Feeling busy but not sure what's actually moving your business forward?

If you can't confidently say which offer is the most profitable, where your best clients are coming from, or which marketing efforts are actually paying off, it's time for an audit.

In this first episode of our Mid-Year Reset Series, Jess and Rachel share the simple framework they use to assess what's working, uncover what's draining time and energy, and make more intentional decisions for sustainable growth.

Remember: your numbers aren't a report card—they're a roadmap.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

• How to use your business data to make better decisions
• What metrics actually matter when evaluating growth
• How to identify what's worth keeping—and what isn't
• Why your strategy should support your life, not just your revenue

Stop making decisions based on what everyone else says you should do.

Your own data will tell you where your biggest opportunities are, what's costing you time, and where to focus your energy next. The goal isn't to work harder—it's to build a business that supports both your growth and your life.

Resources Mentioned

• Rooted in Reality Planner – A Notion planning system that guides you through the Assess, Align, and Act planning framework.
• Life First Business Audit – A free assessment designed to identify your biggest business gaps and recommend your next best moves.
• Laney AI Business Coach – Personalized guidance based on your Life First Business Audit results.

Meet Your Hosts

Jessica Walther is the founder and CEO of The Launch Collaborative and Sustainable Success Systems. As a launch strategist and systems consultant, Jess is dedicated to helping solo business owners and small-but-mighty teams build businesses that deliver both peace and profit. She specializes in creating sustainable growth strategies that align with her clients' values and lifestyles.

Rachel Lopez is the founder and CEO of Gal Marketing Agency, a boutique email marketing and strategy firm. With over a decade of experience, Rachel helps heart-driven entrepreneurs craft intentional marketing strategies that attract, nurture, and convert leads sustainably. Her human-first approach ensures that marketing efforts feel authentic and effective .

Together, Jess and Rachel blend systems, storytelling, and soulful strategy to help you grow a business that's deeply aligned with your life—not just your revenue goals.

Connect With Us:

• Jess Website
• Rachel's Website

Hang Out & Say Hi!

• Deeply Rooted Business Instagram
• Jess Instagram
• Rachel's Instagram

I see this Monarch ad all the time where they're like, "I'll

2

buy your lunch if you can tell me

how many subscriptions you currently

3

pay for," and, the people never know.

4

Well, I'll buy you lunch right now if

you know what offer is making you the

5

most money in your business, which one's

making you the most tired, and where

6

your traffic is actually coming from.

7

Rachel: That's a solid

challenge right there.

8

Jessica: And I could say, you know, some

people have simple businesses, but the

9

more complex offers you get, I think it's

harder to kind of keep track of all of

10

these items because your data is scattered

across all these different tools.

11

Right now I'm working on, with one of

my dieticians to build her a dashboard

12

that brings all her data together because

we were having to go to the podcast to

13

look for this, and Instagram to look for

this, and Practice Better to find that.

14

So without intentionality around it,

getting a really good read on how your

15

business is doing, what's making money,

what's not making money, what's giving you

16

return on investment, what's completely

waste of your time, is super hard.

17

So today we're gonna

hopefully fix that for you.

18

We're gonna walk you through three audits

that I would recommend you kind of do at

19

least once or twice a year, ideally every

single quarter, so you can see what's

20

actually working and where the opportunity

to move your business forward is.

21

Rachel: Yep.

22

So welcome back to another episode of

Growing a Deeply Rooted Business podcast.

23

Rachel, your marketing ecosystem

strategist, and I'm here with Jess,

24

our sustainable systems growth

25

Jessica: It's this way

26

Rachel: And honestly, this

is Jess' zone of genius.

27

This is one of the things

that I look to Jess for.

28

We also collab very well on this because

when it comes to planning our brains

29

live in these two different worlds.

30

So really is, it's a beautiful blend here.

31

But before we jump in, we're

gonna do a quick energy check.

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I have had clients tell me "I

just can't with the numbers.

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Could you not?"

34

And I'm that person when it comes to math.

35

If you start pretending to do mental

math, I'm just gonna pretend with you and

36

wait until you come up with an answer.

37

But we're not doing that here.

38

We are going to reframe before

we start with the fact that

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your data is not a report card.

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It is a map.

41

It is a guide.

