Welcome to Your Asset Plan, Steph
LET’S GET STARTED
How to use your Asset Plan
This is your personalized command center for building your business as an asset—so it can generate wealth, give you time back, and support your life.
Inside, you’ll find your diagnostics, tailored priorities, and a clear, actionable plan to step fully into ownership.
1️⃣ Watch the walkthrough video.
2️⃣ Move through each section at your pace.
3️⃣ Note questions and reflections for your follow-up call.
4️⃣ Take aligned action. This plan is built to move you forward.
Your CEO Snapshot
Where you are now, where you’re headed, and what’s standing in the way
This section captures your current business stage, your goals, and your key challenges—so your Asset Plan is built around your real priorities.
Watch the overview video below which reviews your entire Asset Plan in detail. This is the “meat and potatoes” of your Asset Plan, so don’t skip it!
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Steph currently plays a hands-on operator role in the business. She spends 15–20 hours a week managing customer service, inventory, supplier and fulfillment communications, influencer relationships, and social media. She is the primary point person for keeping day-to-day operations running.
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Alt Sun is currently in the $250K–$500K revenue stage and tracking toward $600K this year. The brand is a sweat-resistant, sunless tanning solution company serving B2B spray tan professionals, with a growing reputation and strong podcast visibility. Steph has built a cult-following community and product differentiation, but profitability and scalability remain pain points.
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Steph is overwhelmed by the operational load and hasn’t had the time or space to think strategically. She’s stuck in the weeds of running the business, relying heavily on intuition instead of data, and struggling to prioritize marketing initiatives that actually convert. Pricing and profit margins are limiting growth, and unclear positioning is making it harder to own the category she created.
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Steph wants to be seen as an industry leader without being consumed by her business. Her vision of success is to be present with her kids while owning a company that runs without her constant involvement. In the next 1–3 years, her top goals are: streamline operations, solidify positioning and demand generation, and set the business up to be a sellable asset.
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You are shifting from overextended operator to visionary owner—a founder focused on building a brand that works for you, not because of you.
Performance Dashboard
There’s power in the data
Watch the video breakdown of your personalized Performance Dashboard, which covers data-backed scorecards across:
We assess the health of your business across four critical pillars:
Profitability (Is the revenue working for you?)
Brand Strength (Is your brand communicating clearly and converting?)
Marketing ROI (Is your visibility translating to growth?)
CEO Role (Are you working in your business—or leading it?)
Your Business, Diagnosed
What’s working, what’s lagging, and what’s ready for transformation
We’ve assessed your business across the 5 Pillars of the Asset Ecosystem™, using a clear color indicator:
🟩 Green: On track
🟨 Yellow: Needs attention
🟥 Red: Immediate focus area
Click into each pillar to see your findings and targeted recommendations.
Owner Mindset
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Owner mindset is about stepping out of operator mode and making decisions like the CEO of a future asset. For Steph, this pillar is especially critical because her long-term goal is to sell the business—something that requires strategic delegation, role clarity, and time to work on the business, not in it.
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Steph is still heavily involved in daily operations, handling everything from customer service to fulfillment coordination. While she’s mentally ready to be more hands-off and has no resistance to hiring or delegating, the systems to support that shift aren’t yet in place. She’s reacting to tasks rather than driving strategy—and her energy is pulled in too many directions.
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Steph knows she wants out of the weeds but hasn’t had the time or mental space to plan her exit.
She’s still the default for emails, vendor communication, and ambassador coordination.
There’s a clear gap between her desire to act like an owner and the operational reality.
Her current time spend (15–20 hours/week) is mostly un-leveraged and low-impact.
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Reclaim 5–7 hours/week through AI or outsourced inbox management. This is low-hanging fruit and would instantly reduce Steph’s mental load. Building a simple system to triage, templatize, or route routine customer service and vendor emails would be a game-changer.
Create a weekly CEO Hour. Block 1–2 hours every Monday morning strictly for strategic thinking and planning. No emails, no operations—just time to assess progress, review metrics, and make high-level decisions.
Redefine Steph’s role with a "Not My Job" list. Outline the 3–5 core responsibilities only she should hold onto, and identify what can be offloaded this quarter.
