Starting a Business with No Experience - Just Debts
I have never really had a proper job. I started my first business when I was 21. For the first few years this was a huge struggle. My wife worked and I wasn't bringing in any income so we built up very large credit card debts. After 3 years of getting nowhere in my business, working 10-12 hours per day, 6-7 days per week I knew something had to change .
This is me and my boys playing at a Scottish Castle
When I first started my business, everyone around me told me I was mad. They said, "go and get a job and start your business when you are in your mid thirties when you have some more experience". I dismissed them at the time but underneath I knew they had a point. With this in mind I started to look for successful businesses and successful business people and learn from them. I joined every business club and networking event I could find and setup my business in a small office on a Business park surrounded my lots of other small businesses.
"They said, 'go and get a job'"
I am the most logical person that I know, and I strongly believe that to be successful almost everything can be broken down into a set of simple steps. When I am learning anything I simply find the person that does it well and copy them! The interesting thing here was that although there was a lot to learn from people it was more obvious how bad many of the businesses were. I could see business owner after business owner working silly hours for small returns with mostly unmotivated staff that didn't stick around long. I think many of them started with dreams but had lost sight of these as they became so busy in the day to day running of the company. It seemed to me that 95% of all businesses that I met operated without any plan or real direction, and as a result they never really went anywhere.
"95% of all businesses that I met operated without any plan"
I knew that I wanted more, and frankly I wanted to prove my doubters wrong, so I learned my most important rule - Businesses Need a Plan to go anywhere. During these early years in business I also learnt a number of other important lessons from my experience and those around me:
I learned from an eccentric economist with an office near mine the importance of profit, its effect on your business and the effect bad customers can have on that.
I also learned the importance of being able to "sell", and sell well, with the ability to negotiate so that your customer feels they have a good deal as well as you. Being able to sell is more important than having the best product.
I also saw people working from tiny run down offices making good money selling to large businesses which made me realize that your brand and image is what you make it, and does not have to be expensive and most small business people give these things a higher priority then they should.
The final and most important point was that most of these businesses never grew. Staff came and went, but they never got any bigger. The clear reason behind this was that the entrepreneurial owners just did not delegate to their staff and when they did they could not help but get involved. This de-motivated the staff and meant the owners became overwhelmed with the level of work they had.
This is my house in the country I built last year - Will it ever be 100% finished?
I made some money in those early years, but not much. The breakthrough for me happened when I became friendly with one of my customers. We became great friends and played a lot of sport and socialized together. He had always wanted to start a business but had never felt brave enough to do it. To cut a long story short I sold him a minority stake in my business so we could run it together. He brought very different skills than I had at the time including strong negotiation and financial expertise amongst several others. Together, as a team, we complimented each other and this was to prove a long and enduring partnership. However, I would say that the key turning point of my business was the fact that my colleague had left a highly paid job and to move to my business he needed to be paid the minimum he could afford to live on, this was way more than I had paid myself. Obviously I insisted that I would be paid the same. The business could not afford this, but this insecurity gave us focus and soon enough it wasn't a problem and the business grew to afford it. "Using the rules that I had learned we grew the business and every year"
The business struggled for another year or so, but slowly we started to get some good reliable staff, put in place good financial reporting and have a clear plan of what we wanted to do. I learned that profit in business is the most important thing, but profit over the long term is the second most important thing. This was only possible if you have motivated staff, offered a good product and you look after your customers well. Using the rules that I had learned we grew the business and every year it got bigger and bigger and bigger -in terms of employees, revenue and profit. We outgrew most of the businesses around us and became very successful and other businesses looked to learn from us.
I was paid very well, but on top of this we generated hundreds of thousands and then a million dollars (around £600K+) of profit (note not revenue - profit!!). And we did this year on year with a company that people loved to deal with, staff stayed for years with us and that had lots of future potential. On this journey I had to set up lots of processes for implemening our products, employ lots of people, set up a management team, repeatedly implement change based on feedback and reporting on various elements of the business. I made loads of mistakes and did loads of things wrong, but we learned from each of them and became a better company. The business started to run so well that in the spring and summer I would only work 4 days per week spending long weekends sailing my yacht in Scotland with my family.