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And ultimately, whatever you

discover in this process of

43

these audits, we don't know.

44

We're not gonna grade you.

45

It's not up to us to judge, where your

traffic flow's coming in for or where

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you're not getting any traffic flow.

47

So if we just wanna show you what's

already killing it in your business,

48

what needs attention, and ultimately

help you just kinda stop guessing.

49

So that's what this episode is for

50

Jessica: Yeah, and this is actually

the first episode of a three-part

51

mid-year reset series that we're

doing, so make sure you stick around.

52

Today is one of my favorite

parts, which is the assess, right?

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You can't move forward unless you reflect.

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So let's get into it.

55

The first thing that you should

be reflecting on are your

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clients and doing a client audit.

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So this is where you're gonna look

at the people that you actually

58

served and try to find-- pull out

common denominators with them.

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What were some common problems

that they came in here with?

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What are some common things

that you did for them?

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What are some attribute traits that makes

this client your best fit client for you?

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And what are the ones

that maybe are worse fit?

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Reflecting back on their discovery call

or intake form, were there any red flags

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that could have set you off to that this

wasn't gonna be a right fit for you?

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And then you're also going to want

to look at where did they come from.

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So it's also kinda working into traffic

source, which we'll get into later,

67

but you wanna know where they're coming

from and just kind of see the overall

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view of your clients and get a good

read on who they are and what they are.

69

This is not only gonna help you with

creating specific offers for them, but

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also pulling out those specific pain

points and transformational desires so

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that you can use that into your marketing.

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Rachel: Yeah, and the way that this

amplifies effort on a marketing

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side is that if you can talk more

specifically to these people who are

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the most fit, the ones that you want to

work with the most, they are actually

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ready to make that buying decision.

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You can weed out the leads that come into

those discovery calls and start picking

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at your budget or at your, deliverables,

and all of those area things.

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So we wanna look at kind of these

overlaps of the most aligned, and then

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start honing in on, like Jess said, those

transformations, those desire points, and

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work that into all of the other points.

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And then also, this gives you a lot

of visibility into a very common

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problem where some people end up

being just a referral business, right?

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So you're maybe putting…

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and again, we'll get into this in the

traffic audit, but you may be putting so

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much time and effort into marketing on

social media or all of these other areas,

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but but when you're looking at it and you

go, "Okay, these six most aligned clients

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came in from referrals, and these other

ones came in and they were the least

88

aligned", it gives you a lot of that

awareness that helps you make decisions

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better moving forward than being like,

"I'm gonna keep spending 15 hours a week

90

cranking out these social posts so that

I can keep talking to these unaligned

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people that are wasting my time", or you

can pivot in a more intentional manner

92

Jessica: Yeah.

93

And you know, I've gotta throw in my

little AI hacks here, but one of the

94

things that I do for my clients so

that I go into their intake forms,

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and I will download their Calendly

or whatever they're using to schedule

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those strategy or discovery calls.

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And on those applications, we're

asking, not only where did we find them

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from, but also pain points, desires.

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If you're a health practitioner, symptoms.

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If you could wave a magic wand

and we could do anything in

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90 days, what could it be?

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Getting all of that information

and then integrating it into your

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marketing is, a really great way to

use AI to synthesize all of that data.

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Because before, I don't even know

how marketers used to do it . Like,

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go through and put tick marks down.

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But it's amazing that you can

put, 400 leads into AI, and then

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it can kinda give you an overview

of who your client avatar is.

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So if you haven't done that yet, do it.

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Just make sure you remove your

name, the names of your clients

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from that CSV before you upload it

for HIPAA compliance and whatnot.

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Rachel: So then this brings us to our

second audit, which is the offer audit,

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and I was literally just telling Jess

that I went through Offer Optimizer Olivia

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using our assistant in the lab to do

this in my business on Friday, because I

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realized that there was a lot of areas of

cannibalization of my traffic and stuff

115

with this, and really, because I had this

audit done, gave me this insight to be

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able to say 100% this is the right move,

and I could make it without sitting there

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and second guessing or worrying if I'm

cutting specific revenues and all of that.

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But this one is I would say,

valuable because it really

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does make such an impact.

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Jessica: So number one, you're going

to want to rank your offers by revenue.

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So which ones are bringing you the most

money, which ones are bringing the least?

