Behind The Scenes Of How I Run Profitable Group Programs
It’s one thing to know that a group program is your best next step to scale your business…
And it’s another to actually make it profitable and sustainable for you as the business owner.
So in today’s episode of the Feminine Fire Podcast I’m peeling back the curtain on my business model and taking you behind the scenes of my business to share how I run profitable group programs.
Because in my experience, spiritual business owners have a tendency to over deliver inside their programs and then often also under price, which is not a great combo when it comes to being in a reciprocal energetic exchange.
You want to be in a place of balance, where the energy out is equal to the energy in, and your programs feel fulfilling rather than draining.
So in today’s episode I’m sharing how I’ve designed my group programs and set up my business – taking into account my capacity, my energy, the season of life I’m in right now and the way I like to work with clients.
I’ll walk you through the questions I ask myself and how I decide on the structure of my programs including the support that I provide clients inside, and how I make them profitable with my capacity and season of life in mind.
So whether or not you are looking at adding in your first group program to scale your business to that next level OR you’re looking at how you can tweak and change your current programs to ensure they’re profitable, this episode is for you.
So let’s dive in…
But first, some context in terms of my capacity and my season of life
I’m a mama to 2 young kiddos, Noah who is 5 and Hugo who is now 2, who go to daycare and preschool 2 days a week. I have another day a week where my parents or my in-laws look after them for most of the day, if not all day.
So I currently work around 10-15 hours per week and a lot of my business decisions are based around this capacity and the fact that my priority in this season of life is to spend more time at home with my kids.
So it’s really important to consider first and foremost your capacity right now
What season of life are you in? And how much time do you WANT to be working?
When you’re in that scaling phase and you’re looking at your business model, it’s all about working smarter not harder. You’ve got an opportunity to really craft a business model that supports you to create your own version of a freedom lifestyle.
To give you an example not from my business:
When I started working with one of my Mistressmind clients she was fully booked back to back Monday to Friday with 1:1 clients, and she rarely had a lunch break. She also didn’t have time for the creative projects she really wanted to do.
So we looked at her calendar, we blocked out a lunch break every day, and we played around a bit with when she wanted to do her creative work. Was it for a couple hours a few mornings per week or was it blocking out a full day? She ended up blocking out a full day and now she has several published oracle card decks, works a few days with 1:1 clients and also runs in person events and a few online group programs across the year.
To make this business model PROFITABLE, we also had to look at her pricing which she hadn’t put up in a long while and was well overdue. So she was able to see less clients during the week and still maintain her income and profitability, and as she’s added in group programs and her published decks she also scaled and grew her income over time.
To give you an example from my business:
I have a very simple business model with 2 group programs. I have my mastermind the Spiritual Business Mistressmind and I have my mid-ticket group program Confident Consistent Cash.
The Mistressmind is my signature program, it’s 6 months, it’s high proximity with me as the coach, clients have a lot of access to me, and it’s what brings in the bulk of my monthly recurring revenue. I run this year round.
Whereas CCC I run when I choose to, depending on my capacity and desire. And it’s worth noting that I only added this program into my offer suite mid last year when Hugo was around 9 months old because I was in a place where that made sense for me capacity wise. Between the end of my maternity leave and then, I ran the Mistressmind exclusively because that’s what I had capacity for at that time.
For me, in this moment in time, in this season of life, when I have really young kids – my capacity expands and contracts quite quickly. And my business model is designed around that and I’ve set up my programs around that. Right now I’m in a moment where Hugo is now 2 so things are a bit more spacious and I can hold space for 2 group programs at the one time.
So you can see how personalised this is, and how unique this is to me at this point in my life. It won’t always look this way and my business and offers won’t always look this way. But right now, this is what works for both me and my clients.
So capacity and how much you WANT to work is important first and foremost.
How I’ve structured my programs and what I include to ensure that they work for me, my clients AND my bottom line.
The Mistressmind includes:
1 x group coaching calls per week alternating between 2 different call times
1:1 strategy and planning calls each quarter.
1:1 voice and text note support each day
Copy review each week
The calls I need to be at my desk for but the voice and text note support and copy review I can do it from anywhere as long as I’ve got my phone and an internet connection. This works SO well for me as a mama. Thursday and Friday when I have both boys at home with me, my only priority on those days is to respond to client messages. My calendar is blocked out for anything else.
Now for some people in this season of life, they’ll choose to be less hands on with clients – so you might be thinking, wouldn’t it be easier for you if you were less 1:1 with clients?
And yes, that is something I’ve considered but I also know that I really love working in this close proximity with my clients. I like:
Having the ability to dive deep with them and get to know them and their business really well.
