How to Build a Sellable Business That Doesn’t Depend on You with Jessica Marx

0:00If you've been feeling stuck in your business and wondering if you're the reason it's not growing faster, I have something for you. I'm hosting a free, no-pitch, live class called Three Money Beliefs That Made Me Millions. And I'm sharing the exact mindset shifts that helped me go from million-dollar years to million-dollar months. This isn't fluff. It is a surprising strategy that changed everything for me, and I want to share it with you. Like I said, no pitch, no fluff, just you and me talking about how we shift our beliefs around money to make you millions. Save your seat now at jasminestar.com forward slash millions.

0:32I can't wait to see you there. on august 12 2025 i dropped a podcast where i gave a particular shout out to a brilliant mind i had recorded that podcast before we actually met in person she came as a guest speaker to my mastermind and let me just tell you the women in the room had their minds blown there was a long line to talk to jessica after the event we had lunch together and everyone just surrounded her she was just like honey to bees and the beautiful thing about this whole thing was that i said i can't keep this amazing, brilliant mind, somebody who's passionate about business and passionate about helping entrepreneurs build scale and, if they would like, sell their business.

1:11I could not be more excited to introduce you and have on my show for the first time and hopefully the first and not last, Jessica Marks. Thank you for being on my show. Thank you for having me. It's an honor. I'm happy you're here. I'm happy you're here. And you are a podcast host for Millions Were Made. And so from one podcast host to another, we're going to have a lot of fun today. Yes. Okay. I think we can both talk it up. I know because we both love what business does. We love how business empowers us and we love the freedom that it provides and we get to build our lives according and around it.

1:40But before we get there, and I don't ever really start the podcast right here. I always go to, what is somebody immediately going to learn? I want to give value. But I think that part of the value that you instill is actually sharing your story and adding context. So I'm going to go against my podcasting norm and say, how did you get here? And what has made you so passionate about making sure that businesses are not owner dependent and building a business for freedom. Yes. And I will give the Cliff Notes version because obviously it is lengthy from 2006 to now. But in 2009, I made the leap from commercial real estate, working for the Irvine company, into a brand new company in the biohealth space, which was a pharmacogenetics company.

2:24And at the time, genealogy was on the horizon. It was still something that physicians weren't that well trained in and more importantly, insurance companies weren't a huge fan of. So as you can imagine, we had an uphill battle because what a PGT test does is it helps physicians prescribe the right medication and the right amount based off of your genotype. So that gives a lot of context in that I was in a startup environment selling something that truly was first to market and also something that a lot of physicians, a lot of insurance agencies, a lot of healthcare providers didn't want that information.

3:05It was untraditional. So flash forward to 2015, I was the only female executive on the team. I was overseeing our entire national sales division of over 500 sales reps, as well as our commercial operations in our corporate office, which is a really unique role because to anybody that has corporate experience, sales is normally segmented completely out. And the way that the infrastructure of this company was built, because I was involved early on, I ended up reporting directly to the CEO and board of directors. And I oversaw not just our sales division, but the entire commercial operations team at our corporate headquarters.

3:47Okay, but we should pause here because when we were talking, now I'm going to get ahead of this. Jessica, I had mentioned Jessica on my podcast on August 12th. So check out that episode. I talked about how we met and what our connection point was. And we met over lunch. And one of the things that you had said that I just have never forgotten is you had this amazing job with Irvine Company. You had risen through the ranks and then you were pitched this startup position and your first day you were at a foldout table. Yes. I mean, and at the time, that's what a lot of startups looked like. Of course.

4:20Right. now in 2025, branding is so important and image is so important. And a lot of newer companies that are getting investors are putting those funds into these lavish offices and these experiences. And Google was really the first one to start that. But we were kind of ahead of that. So we didn't really care what any of this looked like. And it was all hands on deck. And so I had a very unique opportunity. And at the time, I didn't understand fully how strategically I thought and how different that was. And I know that there are a lot of women that say they had really bad experiences or they never felt like their opinions or their thoughts were validated in their roles.

