like being in that small group  with one of my clients, their executive team, kind of their executive leadership L10 that we did once a week. 

00:40:16 Casey: Used to have, man, how many people in it? Like seven, eight, nine.  It was huge. It’s huge. We got nothing done. And then they shrunk it. There’s four of us.  Head of Finance, Head of Ops,  CEO, me. It’s awesome. You’re like in that mighty, tight  crew that gets shit done and you’re accountable to it all. It is a lot of fun.

00:40:38 Casey: If you want to do that, you want to be a Fractional CMO, book it on call, cmox.co/call, and we’ll go from there. All right? All right, see ya. Take care. Thank you for sticking around for the full episode.  As you know, learners are earners, but you’ve got to take action on what you heard today.  For more information and show notes, visit fractionalcmoshow.com.  If you’d like me to answer your questions  on an upcoming episode,  you can share your question at fractionalcmoshow.com. And last, please hit the like and subscribe button  so that I know that this content is helpful to you.  Alright, go get em!