Creating bespoke resources and tools and continuing to build out a really robust content hub of practical resources that I can continue to point them to when they’re working on different projects and goals in their business.
Getting into the nitty gritty and nutting out a strategy knowing that it is fully personalised and tailored to them
Problem solving with them as they implement their plan
I wouldn’t be able to do that in a different type of program or offer where I was more hands off.
So this model and structure suits me and my personality and the way I like working with clients.
Now what’s important to note here is that because this is my high level, close proximity mastermind, the inclusions and the pricing reflect that.
It includes both support within the group but also 1:1 support, and it’s been designed that way because it’s my high ticket offering. I can include all of this because the price reflects the inclusions and support and access to me.
And it’s by no means an expensive mastermind. When you look at the market, there are masterminds that are a lot more expensive than the Mistressmind, particularly for the kind of support you get inside, but it still IS an investment for my clients.
And so the energetic exchange has to match that investment. It has to feel good for me, and for them. I am with them in their business Monday to Friday for 6 months, and often longer because I very gratefully have lots of clients who stay in the container with me for a long time, and so the pricing reflects that.
Pricing is such a key part of profitability.
You’ve gotta bake that profitability into your pricing. It can’t be an afterthought and it also can’t be something where you’re only making a profit WHEN you’re fully booked. Because if you’ve run your numbers and are only making a profit when you’re fully booked, then it’s not going to be sustainable. We want to bake that sustainability in by pricing your offers properly.
If we look at my CCC program as a second example of this:
It’s a mid ticket, group coaching program and when I created it the price point was super important because I knew I wanted to create something at that mid-ticket level to support all the people in my world who knew they needed support but they weren’t quite at the point of investing in a mastermind.
What they lacked was consistent cash. So I created a program very specifically around that and made sure the inclusions still allowed me to give them the support they needed BUT it also made sense for the investment.
So inside that program, there’s no private 1:1 support, it all happens inside our group calls and our group chat. They still get access to me but it’s different and not as close proximity as the Mistressmind.
And within my business model, the income from CCC stacks on top of my monthly recurring revenue that’s already coming in from the Mistressmind.
So as you can see, I’ve designed these offers very specifically around me, my capacity, who I am, how I like to work with clients and what I need at the moment from my business model. This is what works for me, so now it’s about working out what this looks like for you.
The things to consider when you’re creating profitable group programs in your business…
The first is your capacity, your season of life and how much time you WANT to be working each week…
A lot of my clients come to me when they are fully booked with 1:1 and they’ve hit an income ceiling and know it’s not sustainable any longer
Or because they’ve already got a group program but there’s some tweaks they need to make to pricing or the type of client or the inclusions
And the first thing we look at is okay, what’s your capacity right now, how much do you want to be working and when?
You want to make sure you’re structuring your offers in a way that aligns with your capacity and desired work hours.
How many client calls or sessions do you want to have each week?
What access do clients have to you outside of those sessions?
Is there anything else here that you need to take into account when it comes to your capacity?
The next is looking at HOW you like working with your clients
Do you like close proximity containers where your clients get lots of access to you and you can dive deep with them?
Do you prefer being more in the teacher role and running online course style programs with less access to you?
Is there a “done for you” element in your programs where you actually DO some of the work FOR your clients?
How do YOU like working with clients?
There is no right or wrong here but its really important to take this into consideration
Once you know this, you can then make some really key decisions around how you structure your programs and what you include:
Are there any live calls or sessions included? If so, how many?
Is there any private 1:1 access to you? What does that look like?
What resources are you including?
Is there a training component? Is it live or pre recorded?
Is it a close proximity container with lots of access to you? Or is it more hands off?
From there, you need to price with profit in mind:
Looking at the inclusions
Looking at your experience
Looking at the access to you and your time
What is the price?
And then running the numbers and making sure that you’re not only making a profit when you’re fully booked
Feel into that price point and make sure that it feels like a good energetic exchange for you
And if doesn’t, then it might be about looking at what feels out of alignment – do you need to change some of the inclusions or shift around the structure of the offer to make more sense for the price point
That’s what goes into creating and running profitable group programs. And it will be unique to you.
Join the Spiritual Business Mistressmind
This is what I support my clients to do inside the Spiritual Business Mistressmind.
Doors are now open for the next round which kicks off at the beginning of October. If you’ve found yourself nodding along to this and you’re like, YES Bec, I’d love your support to do this, to ensure that you’re creating and running group programs that not only deliver epic results for your clients BUT ALSO are sustainable and profitable for YOU. Then I’d LOVE to support you.
You can find out more here or come on over to instagram and send me a DM at @bec_cuzzillo – I’d love to have a chat with you about how we can work together to step into the next chapter of your business and scale through your group programs.
Find out more here