Document a roadmap to exit operations in phases. Break down the transition into manageable layers (e.g., Phase 1 = inbox + ambassador program, Phase 2 = vendor coordination, etc.), with goals for each quarter.
Brand & Market Clarity
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This pillar is about positioning, demand generation, and customer clarity. For a founder preparing for eventual exit, brand clarity is critical—not just to drive consistent sales, but to make the business irresistible to future buyers. For Steph, whose early brand success was built on innovation and community, the next level of growth depends on reclaiming that unique positioning and speaking directly to her most valuable customer.
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Alt Sun started as a category-creating brand, but the positioning has since been diluted. Messaging leans heavily DTC, while the model is clearly B2B. Her audience is unclear: is she talking to spray tan artists or end users? Her visuals are strong but not tied to a strategic brand story. The brand isn’t owning the category anymore—and the competition is catching up.
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Alt Sun was first to market with endurance and melanin-safe formulas—but isn’t leveraging that story anymore. This is a huge missed opportunity as you can lean into being THE one who driving increased BIPOC sunless tanning customers for spray tan businesses nationwide. Not to just “increase customers” but to help these businesses showcase that they’re BIPOC friendly/allies and have solutions made for them. This elevates the spray tan business and elevates the industry.
Current brand messaging and website visuals lean generic, influencer-coded, and trend-driven. You did one tennis shoot which was cute, but you make claims like “girls night out proof, hook up proof, pialtes proof” - we want to see more of this messaging translated into the visuals and marketing.
WHO is the ideal customer? Your brand vibe/marketing is a little confusing - are you for the consumer, or are you for the business owner? None of your brand messaging speaks to the spray tan business owner who is looking for an endurance formula and why ALT SUN is the right one for their busines. Or, if your positioning leans more into BIPOC “niche”, you need to go stronger there. You’re playing it too safe and relying too much on the visual branding and trends vs. OWNING the category, as you should.
The brand has cultural equity (podcast, community, inclusion), but no clear point of view or market stake.
Poor SEO, missing keywords on pages - when Googling “sweat resistent sunless formulas” your website does not show up until page 2 even though you were the first to do it.
You’re relying too much on organic word-of-mouth without a replicable demand engine. This is a risk to any potential buyer; if you’re out of the picture, does the brand lose value? As it is right now, yes.
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Clarify and commit to your primary customer. Decide if Alt Sun is a brand for artists or a lifestyle brand for consumers. B2B can still be cool (and maybe you consider an at-home mousse or lotion someday), but the brand story and content must clearly speak to the spray tan business owner and what Alt Sun helps them achieve. If you need help with this, we still offer Positioning Workshops.
Reposition around the artist’s transformation. Instead of only highlighting product features (sweat resistance, inclusivity), build messaging around what Alt Sun makes possible for the artist: reliability, rave-worthy results, higher rebooks, fewer refunds, etc.
Create a “Why Alt Sun” page or section. Use this to clearly outline benefits, proof, social validation, and founder story. This should be the most strategic page on the site for converting pros.
Show the promise in action. Lean into visuals that dramatize your claims (e.g. sweat test, wear test, color test on melanin-rich skin) and tell story-based content on socials that builds founder authority and audience trust.
Audit and upgrade discoverability. Rework website copy with SEO in mind. Add keywords like “sweat-resistant spray tan solution,” “best sunless formula for dark skin,” etc., so that Alt Sun reclaims first-page search authority.
Revenue Architecture
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Revenue Architecture is about building a scalable, high-margin offer structure with smart pricing and delivery. For Steph, who already has product-market fit and a cult following, this pillar is less about invention and more about refinement—raising profitability, simplifying SKUs, and maximizing reorder value while preserving ease of delivery.
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Alt Sun has strong demand and clear product differentiation, but pricing is misaligned with fulfillment costs. While Steph has outsourced manufacturing and fulfillment to stay lean, her margins are too thin to scale meaningfully. Product roles are well defined, but revenue potential is being capped by pricing, limited upsell opportunities, and unclear bundling or B2B incentives.
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Current margins are 22–33%, which is too low for sustained growth, even with solid ROAS.
Cost of delivery—including fulfillment and Stripe fees—hasn’t been fully accounted for in pricing strategy.
