But the inputs to his podcast are merely time (and one-time equipment costs). As you point out, a car dealership needs to spend a ton of money on the inputs, but that doesn't translate to a podcast business.
"But the inputs to his podcast are merely time (and one-time equipment costs)"
Well no - they have, among others, the costs I mentioned in my second sentence. But maybe I'm wrong, hence why 'revenue' doesn't mean much - it'd be much more interesting to look at some real numbers instead of the clickbait of just using whatever is the highest number one can find.
An Uber driver doesn't 'make' 15k when he gets paid 15k a year by Uber. He has to pay for gas and maintenance and whatnot. He 'makes' whatever is left over after that, just like any job where one has to pay for (part of) business-related costs themselves. A construction worker who has to pay for his own safety shoes @ $250 and is paid 30k doesn't 'make' 30k, he makes 29750. In this last example the distinction is so tiny that it doesn't matter, but it all depends on the ratios.
Now I realize that in some (dare I say 'less financially savvy') circles the amount that comes in is called the amount that one 'makes', but no person with any (business) financial skills would call it that. And from a website that purports to target those interested in running ones own business, I would expect some more rigor in this respect.
A fair point. However, those are all relatively fixed. A car dealer needs to buy a new car to sell one. They don't necessarily have to invest more in the items you mentioned to grow their revenues.
TLDR: businesses that scale vs those that dont : )
Well, the flip side of your argument is that since "his inputs are only time," then he only has a fixed amount of time to make money from. Whereas, as long as the car dealer can sell every car he buys, he just has to keep buying cars in order to increase his revenues. Clearly there's more to both of these statements than that, but that's the point!
In any case, roel_v is pointing out that revenue isn't a very good metric without more data to evaluate it.
I'd like you to provide an example of a business that doesn't scale :-)
I hear you. I don't find the argument that robust given that everyone is limited by their time - car salesman included - but I hear you.
Agree that more data helps. For a headline I'd rather see revenue than margin or profit, as those are more subjective (or net revenue, if you're selling goods).
Unscalable business? Obviously a subjective take but, to me, that means anything where you're charging by the hour (e.g. consulting).
Agreed that's simplistic, but it's a starting point.
Assuming taxes, office overhead, other processing stuff, keeping profit overhead in place, etc, one could still be paying 3 people $5k-$10k/month with room to spare.