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And then I want you to

rank them by effort.

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So which ones are taking the most amount

of your time versus which ones aren't?

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Even better, if you know how many

hours it takes for you to deliver that

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offer, which a lot of people don't,

but if you don't, it's a great time

126

to figure out how many hours does it

take to actually deliver this offer.

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And then what you can do is divide

your revenue by the hours that it

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takes to deliver, and you're gonna

get your revenue to time ratio.

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And the ones that have the lowest

time to effort ratio that give you

130

the most amount of revenue with the

least amount of effort are those are

131

might be the ones you wanna keep.

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Unless, caveat here, 'cause we're

life first and we're, you know, we

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do believe that you have to eat a

shit sandwich every now and then,

134

but you shouldn't have to when you're

delivering your offer every time.

135

If your offer, you absolutely

hate to do it, you hate to

136

deliver it, then that cuts it all.

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So then that's the third column

is, how much joy do you get and

138

satisfaction do you get from

delivering this offer all the time?

139

For example, I could probably do a lot

more, bring in a lot more clients for

140

launch offers, but I'm very selective

with that because it takes a lot of

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time, energy, effort, and I to do it

every once in a while as a big build-up.

142

But I couldn't even see myself or the

amount of stress that I would have

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because so much is riding on that, doing

this for multiple clients at a time.

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So that's why that offer, I kinda keep

it at a higher price point and, you know,

145

make sure that it's protecting myself from

getting my energy drained from delivering

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an offer that takes so much out of me.

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Rachel: Yeah, and I think so many people

realize this when they do this audit

148

is to realize that "Oh, this $10,000

four-month package, my deliverables

149

and my output and my time put into

this is paying myself $30 an hour."

150

When if you were to focus more on

strategy calls or, intensives of

151

some sort and you're like, "Oh,

that's actually $300 an hour.

152

I have systemized deliverables for this.

153

I can crank it out at the highest value

and not be in employee mode with clients

154

because I'm stuck in this container."

155

I think those light bulbs are what's

so valuable about doing an offer audit.

156

And then when you also have, maybe a

smorgasbord of 15 offers and you're

157

trying to customize and a la carte

everything, this gives you clarity

158

on saying, "Yeah, that's not actually

the way to operate in your business."

159

I think that's the one of the most

important parts of this as well.

160

Jessica: I think it's so funny how

you brought up the, almost retainer

161

model because I think especially for,

you know, OBMs or what I do, that's

162

kind of the model everyone follows

is , "Oh, you know, you'll have me on

163

retainer, so you can tap into me at any

time," blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

164

There was a time where I had five retainer

clients, and it got to a point where I

165

cannot realistically have my brain in six

different businesses where I'm supposed

166

to be managing at the same level as almost

the business owner every single person.

167

I don't even know how I used to do that.

168

So then I definitely scaled back, and

now the maximum number of retainers,

169

I take are two, maybe three.

170

And then I made up that revenue by filling

in some of those more project-based,

171

very, standard deliverable items, and

my stress levels have, plummeted because

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Rachel: Yeah.

173

Jessica: that's a lot

of work for your brain

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Rachel: Yeah, side note here.

175

I have a whiteboard that I used in my very

first year of business where I would write

176

my monthly clients and then kinda like

the Post-It Note launch strategy where

177

people were like, "Ooh, another client."

178

here, because it's so old and I

never washed it off with my little

179

Expo eraser or whatever, it's

faded and engraved in where it's

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seven clients at full management of

their emails, and it was just me.

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I had no VA or anything like that.

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And I was like, yeah, I was killing it

with the $18,000 months, but was I also

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brain dead, and exhausted, and burnt out,

and stressed, and all of those things?

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100%.

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And then when I finally started doing

true offer audits is when I was capped

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at four, maybe three doing strategy

sessions because it brings me joy to

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help people still, and then I need

to figure out this part over here.

188

But that doesn't come to you when you're

just looking at the, " Oh, it makes

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me a lot of money" answer, because

that's only a fraction of the actual

190

equation here when you're looking

at life first business structures.

191

Jessica: Yep, yep.

192

All right, and then moving into audit

number three, we wanna make sure that

193

we're looking at our marketing so our

marketing bridges, our lead magnets,

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and then also our traffic sources.