5:10I had the complete opposite experience. I had a wonderful experience. I had a seat at the table. I was very well respected. The ideas that I would come up with and the strategy that I could layer in and the freedom that I had and the budgets that I was allocated to be able to do what I was able to do at that company were because not just the way that I thought and not just the strategy I had, but the way that I was able to communicate that and with the confidence I had in the outcome and always correlating every strategic plan to the growth of the business for it to be scalable and for it to ultimately have an exit.

5:54And so one of - Let's talk about the exit. That was beautiful and amazing and really impressive. Yes. So the company ended up going to acquisition for a multi-billion dollar deal. And I ended up having to stay on for another two years. Obviously, buyers don't want a mass exodus from a sales force and a sales force that had a really phenomenal culture. We had, which I think is important for small business owners to understand, we had uncapped commissions. So we had sales reps making well into the multi-million dollars annually in their commission plan. And that's part of the reason why we had the growth that we had.

6:35But obviously, when new leadership comes in, new boards through that next two years, I had the experience of reporting to some of the top CEOs, the former CEO of Tenant, PepsiCo, AES, and different boards. And it was phenomenal. But what I started to see was, one, I had worked 100 hours a week for the last seven or eight years, and I was exhausted. But I also started to look around in my personal life and see that I didn't know anybody building a company of this size, but I knew a lot of small business owners. And the way that they had set up their companies, the infrastructure they had, it's almost like this billion-dollar industry of this small group of founders knows something that small business owners don't know.

7:29And I obviously had a front row seat to all of that and how we built it and how it could run without a CEO and it could run without leadership to a certain extent and being in the executive office. And so I thought, I wish more small business owners knew how to scale and scale in a way where their companies are not just liabilities, but that become true assets, not only along the way, but for them to have an exit strategy. yes and that's what brings us to today hey that passion and what you saw you had a unique purview you had a very unique experience and so you're taking this very unique experience and you're making it accessible and you've built a business one of the businesses that you run you've made it a business around taking that philosophy of saying your business is an asset you can either sell it or this could be creating revenue without you having to be in the driver's seat.

8:25So talk to us about the first beginning parts of that business. How did you get started? Who was your first client? What did you see? Because what I want to do is I want listeners and viewers to be able to see themselves in that story and then watch your iteration, but then also see how you serve these business owners. Yes, so I will say, I think I went into it very blindly, partially because of the season of life I was in. So obviously I was very fortunate. I did well financially. I did not need to go back to work. I missed a huge part of the story that I was pregnant with twins when my deal came up.

8:59And so I stayed on through kind of maternity leave and then decided, you know, there's just no way I'm going to go back with two newborns. And at that time, I knew I could get a CSO job with pretty much any startup or scale up at that point. And I could put in some pretty high demands, but I also knew I was going to be trading time for dollars. And at that point, I just didn't need it and I didn't want it. And so I did slowly start consulting and I didn't fully grasp how many issues and how many layers I was going to need to pull back in the small business sector that are no longer relevant when you're working in a nine-figure company.

9:46And so one of the things that I started to notice is that there were companies that were having fast growth. So they were getting to 2 million or 3 million within three to five years, which is incredible. But the founders were completely overwhelmed. A lot of them were just ending up shutting down the companies or self-destructing and didn't fully understand or didn't view success in a way that others were viewing it, right? So to others, that looked successful, but they didn't feel successful. And I knew looking at the companies that they were throwing all of this money into programs, into courses, into business coaches, but nobody was really coming in and fully looking at the entire business doing full due diligence to say, okay, let's stop for a second.

10:41Because even though you got to this point, this thing is duct taped together. Or you are burning yourself out. You don't have a team. You don't have leadership. You don't have something that's scalable or sellable. And a lot of times they weren't even making money themselves. Financially, they were in debt to the company or they were barely getting by. And I just... Okay, we have... Okay. So if you are feeling burnt out, if you have a business that you feel chained to, if people are looking at your business and thinking it's so impressive and on the back and you're looking and thinking this thing is put together with duct tape and bubble gum, if you're not actually getting money and putting it in your pocket at the end of every year, this episode is for you.

