If you want to get around the world, you need a passport & visa. If you leave things to the last minute to get them sorted, you'll need to speak to Rob Lee. He's our guest today on The Next 100 Days Podcast.

Rob explains that his company helps US passport holders and residents obtain visas to travel to countries like China, India, Vietnam, and Brazil. He describes the process of obtaining visas, including the challenges of dealing with government websites and requirements.

Rob shares the story of how he and his wife started the business after encountering visa challenges while living in Central America. They decided to leverage their experience to help others navigate the visa process.

Rob discusses the day-to-day work of his company, including providing detailed instructions, handling document submissions, and dealing with evolving visa requirements, especially for countries like China. He explains how his team has developed expertise to navigate these complexities.

Rob justifies the pricing of his services, noting that while there is an added fee, it provides convenience, peace of mind, and a higher success rate compared to individuals trying to navigate the visa process on their own.

Kevin raises concerns about the sensitive personal data Rob's company handles, and Rob explains the extensive security measures and compliance standards they have implemented to protect client information.

Rob discusses his and his wife's long-term goal of being able to work and travel more freely, and the steps they are taking to make the business more technology-driven and scalable, including the development of new software tools.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, where he introduces AI Agents that sit on websites, to increase engagement, dwell time, leads and conversions.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and at kevinappleby.com

Joe runs an Aquatics business. He is a serial entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience. Joe builds businesses by developing business managers along with systems that support those managers. He’s very proud of the many young professionals he has mentored during his career. Joe’s diverse business experience from food manufacturing to rock climbing gyms, gives him a unique perspective and ability to creatively assess every opportunity. He loves the process of creating a business and turning a concept into a profitable reality.

• Joe transitioned from corporate (Kraft Foods) to entrepreneurship, starting with rock climbing gyms and now an aquarium store
• Niche retail faces challenges from inflation, supply chain issues, and changing consumer behavior
• Adapting business models (e.g. focusing on premium offerings) is key for small businesses to survive economic pressures
• Global manufacturing shifts and tariffs are impacting small businesses, requiring strategic pivots

• Worked at Kraft Foods for 13-14 years, changing roles every 18 months
• Started First Ascent rock climbing gyms while still at Kraft, keeping it secret until resignation
• Sold First Ascent 3 years ago, now owns/operates an aquarium store
• Offers business consulting through Snaggletooth Goby (named after a fish that climbs waterfalls)

• Inflation reducing consumer spending on hobby/luxury items
• 80% of aquarium products come from China, causing supply chain and pricing issues
• Real estate market slowdown impacting new home aquarium installations
• Shift from "superstore" concept with many SKUs to curated, premium offerings
• Focus on high-end systems and service to replace volume of lower-value transactions

• US unemployment low (2-3%) but other economic issues persist (e.g. medical costs, student debt)
• Debate over reshoring manufacturing vs. economic realities of global production
• Tariffs and trade tensions creating uncertainty for businesses reliant on imports
• Short-term corporate thinking vs. long-term strategic planning discussed

• Improving staff training and sales techniques
• Curating product offerings to focus on higher-margin items
• Targeting affluent customers less impacted by economic pressures
• Developing expertise to justify premium pricing and services

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on

Financially Fit Entrepreneur is Phil's positioning - the substance of which is about making finances easy for people using the laws his grandma taught him about budgeting with glass jars as a teenager…

Phil started off helping young couples budget their money, get out of debt and save for big life goals. Through his Grandma’s Jars 1:1 Coaching and Workshops he has helped thousands of people achieve financial security and success. But it was during his 15 years as a stockbroker and financial adviser that Phil honed his cashflow expertise and learned how to apply it to the business world.

Over the past 20 years Phil has worked with hundreds of entrepreneurs and small business owners to help them multiply their profits and create financial certainty… not to mention achieve incredible life goals.

• Phil's "Grandma's Jars" approach uses a simple system of allocating money to different purposes, modernized for digital banking
• Proper cash flow management is critical for both personal and business finances, requiring discipline and purposeful allocation
• Entrepreneurs often struggle with financial basics; getting clarity on current position and goals is an essential first step
• Regular review and adjustment of expenses, including occasional "no-spend months", helps maintain financial health

• Phil learned budgeting from his grandmother using physical glass jars for different expenses
• Evolved system from physical jars to envelopes, paper budgets, Excel, and now online apps
• Developed own software after leaving high-paying finance career to focus on teaching financial basics