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So I'll let you walk us through

marketing ecosystem magician.

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Rachel: Yeah.

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So when you're looking at your

marketing and traffic audit, there

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is that effort ratio here, right?

199

You wanna look at your traffic sources.

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So how are people actually finding you?

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You're breaking this

audit into your funnel.

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So you have your top of funnel,

how are people finding you?

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Are they coming through referrals, social?

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Do you have a podcast?

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All of those things.

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And what's really important here is

that we want to be as real as possible.

207

We do not want to assume we know what

our actual traffic sources are, and

208

that's important because as we're

building out the plan to go forward

209

and make actionable decisions on this,

you can't base it off of assumptions.

210

You have to base it off of validation.

211

then that brings you further into

the funnel, and the area that

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you're gonna look at is where

are your conversions happening?

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Are they happening on social still?

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Are they moving into the email list?

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Were they happening on a lead magnet?

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you have people funneling into that?

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Where are the actions that somebody's

taking after they find you is that key.

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I can't tell you the amount of

businesses that I have been in that

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do not know their conversion rates.

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Plain and simple, are

like, "I don't know."

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like, "What do you mean?"

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You should really know these things.

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No judgment, again, but

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Jessica: And ideally you're looking,

when we say conversion rates, we're

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converting from one step to the other.

226

So converts from social to now

they're on their email list.

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Converts from now they are on your

email list to a strategy call.

228

Converts from strategy call

to now they are a client.

229

Converts from they're a client

to they're in your extension.

230

Each one of those pieces, if you're

looking at conversion rates, and

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you can go in and zoom in on the one

that's the lowest, and that's gonna

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show you where you need to create

your next project or create your

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next effort or initiative around it.

234

Because, you know, if I've got a lead

magnet that's got amazing conversions,

235

but there's nobody going in it, then

that means I need to focus on traffic.

236

Or I also, I could have a lead magnet

that is converting really, really good

237

where people are signing up for it,

but they're never buying anything.

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That's not doing anything

for your business either.

239

So really zeroing in on those different

points to figure out where things need

240

to be adjusted and not just looking at

a lead magnet or a launch in a whole.

241

We always like to kinda go in and dig

a little deeper with those numbers.

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Rachel: Yeah.

243

So then that brings us to our kind of

next filter that we're looking at is,

244

when we're looking at the channels and,

where we're putting our time and effort

245

into, are they actually growing, right?

246

Are we looking at traffic sources

and saying, "Okay, this is

247

Jessica: 200%

248

Rachel: from the last time I looked

at it," or, even just looking

249

historically in one sitting, can you

see is it actually increasing, right?

250

Or is it really hogging

a lot of your energy?

251

Is this taking up so much time

and actually not converting

252

anything - traffic to the next

step interest, engagement whatever

253

those conversions look like.

254

So then once we have those three areas

of visibility, we start to look at

255

what those effort-to-result ratios are.

256

We're not saying, " Oh, this is

giving me, X amount of conversions."

257

We're saying, "This is saying I'm

putting five hours of energy into

258

this, and I'm getting what return out?"

259

so then we can look at the whole

picture and say, "My clients

260

are coming in from this source.

261

I'm spending this much time in this

channel, and this is the actual tangibles

262

that are being, output from my effort."

263

And This doesn't mean "Oh, I pushed

post on social media daily, and I'm

264

not getting anything out of it."

265

Every channel has its own purpose.

266

Not everything needs to drive revenue.

267

Everything can really connect, and

really understanding the goal of each

268

channel is really important as well.

269

Jessica: What I think too when

you're looking at stuff too, as long

270

as you're connecting it to a goal,

because we have, now goals, right?

271

What we need to focus on now for the

business we're building now, but I know

272

me and you are both about to do, a social

media thing, and that's really for the

273

business that we're trying to build

towards to where we have more traffic,

274

visibility, all of that, to be able to do,

more things that are, one-to-many, because

275

you do need to have the right offer fit

for the size audience you have as well.

276

Rachel: Yeah, it's funny, I'm

actually doing, like Jess said,

277

we're doing a lot more on social

right now, trying to test ourselves,

278

challenge ourselves a little bit.

279

One of the videos I just put

out was really talking about

280

the purpose of your email list.