In 2008 I sold the business to a UK publicly listed company for £3.7million / $6million. I continued to work for a year full time to engineer my exit and then took the whole of 2009 off to build my dream house in the countryside of Scotland and do some voluntary work. A testament to the company is that it has continued its growth and strong morals since I have left and I'm sure it will go on to even greater things. At 35 years old I have everything that I could want, a lovely family, an amazing house, fast cars, a Yacht financial independence and I don't owe any money to anyone.
Running a business to a simple formula bought me all of this. I have been very fortunate and I am passionate about wanting to give something back to society. When I sold my company I resolved to spend some of my time in 2009 doing some charity work.
"As a result of my mentoring I have become very frustrated"
I decided that I wanted to do something that I was passionate about and something that had a positive effect on my community so I decided to mentor a small number of businesses in my local area so I could boost the local economy. Once I started the mentoring it was immediately clear how little most business owners know about growing a business. Virtually every business owner I met was drowning in their workload and was not giving their "business" enough attention. Additionally I've found that most owners don't have knowledge of the simple strategies and techniques that I use on a day-to-day basis and as a result are missing on thousands of dollars / pounds of profit. With just a few sessions most of these businesses changed their outlook and started to generated very very positive results.
"...the point of a business advisor or mentor is that they have been there and made the journey you are undertaking"
As a result of my mentoring I have become very frustrated at so called "business advisors / mentors". When I attend mentoring events I seem to be the only one, or in a very tiny minority of mentors who have actually run a business and been successful with the rest working for, or owning, coaching businesses. To me the point of a business advisor or mentor is that they have been there and made the journey you are undertaking. If they haven't then surely their advice lacks experience and a real world perspective. Doesn't this mean that they are charging you to tell you something you could read from a $20 book you can get from Amazon?
In the last few months I have been establishing a couple of new ventures in publishing and video production (which is my hobby). I'm also spending quite a bit of time helping business through this website, and in person, to grow their profits and make a lot more money.
My Personal Life
This is me at the Helm of my yacht "Revolution"
I can't complain about my lifestyle ;) I live in my amazing house in the country with my beautiful wife and two young boys and I work when I want and when I enjoy it (which is most of the time). I love sailing with my family and friends, and my businesses have allowed me the opportunity to own a nice sized Yacht that I keep on the west coast of Scotland. At weekends we all sail off to the Scottish islands and find somewhere nice and remote to stay with a beach (that the kids love and local nice bar / restaurant for us!). My favorite hobby is video photography, (hence the videos on this site!) It all started as my sister lives in New Zealand and we forgot to send her a card in time for her birthday so we made her a video with the kids in it and posted on Youtube. Since then I've been addicted and loved producing simple web based videos. My other big passion is helping other business owners. I love getting a kick out of seeing them do well and helping them believe what they really can achieve with a bit of effort.
What I have achieved is attainable by anyone.
Why Have I done so Well?
The answer is very simple. Firstly I always expected to do well and I dreamed about owning a expensive sports car as part of that dream (which I now own). Unless you are lucky you won't be successful if you don't dream about what you want to achieve. Secondly I have a skill of looking at other people/ business and copying their successful ideas.
Over the years this has allowed me to create a "Success formula" that I've followed time and time again. It's simple but effective and I've applied it many times and I'm doing it today in my current business. The thing is, none of this is rocket science, it just remembering to do and measure simple things at certain times."I can teach you my simple business success formula"
If you have some vision and desire then I can teach you my simple business success formula so that you too can get the benefits I have.
Remember I am successful because I made a lot of profit year on year in my business not because I sold my company for $6Million. - Always focus on making profit, if you do you will find you get more time, more money and can do more things with your life.
I write / film a video blog, it has a dedicated category for start-ups and another for established businesses who what to grow profits. In this blog and my "free videos" section I've put together invaluable hints and tips that have helped me make more money.