My 21 Do’s and Don’ts for Creating A Successful Business in One Year

Starting a business is not for everyone -- by any stretch. It’s hard work, can be stressful, and outcomes are uncertain. Progress can be slow. There is a steep learning curve, and you’ll make mistakes before you figure it all out. ?Some of those mistakes may even cost you dearly in terms of time and money, but each one teaches you something.?

And then one day, if you’re lucky (and skilled), you’ll find yourself enjoying a thriving business that you built by yourself, for yourself, on your terms. ???

I started my business, Globia Content Marketing, 18 months ago. It’s been quite a ride, but I am going to call it a success:

·????? I’ve surpassed my corporate income

·????? I don’t work more than 30 hours week

·????? I do work I enjoy and am good at (and can decline work that’s not a good fit for me)

·????? I work for great people who trust me and treat me as the expert

People ask me all the time how I built my business.? I meet so many people who have been laid off or are just burned out by corporate and want to do their own thing so they can enjoy the benefits of financial and professional freedom. ?

Once I decided to stop looking for full time work and open my own business, I built quickly because I only want to work a handful more years. I don’t have much time to waste.?

Here are the 20 things I did…and wish I didn’t do. I hope it helps you on your journey.? ??

1 - Write out a business plan.

This plan should contain your ideas of what you would sell, to whom, and at what price. It covers how you will market yourself and where your target audience could be. It details startup costs.? Do nothing else until you do this! It gave me so much clarity and solidified my belief that my business idea had legs.? There are lots of templates online.?

2 - Choose a niche!

A lot of entrepreneurs are afraid that if they narrow the field they play in they will leave money on the table. But the ‘riches really are in the niches’. Don’t be afraid of this. Niching down makes the work easier to sell, market, and execute. ?It’s the sole reason why I was able to onboard 12 clients in my first year.? (I do content marketing in one vertical only and am able to leverage 25 years of experience in this industry).?

3 - Keep it simple with the software.

Yes, you need some basic tools to get your business started, but you can also spend a lot of money on tools and automations you just don’t need (yet or ever). I use Calendly for setting up calls, Loom for recording videos, Slack to chat with clients and my contractors, ClickUp for project management, Zoom, Wave for bookkeeping, and ChatGPT.? Under $100/month.?

4 - Stay organized with a PM tool.

A lot of entrepreneurs fall down here. You have to be organized to be an entrepreneur. Use a PM tool to track all your leads and conversations and use that tool to manage all your activities for each client. I have a board for each of my clients and invite them to it (if they don’t have their own PM tool that I join).?

5 - Open an LLC to protect your business.

You can just be a contractor, but it makes sense to protect your personal finances by opening up an LLC. In most states it doesn’t cost very much ($100 in Idaho). Also, open up separate checking and savings accounts for your business and a dedicated credit card. It just makes accounting so much easier.?

Also, figure out deductions, taxes, and payroll (if you are an s-corp) early, so you don’t get slammed at tax time.? It can be confusing and complicated, but it is so important to keep on top of the financial side of your business.?

6 - Outsource what you’re bad at – quickly.

Don’t waste your time trying to learn something you’re bad at when someone else can do it for you for a reasonable cost. Bookkeeping is a prime example.? Web design is another. ?Email automations and nurture sequences (ie, Mailchimp) is a third.? Figure out the things that suck up your time and frustrate you and outsource them quickly. Do not stay on the struggle bus!

7 - Skip creating the course and the digital product.

There are lots of entrepreneur coaches and celebrities (like Justin Welsh) who will tell you to create a digital course and digital product so you can have ‘multiple income streams’. You’ll also hear people talk about passive income streams. There is no such thing.? Start with consulting or services, and maybe look at these things down the line after you have a large online audience to sell such digital products too.?

Same goes for starting a newsletter. Just hold on that for a while. They take up a lot of time and you won’t have the reach you want until you have a large following.

8 - Hold on the 1/1 coaching.

If you are a good student and ambitious you can get much of what you need from books and podcasts.? I’ll list them below as a footnote to this post. Individual coaches are very expensive ($500/hour) and for me it was not worth it until I spent some time trying to work things out for myself. Engage a coach when you really need someone to get you unstuck.?

9 - Join an entrepreneur community for $100/month.

There are several entrepreneurship communities out there that can be a great source of support and information. Often the community leader (a coach) is very involved, answering questions and engaging with people in the community. They also often bring in speakers and provide templates and frameworks for you to use in your business.? Find a coach who you like and join their community. Thomas Strider has a great community. :)

10 - Go deep and get better at your craft.

When you are a consultant you do not have a team to rely on. You’ll feel your gaps intensely, and quickly.? There really is no hiding from your weak spots when you are a ‘solopreneur’. Take yourself to school (podcasts, courses, newsletters, whatever).? I quickly taught myself SEO, AI tools for marketers, and social media.? This also gives you a lot more to talk about on social media because you’ll be plugged in to your profession.

11 - Figure out marketing on LinkedIn.

This is really the only place for most of us to gain partners, find clients, and meet peers.? Figure out how to write for social and post 2-3x/week. If you hate posting, then just start finding and commenting on relevant accounts.?

A caveat on this: many of us accidentally build networks of our peers because our content attracts our peers. Find a way to attract target customers also, which means posting content that is very very specific to them.?

Follow Sara Royf for clear, focused LinkedIn tips and coaching. ?(Thank you, Sara, for all the help. :)

12 - Don’t count on inbound.

