What Business Are You Really In?

Most people can't answer the one question that decides whether they'll ever break out: what business are you actually in? In this video I share two conversations that changed how two CEOs saw everything they'd built.

One runs a lawn-care business doing a million a month and told me he was bored and wanted to start something new. I told him he wasn't in the lawn business, he was in the trust business, and he could double or triple revenue without a single new customer. The other is a top photographer in Atlanta who thought he was in photography. He's actually in the marketing business, sitting on a brand he could turn into something a hundred times bigger. The lesson underneath both: your product is a means to an end, not the business itself. The real money is in moving from product market fit to platform market fit, and you often get there by expanding what you already have.

⏱ TIMESTAMPS (00:00) The question: what business are you really in? (00:19) The lawn-care CEO doing $1M a month, and bored (01:11) "You're not in the lawn business. You're in the trust business." (01:49) Double your business without a single new customer (02:10) Product market fit vs platform market fit (02:33) Why private equity buys businesses like this (03:03) Passion projects don't make money. What makes money does. (03:19) The Atlanta photographer who's actually in marketing (04:50) Turning a service into a brand and a platform (05:03) Tiered partners and replicating the model city by city (05:44) Why not knowing your business keeps you stuck (06:00) What we learned at Terminus: product is a means to an end (06:27) Get from product to platform, that's where the money is

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