How To Manage Your Business According To A Business Expert

Joseph Liu recently wrote about things he would have loved to know before he started his own business in a bid to help those just starting out a business or those thinking about it. According to Liu who started his business 5 years ago, he has recorded a lot of first experiences including building his first website, creating his first course online, among a host of other things.

With the experience, he wrote that he has found that shifting from full-time employment in the corporate world to becoming a business owner in charge of everything pertaining to the business has taught him different lessons that he would have loved to know before he started the business.

1. Outsourcing doesn’t feel so good at the onset

As a business owner who is self-employed, a lot of people assume it means you have to get everything done all by yourself. Liu said when he started, he had that same notion and so he tried to do everything all by himself.  However, he wasted a whole lot of time in an attempt to get everything done all by himself.

He later decided that he would outsource every task that did not fall within his major area of interest or expertise including logo design, Web Development, trademark filming, document design, animation for his short films, photo editing, among others. He noted that even though outsourcing amounts to an investment of both money and time, it actually helps in freeing up one’s energies and focus. Also, it helps one concentrate on the actual job that brings in the money. It also helps one to work on the best growth strategy for the progress of the business.

Liu said he wasted a lot of time when he started as he tried to get everything done all by himself

2. Invest in the right things

Liu mentioned that at the start of his business, he had plans to make his business run on a low-cost operation and low-overhead which implied that he had to do his best to reduce unnecessary expenses. As a result of that, he said he ended up carrying out a lot of tasks manually against investing in administrative tools, services, and software.  He said he did things the old-fashioned way and that ended up consuming his time. For instance, he used Excel sheet for tracking his finances but it became messy whenever he had to track his income, expenses, and invoice.

He said he later decided to invest in paid solutions which he admits are actually worth the sum he paid. For tracking all his business finances, he mentioned that he makes use of QuickBooks Pro. For automating his scheduling processes, he makes use of ScheduleOnce. Also, he said he decided to automate his email marketing by signing up for a MailChimp account.

According to Liu, the commitment to overhead business expenses created a sense of urgency about growing his business as a way of justifying the spending. He noted that commitment to overhead business expenses sometimes feel scary when one is just starting out. He, however, added that investment in the appropriate overhead can help in saving time, building a solid foundation that supports business growth and it also helps the business operations to be more professional.

The commitment to overhead business expenses created a sense of urgency about growing his business as a way of justifying the spending.

3. Your Business Will be Different Within a Year

Liu admitted to being a perfectionist noting that it has helped him to consistently deliver high-quality work to his client which has, in turn, helped the growth of his business. However, his perfectionist attitude has also caused him to invest too much effort and time into making things right and later exiting such investment within a short period of time.

For coming up with a company name for the first time, he said he invested a lot of energy into that as he ran surveys, tried to trademark the company name and even built his branding all around the name. At the point, he felt the name perfectly covered all his work as well as the vision he had for the business. However, before the end of one year, the name became too limiting in his opinion. Liu noted that he has learned that a new business actually evolves way faster than a person could have ever imagined and one year down the line, a business could look totally different from what it was a year earlier.

One year from now, your business could look totally different from what it is today

For instance, he said when he started, his clients were different, his investment endeavors were different and his fees were lower. The implication of the change comes in two-fold. First, it means one should make decisions that maximize versatility as one doesn’t know the direction the business could go. Also, as regarding the company collateral, Liu advised aiming for what is high quality and not just perfect quality because there is a possibility that things could change sometime down the line.