11:24So you are looking at the layers that you have to go through to truly understand what is causing the burnout or what is causing the lack of profitability? What do you start seeing in the beginning? Yes. So we've always been a private advisory firm. So we work one-to-one. Actually, let's pause. Yes. As a host, I know a lot of information about you. Now what we do in the story is we put in context of what you do now so that when we go back to that iteration story or that journey, people have more context of what it is you do now. Yes. So one of the companies I own and my true love and passion is Tailored Premier.

11:58We are a private boutique advisory firm. We typically work with companies generating anywhere from 2 million to 25 million that have had some pretty decent, quick growth and would like somebody to come in that is a thought leader in the space. I also have a team of phenomenal advisors that have all gone through acquisitions and run eight-figure companies themselves to come in and we have a proprietary method that we've copywritten where we go through full due diligence. Prior to me starting this firm, the only time a company went through due diligence is when they were ready to sell. And then all of the skeletons came out of the closet and either a banker or an M &A attorney or a broker was looking at them and saying, your company's not really worth what you think it is, and here is why.

12:48It's more than the P &L. It doesn't have the right systems. It doesn't have the right reoccurring revenue. It doesn't have the right margins. It doesn't have the right team. It doesn't have the right offers. Your leadership isn't qualified. I mean, there's a million reasons why a company becomes devalued through that process. We wanted to offer something to business owners who are really serious about making a ton of money along the way and at the end by giving them a, not only doing full due diligence, but saying, here's the go forward strategy. Here's where you need to focus the next two to three years.

13:28Here's all of the risk in your markets. Here's all of the opportunities you have in your company. Here's all of the areas where if I was coming in with my own dollars to buy you, I would devalue you or I would negotiate the deal because this to me is glaring. It may not feel huge to you, but to me as a buyer, I'm going to negotiate this down all day long. And so we are really the first of our kind. We audit two to three companies per month. We are referral only. We are always waitlisted. And we've built this brand off of, we want to put, and we predominantly work with women, we want to put more wealth in the hands of women and not just at the end of their journey.

14:10We want to do it along the entire way. So when you first started this and you are looking at businesses, what are like two or three of the most common struggle points for entrepreneurs? Because people are watching and you're like, okay, can she predict my future or can she say exactly where I'm at? And then how do I get out of it? Yes. Well, I will say 95 % of the clients that come to us identify a problem, right? They tell us, I have a sales problem. I have a marketing problem. It's my team. It's, you know, whatever it may be. It's my positioning. It's my branding. And when we get in there, 95 % of the time, what they've identified as the growth blocker or the thing that is causing them the most stress is actually not the core issue within the organization.

14:54So that's another problem is that they're trying to fix something that maybe should be four or five steps down the road because they have a much bigger issue that they need to fix now that they don't even understand is there. And so I will say a lot of times it comes down to, so what we say, business models for the most part are the same, right? Whether if you're a service-based business, you've got your branding, you have your positioning, you have your offers, you have your marketing, you have your sales, you have your operations, you have team, you have, all of those things are going to be the same fundamentals that create a business that's able to scale.

15:32We oftentimes find that companies are not as profitable as they should be. And so they are not able to reinvest into quality leadership or positioning and branding in the right marketing. But a lot of times they're not profitable and it all comes down to the offers. And in 100 % of the businesses we have audited, we have restructured in some capacity the offer and product suite. And I won't forget, I will never forget this question because at the mastermind, the women in my mastermind, they have different business structures. Some are service-based, some are MRR, some are courses. And a woman had raised her hand and said, well, what is a general rule of thumb for profitability?

