Silicon Valley venture-capital-funded start-up companies have created a whole world of business advice and jargon to go with it. Much of that advice is irrelevant to the small, privately funded service firm owners reading this! However, one VC concept I find fascinating is “Product Market Fit.” (Or PMF as the tech bros call it.) Because…
Focusing our business on solving a specific problem for a specific group of people (e.g., “Accounting and financial operations for brewery owners.”) makes growing a business so much easier. But at the beginning, everything about this process feels wrong! It can feel like we’re going backward. Imposter syndrome is everywhere, and your gut tells you…
When I started my business, I was selling help with business operations for founders wanting to grow their businesses. That’s what I thought people wanted, and I had a track record of doing it. Sales are easy when you sell folks what they already want! I was riding a Trojan Horse. Talking about growth (what…
Last week we talked about the three drivers of value, scale, scope, and uniqueness. If you want to grow your profitability, you can’t pursue all three – they have different trade-offs and strategies. You’ve got to pick one. Let’s look at those trade-offs to find out which path is right for you. Scale Agencies that…
Most of us agree that the value you can charge is directly related to the value you create. So to make more money, you must create more value. But how do you measure how much value you are creating? On a recent episode of Michael Neill’s excellent podcast, “Caffeine for the Soul” he talked about…
I was talking with a friend who owns his own business. I often tell him that he’s my business hero – he makes a terrific living for his family and significantly impacts his clients – and does it all in less than 20 hours a week. But that’s a story for another day… Anyway, He…
For a minute, let’s imagine that there are two parallel worlds. In one world, we’ll call it the rosy world; opportunity is plentiful. When you need new business, you can find it. Not just any client, but good profitable clients who value you at your best. When I meet clients living in the rosy world,…
There’s no right way to run your business. No one can tell you that you have the wrong goals. Do you want to be famous? Do you want to be influential? Do you want to have a huge audience? Do you want to maximize your financial rewards? You can do that. Do you want the…
As we’ve leaned into getting ourselves out of the day-to-day grind by letting go of doing the thing and focusing on building the system that does the thing, I want to pause and think about “the why.” If you let go of the thing you trained your whole life to do; you need a powerful…
I’m in an agency owner’s slack channel where it’s common to ask questions about how to improve and grow businesses. I enjoy popping in every few days and joining in the conversation! Last week, one question stopped me in my tracks. This agency owner asked: “If anyone is willing to share, I’d like to know…