• Track 5-6 key numbers monthly: revenue, salary paid to self, expenses (cost of goods + overheads), tax set aside, profit
• Use a "cascade" system to allocate funds purposefully through business and personal accounts
• Maintain 1.5-2x monthly expenses in operating account; excess flows to reserves and other purposes
• Build 3-6 months of operating expenses as a rainy day fund before major reinvestment or expansion

• Entrepreneurs often lack clarity on basic financial position and profitability
• Tendency to increase expenses as revenue grows, reducing margins and financial stability
• Discretionary spending in business often less scrutinized than personal spending
• Lifestyle inflation can trap entrepreneurs in need for high income, limiting flexibility

• Conduct regular "no-spend months" to reset expectations and identify core vs. discretionary expenses
• Review all expenses line-by-line periodically to eliminate unnecessary costs
• Align business finances with personal life goals and vision
• Build purposeful reserves to enable creativity and reduce survival-mode thinking

• Focuses on transparency and creating a safe space for entrepreneurs to face financial realities
• Uses visual tools like the "cascade" concept to make financial management more intuitive
• Emphasizes learning from past patterns to plan for future fluctuations
• Helps clients get clarity on both current position and desired outcomes.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and...

Ben Johnson leads Particle41, which exists to strengthen your team with flexible technology. That manifests as a team of our own that is uniquely able to exceed expectations during every step of a project. In a marketplace flooded with partners who over-promise and under-deliver, Particle41 is doing things differently.

Graham, Kevin, and Benjamin introduce themselves. Benjamin shares his background as a serial entrepreneur and founder of several tech companies, including his current venture Particle 41 which provides CTO consulting, software development, and other tech services.

Benjamin discusses how Particle 41 leverages talent globally, with teams in India, Brazil, Argentina, and the US. He emphasizes the importance of finding talented individuals and building diverse, execution-oriented teams to deliver the best service to clients.

The group discusses the critical importance of focusing on customer experience and ensuring businesses have the right processes, policies, and level of maturity in place (e.g. password management, subscription management, onboarding/offboarding procedures) to operate effectively.

The group explores the ethical implications of using AI, particularly in areas like content creation where AI can reduce authenticity. They caution against defaulting to technology just because it's available, and emphasize the need to thoughtfully consider the human element.

Graham and Kevin summarize the key takeaways from the discussion with Benjamin, highlighting his passion, purpose, and experience as a serial entrepreneur. They discuss potential opportunities to collaborate, including leveraging Benjamin's expertise in areas like RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) AI.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and at kevinappleby.com

Liz Steblay's business is about mentoring professionals. She champions self-employed professionals, protecting their rights as small business owners and helping them to create the career of their dreams.

Get Liz's book here: 6keys.info

Liz Steblay discusses her own journey from corporate consultant to successful solopreneur, and the common challenges and fears that people face when considering making the leap to self-employment. She emphasizes the importance of developing confidence and a growth mindset to overcome the "FUD Monster" (fear, uncertainty, and doubt).

She explains the importance of narrowing your focus and becoming known as an expert in a specific area, rather than trying to be a generalist. She provides tips on how to identify your niche and make yourself memorable to potential clients.

Liz advises that successful solopreneurs focus on building relationships and trust with clients, rather than traditional "sales" tactics. She emphasizes the value of networking and using social media to establish yourself as an authority in your field.

Wait! You'll discover a brilliant way to get the price you want for your services. Liz shares strategies for pricing your services effectively, including using a range rather than a single rate, and considering a hybrid model that blends hourly and value-based pricing. She cautions against underpricing to win business.

Mentoring Professionals expert Liz provides the details for her book "Succeeding as a Solopreneur" and her website 6keys.info, where listeners can learn more about her work and resources for solopreneurs.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. He is the founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and at kevinappleby.com

Betsy Kent is a world expert on the formation of the Ideal Customer Profile. Since 2018, Be Visible has paved the way in identifying the perfect audience for businesses. Now with MeclabsAI, Betsy is creating Simulators for ICPs and that is transformational. Empower your business with smarter, faster, and more effective marketing driven by AI Agents and Customer Simulators.

Kevin and Graham introduce the podcast and welcome their guest, Betsy Kent, an expert in the creation of an Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). They provide background on how Kevin and Graham started the podcast years ago after meeting through an online marketing course.

Betsy explains that an ICP is a detailed profile of a business's perfect buyer - the person or people who will see immediate personal benefit in the offering and are in a position to say yes. She shares how she developed her own methodology for creating ICPs when working with clients, going beyond just demographics to deeply understand the customer's mindset, emotions, and decision-making process.