Pricing hasn’t increased since launch, despite category growth and brand equity.
Steph prefers not to bring production in-house, so increasing margin must come from pricing strategy.
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Increase prices by ~20% across the board. Based on current cost structure, modest price increases would bring margins closer to 35–40%, the minimum threshold needed for profitability in an outsourced model. Example: $87 → $106; $76 → $92.
Reposition Ride or Dye or consider sunsetting it. If it’s not pulling its weight financially or strategically, eliminate or bundle it as a limited-time bonus to increase average order value.
Create volume-based or subscription-based incentives. Encourage higher B2B reorder frequency with a “Pro Pricing Tier,” quarterly restock bundles, or early access to new SKUs. Focus on increasing LTV from top artist accounts.
Experiment with bundles or starter kits. Package products by customer goal (e.g., “The Fitness Studio Favorite,” “Made for Melanin Starter Pack”) to increase cart size and showcase product versatility.
Audit and refine fulfillment and payment platforms. Investigate moving from Stripe to Square to reduce processing fees by ~1%, and assess affiliate tracking features for future growth.
Financial Intelligence
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Financial Intelligence is about understanding the numbers that drive your business and making confident, informed decisions using them. For Steph, who has outsourced bookkeeping and feels generally supported in her financial systems, the next level is shifting from passive awareness to active strategy—especially with profitability and future sale in mind.
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Steph has a bookkeeper she trusts and solid systems in place for tracking income and expenses. She receives monthly P&Ls and feels confident that the books are clean. However, she doesn’t fully understand her margins or how to use the data to guide strategic choices like pricing, pay, or reinvestment.
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Gross margins are significantly lower than ideal, ranging from 22%–33% when all delivery costs are included.
Financial statements do not account for variable costs like Stripe fees and shipping when calculating gross profit—leading to an inflated sense of margin.
ROAS is strong, but not enough has been invested in marketing for this to be consistently measured or to know if it is repeatable.
There is no clarity yet on when or how to shift the business to a payroll-based model.
Financial data is being received but not actively used for forecasting, pricing strategy, or decision-making.
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Redefine gross margin tracking to include all variable costs. Update internal reporting to reflect true margin by including payment processing fees, shipping, and fulfillment costs in COGS—not just raw materials.
Shop around for suppliers. While the current vendors seem to be working well for delivery, it may be time to shop around for a new production vendor to see if lower costs can be found. It may be the only way to increase margin while not raising your prices too much.
Develop a simple financial dashboard. Even a monthly Google Sheet summarizing key metrics (revenue, margin, ad spend, cost per order, owner draw) will help you move from passive review to active insight. If you need help with this, this is a service we offer at Daring Haus.
Schedule quarterly financial strategy calls. Not just check-ins, but proactive reviews where you analyze what's working, what needs to change, and how your numbers are trending toward your growth and exit goals. We highly recommend working with a Fractional CFO (like Mike!) because your goals include preparing your business for sale. You need more than clean books; you need a financial strategy that scales with you and increases your valuation NOW, not in 5 years when you want to sell.
Operational Systems
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Operational Systems ensure your business can run smoothly—and independently—without relying on the founder. For Steph, who wants to spend less time in the business and eventually prepare it for sale, building out these systems is essential. Her current setup is functional but overly dependent on her availability, which caps both freedom and value.
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Steph has a few part-time team members and contractors, including support on social and special projects. Fulfillment is outsourced, which is a strength. But there are no centralized SOPs, ambassador/influencer management is manual and clunky, and customer service still flows directly to Steph. A few things are semi-delegated, but nothing is truly systematized or scalable yet.
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Steph is the bottleneck for customer service, vendor communication, and operational fire drills.
There’s no automated system for ambassador management or affiliate tracking.
Email marketing is underutilized and doesn’t have a consistent flow. This isn’t just about marketing; this is a system that can be better leveraged to increase customer lifetime value (LTV), positively impacting everything from sales to marketing costs to profit.
The customer journey is mostly organic, with touchpoints happening on platforms Steph personally manages. A strong lead tracker coupled with data scraping (i.e., a cold leads closing system) would be massively benefit.
