3 Life Changing Business Lessons I Wish I Knew When I Was Just Getting Started
I would have saved myself a lot of stress and anxiety
This week, I’ve been in a reflective mood. Maybe it’s because I turned 40 a few months ago, maybe it’s because The Little Dude starts kindergarten next month, or maybe it’s because Juliana’s business is taking off and we’ve been having long talks about the early building stage.
Regardless, I compiled a list of lessons I wish I knew when I was younger and newer to entrepreneurship.
Today, I am sharing them with you.
LFG. 🔥
Lesson 1 - Nothing Matters Except For Sales. Get Cash Money In Your Bank Account
In the beginning, I thought I had to be everywhere.
I spent hours every day writing newsletters, filming videos, planning YouTube vlogs, and doing general marketing.
Looking back, I can see that I wasted so much energy on tasks that did not move the needle.
If your effort does not generate leads and sales, it is a waste of time. Selling your service is the only objective that matters early on. You could argue it’s the only objective that ever matters. Everything you do is a means to an end, and that end is generating sales.
You need basic marketing to generate leads, but building community, shaping narrative, and changing culture are early distractions.
Your community forms naturally as customers have incredible experiences with your business and tell their friends.
Focus on sales first. Everything else follows.
To keep your marketing simple while you focus on selling, use this streamlined playbook:
Build a website with a lead capture form to serve as your home base.
Write one piece of content per week to build search authority over time, and launch a weekly newsletter.
Create one piece of social media content per day and use Publer to cross post it and schedule it across all platforms.
Spend 10 minutes a day engaging on LinkedIn.
Record one YouTube video every week.
This covers your brand awareness and positions you as an authority. Spend the rest of your time talking to prospective clients, attending events, making direct connections, and selling your services.
Get cash in your account. Life and business become infinitely easier with capital. Ignore the shiny objects and grand visions until you hit $1M in annual revenue.
At that milestone, the rest falls into place.
Lesson 2 - Hire People As Soon As Possible
At 25, you feel like you have no time and nothing moves fast enough. At 40, you realize everything moves slower, so it pays to be methodical.
The anxiety I felt at 25 kept me hoarding cash. I thought profits were just money to store away. Looking back, I realize time is far more valuable than profits.
Make every sacrifice to hire team members and employees.
Nothing beats a trained team with diverse skillsets executing alongside you. You cannot do it all alone, and even if you could, why would you want to?
As long as your basic personal needs are covered, reinvest your profits and cash flow into your team, infrastructure, and foundation.
I am back in heavy investment mode right now. My priority is ensuring my team gets paid, taking my baseline salary, and funneling all remaining profits into expanding Stodzy.
Treat money as a tool to create future leverage, not an asset to hoard. Money is energy, so put it where it yields the highest return.
Lesson 3 - Give Extra Attention To Your Books, Your Accounting, And Your Taxes
I’m embarrassed to admit that I recently learned this lesson the hard way.
For 15 years, I was always on top of my taxes. I had a healthy fear of working hard only to get blindsided by a surprise tax bill.
I used the same accounting firm from 2010 until two years ago, when they sold to a new firm. Suddenly, a guy named Richard was managing my account.
Long story short, I discovered overnight that my taxes were filed incorrectly, I was a year behind, and I owed $300,000.
I eventually filed amendments and recovered about $90,000, but the situation caused massive, unnecessary stress.
For many founders, a mistake like this is a death sentence. I’m in a fortunate position so it didn’t hurt my business, but it caused a lot of un necessary stress and anxiety.
I always feel like the time I am managing my books is a waste, because I would rather be doing work that generates growth. But as I’ve gotten more mature, I realize the long conversations with my accountant are always worth it.
Clean books are a business asset. Treat them as such.
Do yourself a favor and hire a proper bookkeeper and accountant. A true professional saves you money, gives you clarity, and guarantees no nightmare surprises in your future.
In Conclusion
Be patient, my young padawan.
I remember sitting in my old office in Boca, staring at the wall, thinking Google might disappear in a few years and crush my business.
Fears and insecurities are normal at the start of your journey. If you feel anxious about the future, welcome to the club.
The remedy for that anxiety is patience combined with fundamentals. Opportunity always exists, but you can only capture it if your accounting is clean, your team is solid, and your sales engine brings in steady cash flow.
Nothing else matters.
Love you guys. Talk to you next week.
Tim
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