Betsy provides a case study of how she worked with a high-end dentist client to identify their ideal patients, leading to immediate improvements in how the dentist interacted with and converted prospects. She emphasizes the importance of truly understanding your target customer, rather than just casting a wide net.

Betsy discusses how she is now using AI to take her ICP process to the next level, creating "buyer simulators" that allow businesses to test ideas and content with a highly detailed, interactive version of their ideal customer. She explains the benefits of this approach compared to traditional market research methods.

Betsy shares her vision for making her ICP and buyer simulator tools more accessible and user-friendly for businesses to use themselves. The hosts and Betsy also discuss her other interests and plans for the future. The hosts thank Betsy for being a fantastic guest on the podcast.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and at kevinappleby.com

Career Mastery expert Becky Heidesch is the founder of two online career centres, and a US nationwide boutique executive search firm, where she has interviewed hundreds of executives and placed senior level women in dozens of industries in corporate America.

As a public speaker, she has led career seminars for companies and organisations, along with various women’s groups including, Women in Automotive, Women in Financial, Women in Government, and Women in Sports.

Becky discusses her background and the motivation behind writing her new book "The Career Master Class for Women". She shares insights on the unique challenges women face in the workforce, as well as universal career management strategies that apply to all professionals. Becky emphasises the importance of being proactive in managing one's career, especially given the rapidly changing business landscape.

Becky describes her experience working in executive search, including the rigorous 17-step process her firm uses to vet and place candidates. She explains how they aim to find the perfect "needle in the haystack" to fit the client's needs, and the importance of cultural fit in addition to skills and experience. Becky also discusses the guarantees and consequences of unsuccessful placements.

Becky outlines the key qualities she looks for in successful candidates, including strong skills, tools, education, and experience, as well as personal qualities like emotional intelligence, judgment, and work ethic. She emphasizes the importance of the "total package" and how her firm assesses candidates across multiple touchpoints.

Becky discusses the challenges and evolution of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts in hiring. She shares how her firm has adapted to client demands for more diverse candidate slates, and the need to balance talent and merit with addressing historical underrepresentation in certain industries and roles. Becky emphasises the importance of focusing on competency while also recognising the need for pipeline development.

Becky provides advice for professionals looking to make career changes or extend their working lives. She encourages finding the intersection of passion, skills, and opportunity, and being strategic about transitioning to new roles. Becky also highlights the benefits of leveraging the experience and wisdom of older workers to complement the digital skills of younger generations.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin...

Nile Frater is the Founder of Masse, an innovative an AI & SEO agency that specialises in high-scale content campaigns for cutting-edge tech companies. In just 12 months, Masse has grown from $0 to over $1.5 million in ARR, leveraging a unique human-AI hybrid approach to SEO.

Originally from Glasgow, Scotland, Nile now resides in Andorra and continues to be at the forefront of SEO and AI, helping startups scale quickly and efficiently.

Graham and Kevin kick off the meeting, noting that there are more AI bots than people participating. They discuss technical issues with the meeting setup and getting everyone connected.

Nile shares his background, explaining how he developed expertise in SEO while running a previous company that was impacted by a Google algorithm change. He discusses the challenges of navigating Google's evolving guidelines and the need to quickly adapt to recover lost traffic.

Nile emphasizes the importance of creating high-quality, targeted content to rank well on Google. He explains how the shift towards shorter attention spans has led to the need for more frequent, digestible content that comprehensively covers a topic, rather than long-form "skyscraper" articles.

Nile discusses his agency's approach to using AI to assist with content creation, striking a balance between AI-generated and human-written content. He highlights the benefits of using AI to quickly provide foundational knowledge, allowing writers to focus on adding unique value and insights.

Nile shares strategies for ensuring AI-generated content sounds natural and avoids common AI writing patterns that can be detected. He notes the importance of adding human-written elements and opinions to create content that is indistinguishable from a human-written piece.

Graham and Kevin summarize the key insights from the discussion, highlighting the importance of content quantity and quality for SEO, as well as the potential benefits and challenges of leveraging AI for content creation. They discuss potential opportunities to collaborate on AI-powered tools and services.

Graham Arrowsmith

Graham founded Finely Fettled ten years ago to help business owners and marketers market to affluent and high-net-worth customers. Graham founder of MicroYES, a Partner for MeclabsAI, which combines the world's biggest source of 10,000 marketing experiments with AI. Find Graham on LinkedIn.

Kevin Appleby

Kevin specialises in finance transformation and implementing business change. He's the COO of GrowCFO, which provides both community and CPD-accredited training designed to grow the next generation of finance leaders. You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and at kevinappleby.com