Profit Matters

I can picture you reading this headline, thinking “duh”—of course profits matter. But what isn’t always obvious is what they enable you to do—as in their relationship to the impact you’re able to make with your work.­

Jonathan and I talk big and small picture when it comes to how to think about profit:

Why profit is the most important measure of how your business is doing—even when profits are not your purpose.

The difference between relying on vanity metrics and your bottom line to show you how you’re doing.

Measuring impact vs. measuring revenue and what you need to build so they grow in tandem.

How to avoid short-term thinking while still keeping your eye on your profit line.

The value of reliability in your profit generation—and what that buys you in your business and your ability to make an impact.

Quotables

“You can’t buy Cheerios with likes on Twitter.”—JS

“My concern sometimes with these giant lists is that they don’t have this commonality in the audience that is going to help you grow your business.”—RM

“You can measure impact. And that’s a great thing to measure, but you can’t eat it for dinner.”—JS

“Once you run the long-term profit numbers, then you can make a wise-for-you investment decision. This is a good idea, a bad idea, or I’m not sure. Maybe I need to test it more.”—RM

“I always notice when businesses basically tank because some cost cutter becomes the CEO—like the COO or the CFO becomes the CEO—and they stop investing in innovation.”—JS

“You can’t cut your way to innovation. You can’t cut your way to being the industry leader. It just doesn’t work that way.”—RM

“If you’re going to call yourself a business, then you need to have profits. Even though profits aren’t your purpose, they still need to be there.”—JS

“Until there’s some kind of reliability built into your revenue model, your business is really hard to sustain.”—RM