281

And when I was reflecting and scripting

out that video, and it came down to

282

thinking of all of the different reasons

that my clients have told me they wanna

283

get their email list doing things,

or even there are different reasons

284

as to why we wanna amplify on social.

285

It is so nuanced into everybody's own

personal business life structure, and

286

that literally dictates your strategy.

287

It dictates how you go forward, which is

why these three audits layered together,

288

I think are so important important to how

you make decisions in your own business.

289

Don't just listen to random strangers on

the internet tell you that you need to

290

launch every quarter, that you need to

do this or do that, because at the end of

291

the day your numbers, your insights into

your own reality should decide how you

292

move forward and the purpose that you're

giving to things versus just your wheels.

293

Because that's what this is supposed

to tell you is, "Hey, stop wasting

294

time on this because somebody told

you to post seven times a week.

295

Here's where your actual

energy should be put at

296

Jessica: Yeah, and then always

just looking at your life too.

297

Because there can be really great

business advice that's not gonna be

298

really good life first business advice.

299

For example, I had a client who this year

they had been running their business off

300

of just one huge launch a year, and he got

the advice to break it, and we're gonna

301

do monthly cohorts every single year.

302

And then when we got to, breaking it down

and, what that would take energy-wise

303

from us, from him, from the team, it's

just this is not sustainable with the life

304

and the values that this company holds.

305

So we kinda pivoted and went back to

three times a year versus once a year.

306

So that's why this reflection part

is so important because it's about

307

looking inward at your real numbers, at

your real being, at your real current

308

state of life underneath it all.

309

And being really honest with

yourself about what you wanna do

310

and maximizing the amount of revenue

that you can make without sacrificing

311

those values that you wanna do.

312

Rachel: All right, let's tie this

all together, 'cause I know we

313

went on layers on layers here.

314

These three audits, they

all build upon each other.

315

The client audit, who actually lit you up?

316

Where did they come from?

317

How do we find more of those

people and not just more clients,

318

is the answer in that audit.

319

The second one is the offer audit.

320

Revenue next to effort.

321

How do we grow those kind of really

enjoyable, profitable offers?

322

And how do we fix or either

retire the ones that are draining

323

our energy and undercutting our

value from an hourly perspective?

324

Then that third audit is the

marketing and traffic audit.

325

Which channels are growing versus which

channels that are hogging your time?

326

Where do you wanna spend your limited

hours so that you can really talk

327

to the people that are doing and

taking the actions that you want?

328

So those three layers, you

don't need a whole new strategy.

329

Ultimately, pivoting and changing

everything in a whiplash kind of

330

direction isn't great for your business.

331

How do we look at these three areas of

our business, find the overlap, make

332

the decisions with more intention,

and give you that clear look forward

333

at what's already working and

what's actually killing your time?

334

Jessica: So we do have

the Rooted in Reality.

335

It's a paid Notion guide that kind of

walks you through this our three-step

336

planning process, which includes this,

which is the assess step, and then

337

it brings you through align and act.

338

But also we've been working on a

new free item for you to help you

339

do this, and that is going to be

the Life First Business Audit.

340

It's a quick assessment.

341

It's gonna take about two to three

minutes for you to complete it,

342

and it's gonna show you where your

biggest gaps are right now and the

343

moves to make in your business next.

344

And it's also gonna give you access to

our Life First Business coach, Laney,

345

who is gonna really help you go through

and diagnose some of these things and so

346

that you can help figure that out itself.

347

Eventually, the planner and the lab

might work together a little better,

348

but that's what we've got for now.

349

So they're both very useful, and we

would both use them for planning.

350

Rachel: Yeah, so if this episode hit

home in a little bit of areas and maybe

351

somebody else in your, business, life

might feel the same, send it to a business

352

bestie, someone that you know has been

working twice as hard on the areas that

353

probably aren't moving a lot of things.

354

Share it with her.

355

Find us on Instagram or on TikTok.

356

Tell us which audit you're either most

excited to run or which one's kinda

357

gonna terrify you because it's gonna give

you a lot of visibility into the gaps.

358

And yeah, we read every comment,

every message, everything

359

that you guys send over.

360

Until next week,

361

Jessica: We're rooting for you

362

Rachel: for you.