16:16Then you had said, well, what kind of business do you have? And she was like, I have a course in membership, online education style business. And do you remember the number, the percentage that you had given her? Yes. So for something, for a true online business, healthy margins can be between 40 and 50%. We oftentimes see them higher than that. And it can be. We are so lucky that we We live in a time right now where we have automations, we have AI, we have tech stacks, we have so many things playing in our favor to make companies more profitable. Now, if you're a restaurant or you are in a different market, 40 to 50 % may be a huge stretch.

16:59But I have a rule of thumb, and I say it all the time, that if you're not at 20 % profit, why are you even running a business? Because chances are, if you look at 20 % profit on a million-dollar company, that's$200 ,000. And we know that$200 ,000 really isn't$200 ,000. And then you've built a seven-figure company, and you can't even live off of that. And so profit is the number that we find so many business owners are not focused on enough. they know it, they know the number, but they don't understand how to change or modify it to their favor and the different layers of the company that impact profitability and where to start with that.

17:47So somebody's listening and they've had their business X amount of time. What's the trajectory? Like if somebody has a digital business, how many months or years do you say aspirationally it's going to be between 40 and 50 is healthy and then versus a service-based business? Like what's the timeline that somebody should be assessing? I mean, we can shift profit pretty damn quick by making some very small shifts. Okay, so let's say somebody started a digital business two years ago. Should they be at 40 % profit? You know, it just depends. And I know it's hard and I always am. This is part of the reason why we do full due diligence.

18:21And this is why I think a lot of business advisory out there fails the client because they don't have enough information to really provide guidance. And here's what I mean by that. So could we say at two years, yes, you should absolutely be at 40%. We could. But if we're trying to get you to an exit and we're trying to take advantage of a market right now, maybe it's an AI, then we're wanting to reinvest as quickly as possible. And I'm less concerned about the profit as I am growing and scaling and getting in front of markets to be able to attract that buyer and to come in at the highest multiple.

19:05So would I take maybe on a digital company or a tech company, would I say I'm going to play the long game and know that I can wait four or five years and have a massive exit versus versus maybe a health and wellness, online health and wellness practice, where we're going to need a lot of proof of concept. We're going to need to grow and scale the business, and we can kind of pull some profits and do owner distributions and make sure that that person's taken care of so that they can really reinvest into the company their time, because that's what it's going to take for that type of business model.

19:38Yes. So it is very nuanced, and I think that's why I want your listeners to understand, and I say this frequently, advice can be good or bad depending on who's giving it and who's taking it. And so it's really important that when it comes to your business model and when you ask questions, and we had this conversation with your mastermind, you can't ask a vague question and expect to get a response that is going to have massive impact on your business. because anybody who's going to give you really great business advice is going to need to know the data. They're going to want to know the analytics, the metrics.

20:19They're going to want to know the history that plays into what got you to this moment because it could be multiple different ways that got you here. And that's going to be important from the brand story of, okay, where do we go next? I love this. Okay. So we were talking about the mastermind. We're talking about asking vague questions, we get vague answers. Now, a very specific question that a lot of the women were asking there with you in the room and then after you had left was this idea of owner dependency. Because I would say the room was about split. Now, this is a room of all seven figure founders, but the room is split between people who are like, I am still very much in the business.

20:57And one of the women that you had spoken to, I mean, she had profit margins that were close does 63%. And she's just like, is that too high? And so we have these people who are still so in the business and then we have a support structure. Can you explain owner dependency and why you are such an advocate to make sure that people are on the business and not in the business? Yes. So you as the founder have to understand what a CEO actually does. And one of the things I talked about with your mastermind group is that small businesses should run like large corporate companies. It's just a reduction in headcount and sometimes budget from a dollar perspective, but not a percentage perspective.

21:38And what we find is that, especially women, they get into business because they want to change their life in some format. For those coming out of corporate, it's that they want their time back. They don't want to have to clock in and clock out and miss their children's events. For others, it's that they want uncapped wealth. For other individuals, it's that they want to make a massive impact, whether it's in health, wealth, finances, whatever they may be. We work with a lot of private physicians. And so they want to be able to have that impact. But then they get into business and they get to seven figures and they realize, I'm not doing any of what I actually wanted to accomplish by starting this business.