If Steph stepped away for 2 weeks, customer emails would go unanswered and order flow would likely get disrupted. That’s a red flag!
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Implement a simple AI or VA-based inbox system. Use templated responses and smart routing to manage routine queries. Even a lightweight solution could save Steph 5–7 hours a week and reduce client frustration.
Map and document the customer journey. Create a simple flowchart showing how customers discover Alt Sun, place orders, get follow-ups, and repurchase. Use this to identify where automation (email flows, reorder nudges) can be introduced.
Create a single-source SOP hub. Begin documenting repeatable tasks, even as voice notes or Looms, to make onboarding future support easier and reduce dependency on Steph’s brain.
Audit and relaunch email marketing. Create a compelling welcome flow with real benefits for joining the list. Use email for consistent education, reorders, and upsells—especially since Alt Sun already has high trust and brand affinity. “Join the Alt Sun Gang” doesn’t really give you a compelling reason to join the newsletter. Email marketing can be an incredibly powerful way to stay top of mind for current customers and even do pre-sales, new releases, etc. so do not sleep on this any longer
CEO Priorities
You don’t need a 50-step plan. You need clear, confident direction.
Here are your top priorities for the next 90 days, designed to build momentum without chaos
Top 3 Priorities
The highest-leverage actions to align your business with your goals.
Priority #1: Raise prices across all SKUs to improve margins and position the brand for growth
Alt Sun cannot scale without better profit margins. Work with your bookkeeper to assess current delivery costs and raise prices by ~20% across all products. Update the website, distributor pricing, and internal materials to reflect new rates. Pair the increase with messaging around premium performance and brand leadership to maintain customer trust.
Priority #2: Reposition the brand with a clear POV that speaks directly to spray tan professionals
Decide whether your core customer is the artist or the end user—and go all in. Rewrite your brand story and homepage copy to speak to what the artist gets by choosing Alt Sun (higher client satisfaction, loyalty, ease). Create a “Why Alt Sun” section or landing page that makes the value clear and aligns messaging across your site, social, and email.
Priority #3: Systematize your most time-consuming workflows to free up 5–7 hours per week
Start with customer service. Use templates, a VA, or even a lightweight AI inbox system to handle repeat questions and vendor comms. Then tackle ambassador management—migrate to a tool or automation system that tracks engagement, codes, and payouts. Set a goal to fully offload these two workflows in the next 30 days so you can focus on growth. A custom automated workflow built through Make.com or n8n can utilize AI models to pull data and perform these tasks for you.
Quick Wins
Simple, immediate steps you can take to build confidence and create space.
Step #1: Create canned responses and filters for your inbox
Start with your most common email types—order confirmations, shipping delays, ambassador inquiries, and vendor follow-ups. Write 5–7 templated replies and set up filters in Gmail or HelpScout to auto-label or forward messages. You’ll immediately reduce mental clutter and reclaim time with zero tech investment.
Step #2: Update pricing in your backend and notify key customers
Use the next 48 hours to update product pricing across your website, distributor accounts, and internal spreadsheets. Draft a simple, confident announcement to your core artist customers explaining the change—position it around rising costs and premium formulation, not apology. This creates immediate revenue lift without needing new customers.
Step #3: Rework your Instagram bio and pinned post to speak to spray tan pros
Your audience needs clarity at first glance. Update your bio to say exactly who you’re for and what your formulas do (e.g. “Endurance sunless solutions for pros who don’t play”). Pin a post that introduces the brand from a spray tan artist’s POV, with testimonials or behind-the-scenes info to build trust instantly.
Biggest Lever
The one action that will create the most ripple effects for your business.
Redefine your brand positioning and messaging to speak directly to the professional spray tan artist.
Alt Sun was a category pioneer—but the market has caught up, and the brand story hasn’t kept pace. The most impactful move Steph can make is to sharpen her positioning and commit to a clear POV that speaks directly to the B2B buyer. This includes reworking the homepage copy, updating product pages to highlight artist outcomes, launching a “Why Alt Sun” explainer, and creating consistent content that reinforces Alt Sun as the premium solution for ambitious pros. With this clarity, every other growth lever—from pricing to marketing to repeat sales—becomes exponentially more effective.