Show Notes
Maximizing your business and bringing in new clients. It sounds great right? But actually achieving those goals is a lot harder than it sounds. That why we focus so intensely on it in Phase 6 of the BLL. It comes at the end of the consolidation phases and before expansion. Expanding is incredibly exciting but you have to make sure the business is ready for it.
Maximize
The first thing you have to consider is what kind of business you’re operating. If you’re running a factory maximizing might mean bringing on several new employees. If you’re running a professional services company maximizing might mean finding a few new, higher-paying clients. Think about what kind of business you’re operating and what maximizing means for you. You can write down those ideas in the workbook for this episode.
You have to work at least four hours every week on your business at a bare minimum. So what should you be working on while maximizing your business? What are the skill gaps you need filled? If you’re a really good technician maximizing might mean bringing on someone much better at the entrepreneurial aspects of running a company. Or perhaps you need someone more skilled at human resources and management. As you grow your time is going to become much more important. You need to start thinking about the areas of the business others can take over.
There are a couple of different ways to think about maximizing your business. The first is maximizing your revenue. This is something every business owner wants to do. But you need to think about what that actually means for you. Getting more out of your employees is one option. Another is to increase prices. The 80/20 principle is instructive here. 80% of your money comes from 20% of your clients. That means it may be time to cull some your client base and focus on the ones who are paying you the most.
Bringing on investors
Finding new money is a critical part of expanding your business. But deciding on where to get that money isn’t always easy. Remember that you don’t want to rush into this. Get as much advice as you can. Your lawyer and your accountant should be consulted all the way through this process.
There are many different kinds of investors. They include:
- Venture capitalists
VC professionals use other peoples money to invest in promising companies. They will want to see a proven track-record or a big upside from some new product or service. There risk/reward analysis is going to be much more extensive than other kinds of investors. - Crowdsourcing
This is becoming a more popular way to fund new and existing businesses. It’s especially popular in developing countries but is becoming more common on countries like Australia. - Family and Friends
This money has yet another layer of risk. Not only are you risking an investors money – you’re also risking your personal relationships. Document everything if you decide to go this route. You don’t want any misunderstandings complicating things in the future.
More about this Show
We started Business Legal Lifecycle to create a simple way for you to understand complex legal terms. Most importantly we want to help you to develop a plan to take your business successfully into the future. There’s a startling statistic the underscores the importance of developing a solid plan. The majority of business owners are just seven months away from losing everything. A single aspect of your business that is not set-up correctly can shut down your whole operation very quickly. Legal advice is not cheap and even when you can afford it there is often a divide between lawyers and their clients. We want to close that gap once and for all. We want to put legal knowledge and tools into your hand to prevent the worst from happening to you.
Twice a week we are going to deliver those tools right to your home or office with Business Legal Lifecycle TV. We’ll start the week with Fast Fix Monday, a short 5-10 minute video that will tackle a single issue that businesses have to deal with. Then on Wednesday’s our main show will feature with more fulsome discussions and interviews all delivered in a straightforward and easy to understand format.