22:28I'm not rich. I don't have a ton of time. My team is heavily relying on me. I'm the focal point of the company. I could probably walk away today and go get a job that's higher paying that requires less hours. And so they get to this space, but they don't know how to get out of it. And so we've become a huge proponent and I talk about it and I share it a lot. And it's the reason why I can run three companies in a CEO seat right now very effectively at about 20 hours a week is because I understand what my role is in each company as the CEO. Does it look different in every company in every season?

23:06Absolutely. But I have really strong leadership. I have an incredible number two in every single business I operate. I know what data and information I need to see on a weekly and monthly basis to understand the performance of the company without being in the day-to-day or the weeds. I can articulate very clearly what needs to happen, what the goals are, what the numbers we need to hit, the metrics, what are the KPIs that are set. I have really great incentive comp plans, which we layer into every single company we work with. So when I win, when the company wins, they're winning too. And what happens and the reason why we have so many owners that come to us and the business truly is dependent on them, which means it's never going to be able to sell or it's never going to be able to hit a peak performance state is because they don't know what they don't know.

24:03And they've never sat down to look at the company through a lens like we look at it. We're not emotionally attached to these companies. We're looking at the data. We're looking at the analytics. We're looking at markets. We're very well connected in multiple industries. So I have other thought leaders I can reach out to. I know what companies are trading at. I know what deals have been done. And I can take all of that information and I can write strategy for them to be able to go and do the same thing, whether they want to sell or not sell. It's my goal that none of our founders are working more than 20 hours a week, and they don't.

24:40We take 10 private clients a year. They've all gone through our audit process before they're welcomed into that container. I sit basically as their board of director, and I can't have 10 of those clients if they're 10 clients that are working 40 to 60 hours a week. Can you imagine the amount of pings I would be getting daily from these business owners? And so the criteria to be a private client of ours, is that you are a CEO and you're sitting in that seat and that you and I together can grow and scale this company and make you a lot of money. It pays my fees easily. The ROI is massive for them and that there is endless opportunity two years from now, five years from now, should they decide to exit.

25:26So when we talked about owner dependency, one of the things that you had said is you have a very powerful number two in each of the businesses that you run. What were you looking for in each of those number twos? And then what was the process in finding them? You have very different businesses. Yes. So it is a lengthy process. And we find that, so this is also something that we offer as a backend strategy where clients who do go through our audits, who either don't have the right number two or don't have a number two at all, they have a VA or an executive assistant that they've turned into their number two that has no skill set in growing and scaling a company.

26:04This is a service that we ultimately ended up layering in is going out and helping business owners create the infrastructure in their company to be able to hire effectively, but then to also show them through our own proprietary process how we go out and hire this talent. And it is a lengthy process. If somebody tries to say, well, I need somebody in 30 days, we're not the right firm for you because one, you're only going to capture a very small audience in two weeks to go through an interview process. Two, it's leveraging networks. It's finding the right experience of somebody who's already gone where you want to go in another business.

26:44So they've maybe worked for a larger name in your industry and now they're looking to move on. Or they have experience within a corporate marketing agency or, you know, Hawk Media or some of the media companies that you can then, that they're now looking to come in and take their expertise and help build and scale a startup. So we're looking for not just previous experience, but then we're also looking for how do they work with the founder's leadership style and how can they complement that? So my number two has a very different skill set in tailored than I have. She is very systems and operations.

27:32And I'm the opposite. I'm like, I print out paper. I'm not. And I said this at your mastermind. I'm not in Slack. I'm not in Basecamp or whatever they use. I don't know the logins. I don't care. Do they all leverage it and function as a team using that? Yes, I don't. And so she has to bring me information in a different format that works well for me. I don't need to adapt to what they're doing in order for the company to be successful. I know how I operate and I knew what I needed in order to operate in my zone of genius and be able to grow and scale the company as a CEO. How did you find her?