Many people think all that posting on LinkedIn is going to unleash a flood of clients asking to work with you in our DMs (and the LinkedIn gurus promise it). It’s just not true, especially if there are dozens of people in your space and you find it hard to differentiate yourself.? So, figure out how to do outbound on LinkedIn, and by this I mean creating a commenting and direct message strategy to connect with target customers.?

13 - Build a peer and referral network.

Find peers (people who do what you do) that you resonate with and reach out to them for coffee chats to see how you can support and learn from each other. Also, find people who do work related to what you do who can offer services adjacent to yours and fill in your gaps in knowledge. For me, that’s technical SEO people, digital marketers (paid) and video people.? Those are not services I offer but they are services my clients want sometimes and I want to be ready to bring a partner to the table.?

14 - Figure out a simple offer.

You can’t sell your services until you know what they are. Also, if your services are different for each client, you will have trouble scaling and executing in the long term. You want 1-2 simple, clear offers that you can sell and execute over and over again. Ken Yarmosh’s course on Scalable Service Offers will help you button this up. He’ll also teach you how to present your offers to customers, and the difference between legacy clients and lighthouse clients. Lighthouse clients are what you want; legacy ones you’ll struggle to service and then get rid of.? You’ll save yourself a lot of pain if you set this up correctly at the start.

15 - Figure out your pricing. ??

This is WAY HARDER than you might think. For starters, experienced people (especially women) often underprice themselves.? This is a mistake because it’s hard to raise prices later. ?Also, the higher your prices are the more customers will associate you with premium services and outcomes. That’s what you want, right?

So, find out what you are worth (by talking to people and doing research) and don’t hesitate to charge it.?

Also, try to avoid hourly pricing – it creates a situation that is less strategic and more production oriented, in which customers can just drop work on you and your income won’t be stable. Project based or retainers are better.

16 - Don’t bother with an expensive website.

I spent hours on my beautiful website, and it just sits there. You just don’t need one, especially if you are marketing primarily on LinkedIn.? People will not find you by search (because SEO takes soooo long to build up).? If you want a place to point people to with full detail about your offers, then just create a simple landing page.?

If you want a place to host longer form content to help build your credibility you can create articles on LinkedIn.?

You’ll want a site eventually, but you don’t need one to get started. And once you create a site, for the love of cookies keep it simple.?

17 - Get testimonials as soon as you can.

You might feel awkward asking for them, but sharing testimonials from happy customers is critical for building your business.? (This is your ‘social proof’.) All of my clients have been happy to write me 3-4 sentences on our work together. You then use them on social media, in your about section, in proposal materials, and on your (eventual) website.

18 - Try to get on relevant podcasts.?

This one can really open up your world. Find out what podcasts your target customers listen to and pitch to be a guest (look up templates online for guest pitching).? I wouldn’t bother with podcasts related to your profession (in my case content marketing podcasts). It’s nice to be on those, yes, but my target audience doesn’t listen to them.?

19 - Ignore people who brag on social media and gurus who have THE answer

There is a large class of folks on social who brag about how much they make – mute those voices. It just makes you feel bad.?

You can go down quite a rabbit hole and end up feeling quite miserable if you follow people who use ‘envy marketing’ (statements about how much they make and pictures of their feet by the pool).

Also, ignore annoying entrepreneur gurus who have an easy ‘framework’ or ‘system’ for building your business.? One size does not fit all entrepreneurs.?

It’s just such crap - enough said.

20 - Put good contracts in place.

Create a short statement of work that covers your scope. It should be clear on what you include, exclude, your pricing, payment terms, scope changes, and any work guarantees. Get it signed. There should never be any question about the work you're doing and a good contract protects both parties.

21 - Enjoy the ride

Remember that you are building something for yourself that will give you the levels of freedom, autonomy, fulfillment, and income that you didn’t have in corporate.? It will get tough but there is nothing that feels quite like building something that you love to do and that sustains your personal and financial goals.? And the best thing for me has been how proud my teenager is of me. He thinks his mom is badass and wants to go into entrepreneurship himself.? (Victory, right?)

I also owe my husband a huge thanks for listening to me, supporting me, and being my bookkeeper. Jason Densmer, PE

Resources for you to read and listen to these on building a business

Books

• Starting a Business: QuickStart guide – Ken Colwell
• Rework – Jason Fried
• Two Week’s Notice – Amy Porterfield
• Rise of the Youpreneur – Chris Ducker
• $100M Offers – Alex Hormozi (take it with a grain of salt, but you do need to read it)?

Podcasts

• Six Figure Shift – Peggy Re James https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/six-figure-shift/id1671248895?i=1000648068852
• Business Chix – Natalie Eckdahl, MBA https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bizchix-podcast-female-entrepreneurs-women-small/id811105481
• Smart Gets Paid – Leah Neaderthal https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-smart-gets-paid-podcast/id1531756453
• Coaches, Consultants + Money - Erica Goode, CPA https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coaches-consultants-and-money/id1645179181
• Tax Saving$ - Mike Jesowshek, CPA
• 7-Figure Leap – Dustin Riechmann ??
• Grow Your Independent Consulting Business – Melisa Liberman
• Six Figure Secrets of Fractional Experts
• The BS-free Service business – Maggie Patterson https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bs-free-service-business-show/id1098466347
• 10 Minute MBA – Scott D. Clary
• Duped: The Dark Side of Online Business Dr. Michelle Mazur