Google just announced that it would lay off 12,000 employees. That’s 6% of its workforce.

Microsoft is going to lay off 10,000 employees. Amazon plans to lay off 18,000 workers by the end of the year. Robinhood will cut 23% of its workforce. Salesforce is cutting 7,000 jobs.

Snap

Meta

Stripe

Coinbase

Lyft

On Twitter

Wayfair

All are laying off thousands of employees.

A similar picture will emerge in Europe. Here’s just one example:

BASF plans to close its Ludwigshafen site. Not only are about 50,000 jobs at risk, but also suppliers, all kinds of subcontractors, and a vast ” rat’s tail”!

Back to the USA:

The U.S. reached its debt ceiling on Thursday, and the current political climate could repeat or surpass the debt ceiling debacle of 2011.

That means a $31.4 trillion problem to solve.

The result could be a freefall in markets worldwide.

U.S. home sales plunged last month to 2008 levels. The Federal Reserve has announced at least two 0.25 percent interest rate hikes through 2023, making debt even more unaffordable.

Commercial real estate, especially downtown offices, is suffering as workers refuse to return to their offices. The retail sector posted an outsized decline in January.

In cryptocurrency and other speculative industries, scams are being exposed with increasing frequency, which is an early warning sign of an impending recession. We keep warning that.

Private equity firms will lower their valuation multiples.

“AI will cause distortions and price corrections.

Florida’s orange crop is expected to be 93% below its previous peak this year. Egg prices are rising.

And on and on.

So, what now?

The tide is clearly receding.

Is this the end of the world? Not by a long shot. Everything is still okay. It will continue to be suitable (for some) and improve with time.

But you can’t escape the consequences.

Things are going to change. The consequences are here, and it’s time to pay the price.

The easy times are over (for some, at least for a season). For the “masses,” it’s getting serious.

Are you ready?

For at least 24 months, I have regularly repeated my long and (admittedly) bland “statements” warning of this development.

I’m not the only one beating the drum for preparedness.

If you’re not prepared, you haven’t been listening (correctly), or at least you’ve been listening to the wrong people. (Where this comes from, among other things, YOU can read about in the book).

The bad news is that it will be a challenging year.

The good news is that you still have time to prepare for them. It’s always possible to make a course correction.

The longer you wait, the harder it will be, but you’re never really stuck or “screwed forever”.

Yes, this year is going to be challenging.

Welcome to life.

Rather than refer you to a bunch of videos I’ve recorded on the subject and force you to listen to me for hours, I’ll tell you the essential things you need this year:

Profits:

If you’re struggling to make and keep a profit now, you’ll be in the red by the end of 2023. I’m just reiterating what you already know.

That’s it.

If you need to work on your income strategies, reprioritize them and start acting.

Or don’t and watch everything go down the drain, including your savings and income. It’s up to you.

Reconcile Expenses

If you have recurring expenses, you need recurring income.

Trying to balance the pace, pressure, and price of recurring expenses with one-time income is madness.

Go for something other than the quick buck so much as continuity.

Whenever I preach continuity, people want to live on a shoestring budget—fifty dollars a month for a general “membership.

People aren’t as receptive to continuity at low prices anymore. Look at what’s happening with Netflix. It got too expensive to minimize churn.

I’ve told my team to focus even more on the continuity of our business, and I can tell you that we’re not going to introduce a low-cost membership.

I’m too old, tired, and cranky to try to pay big bills with small “revenue events. It doesn’t make sense to me.

Leads, leads, leads!

It would be best if you had more leads to sell the same monthly volume when you tighten your belt. Or put another way:

When fear floods a market and doubt increases, you have to talk to more people to close the same number of sales. If it were 1 in 10 in the past, it would be 1 in 20 in the future.

If you have the right processes and systems in place, doubling or even tripling the number of contacts is just a matter of “stepping on the gas.

I don’t recommend relying on “organic” in tough times, which means operating exclusively in the conventional referral space.

Why not?

To increase organic share, you must increase the “most expensive” thing: your time.

And increasing expenses during an economic downturn is not the wisest decision. (That’s how it is, from a business perspective!).

So while the sun is still shining, get something going that will bring in new customers and interested people daily.    Right now.                 Today.   

Not in 6 months when it will be more complicated.

The more leads and interested people you get today, you’ll have when you need them. The team and I are working on a minimum goal of 10,000 leads and 2,000 possible clients by the end of the second quarter.

That’s the most significant safety net we can give ourselves! An enormous list of people who already know, like, and trust us.

Not everyone can take this step simultaneously, even with our guidance.

It’s a question of liquidity.

To get this off the ground, at least $5,000 should be applicable.

For any members having trouble here, we are working on a unique “member campaign” that will solve this problem by pooling efforts so everyone can participate, even with a small portion.

More about this soon, HERE!

Of course, there are many other things to do:

Reduce spending.

Work more with existing contacts.

Consider new tax strategies.

Keeping an eye on the leverage of debt

Etc. etc. etc.

But this only matters if you have additional income and contacts to keep you going and, more importantly, growing.

Before I end this “rant” (sorry to bother you with a reality check so early in the week and so early in the year), I want to make one more point:

The days of just doing the bare minimum are over. Point.

If you run an ad with a “funnel/hopper” and then give up because it didn’t work, you won’t make it in 2023, either.

If you get rejected by ten people in a row, then throw up your hands and give up, you won’t make it in 2023, either.

If you talk to a potential customer once on the phone and then never speak to them again because you didn’t close the deal the first time, you won’t make it in 2023, either.

If you only test one order line….

If you only do what your “boss” tells you to do and nothing else….

… then you won’t make it in 2023.

The easy times are over.

The competitive advantage in 2023 will be YOUR willingness to make something work UNTIL it works, not IF it works.

And if you can commit YOURSELF to it, then it doesn’t matter what happens in the marketplace; you will succeed.

I’m sure that email, that text so early in the week, wasn’t funny, but someone needs to tell you that. Someone needs to wake you up and ask you to open your eyes and look around.

The data is there, plain as day. Ignore it at your peril.

Stay smart. Invest in yourself and what matters now. Get help with marketing. Get help with recurring revenue. Get help not to give up so often.

You can do it.

The bad news is that there will be challenges this year.

The good news is that every year has challenges.

So rise to the challenge and get something done.

For those who can and want to, it is important NOT to be ALONE.

Let’s combine and coordinate our POWER!

Because POWER is what CREATES LIFE! (old flag saying of my home club 😊)

In this sense …

To your success!

Ralf and

T4 Pro Team