← The $100 MBA Show
The $100 MBA Show
MBA2582 Q&A Wednesday: How Do I Build a Business When Everyone Says It Won’t Work?
00:13:49
What do you do when everyone around you says your business idea is doomed to fail? Should you fight? Prove them wrong? Or is there wisdom in their doubts?
Loading summary
Transcript10 lines
- [00:01]
Jim
And we're back, folks. It looks like Jim from sales just got in from his client lunch and he's got receipts. His next meeting is in two minutes. The team is asking, can he get through his expenses in that time? He's going for it. Is that his phone? He's snapping a pic. He's texting Ramp. Jim is fast, but this is unheard of. That's it. He's done it. It's unbelievable.
- [00:21]
Ramp Ad
On ramp, expenses are faster than ever. Just submit them with a text. Switch your business to ramp.com.
- [00:31]
Omar Zenhom
What do you do when everyone around you says your business idea is doomed to fail? Should you fight? Should you prove them wrong? Or is there wisdom in their doubts? In today's Q and A Wednesday episode, we get into a question from Hasan that dives into this exact dilemma. How do I build a business when everyone says it won't work? My promise in today's episode is to uncover the truth about validating your business idea. We want to avoid blind faith. We want to build a case that proves your concept. Your idea has real potential. Welcome back to the A Hundred Dollar MBA show. I'm your host, Omar Zenholm, where we deliver practical business lessons three times a week. Monday, Wednesday, Friday. My job is to help you take action so you can start, grow and scale your business. Today's episode is Q and A Wednesday. If you have a question you want to ask, by the way, just go ahead and ask it over@100mba.net Q and we'll answer it right here on Q and A Wednesday. Today's question is from Hasan and Hassan asked, how do I build a business when everyone says it won't work? First of all, Hasan, congratulations on having the courage to think differently, to go against the grain. The world's most successful entrepreneurs have all faced skepticism at some point. But here's the key. You can't rely on gut feelings and ignore criticism. You just can't. Okay? You need to validate your idea with facts you can prove. But let's back up a bit. One of the things I had to learn the hard way is how to get my mind right when it came to my ideas, my business ideas, and the advice I would give myself. I can go back in time is don't fall in love with any particular idea. This is one of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make, including myself, like I just mentioned. But here's the thing. One of the best ways to change this is to change your goal. Your goal is, isn't to prove your idea is right. It's to Become a successful, profitable entrepreneur. That's what we're aiming for here. That's what winning looks like is having a business that's successful, that's making us money, that's giving us financial freedom, it's giving us everything we want out of that business. It's not to be right. It's not so that we have the right idea. If the idea I have is a disaster and it won't get me to my goal, which is being successful, then forget that idea. You know, f that idea. Who cares about the idea? The idea doesn't matter. You're in search of the truth. You're in search of what's going to work. If you're emotionally attached to your idea, you might ignore clear signs that it won't work. The best business isn't the one you love the most. It's the one the market loves the most. The market matters. And that's why we need to show proof the market loves what we have. We need to show evidence that this is actually something that people want and will be successful. So fight for success, not for any particular idea. By the way, this makes you a way better leader and listener. So that when you're with your team and they're sharing ideas or they're even contradicting what you're saying or maybe disagreeing and say, hey, I think we should go another route, you are open to those ideas because you're trying to get to the path that's going to get you to success faster and more reliably. You're checking your ego at the door. And by the way, you hired this person to do this to help you become successful. So it's not about the ideas you should be fighting for. It's which idea is going to help us succeed. And this applies to like the business idea, the product or service, or any idea in marketing and sales, and any part of any decision that we're trying to make in our business. So what should we do instead? Well, that leads me to tip number two. Build an evidence based case. To know if your idea has potential. You need evidence, you need proof. This isn't about hunches, it's about data. So we're going to validate three things. The first thing we're going to validate is the problem. Validate the problem is this problem that I'm trying to solve. A problem people are actively trying to solve. Okay, so how do you do this? Well, you look for proof. Are people searching for solutions online to this problem? Are they already spending money on alternatives or Other solutions that are not so great use tools like Google Trends or Exploding Topics. Great, great tool to figure out if these ideas, if these solutions are being researched. The second thing we want to validate is the solution. Does your solution actually address the problem better than what's already out there? There's no point in trying to launch a product or service that's inferior or at best the same as the competition. Then you're just like fighting for scraps. You don't want to be in that battle. This is where testing and feedback comes in. I'm gonna give you an example in a moment of all these validations, in a moment how to do them. But we want to test in the real world and get feedback to see if the solution actually addresses the problem enough for people to want to pay for it happily. Number three, validate the market. Is there enough money to be made in this market? Is there enough money to make your business sustainable and profitable? Okay, this is important because we don't get into a business and go after a market that really doesn't have enough tam, which is total addressable market. For example, if there's only a thousand people that want this solution and you want to make $10 million, it's going to be quite hard for you to serve a market that small. So how do you do this? Well, you look for competitors. Yes, competitors are a good sign that money is being spent in this space, that there's enough people giving away or taking their dollar out of their wallet and giving it to companies so that they can have a solution to that problem. So let me give you an example of how I implemented this in my own business. My software company, Webinar Ninja, that I started back in 2014, that I built and scaled to over 30,000 users over 10 years. And then we recently got acquired by a big company called Pro. When I started Webinar Ninja Back in 2014, I noticed people were already running webinars but are struggling with the existing tools. In fact, they were using several tools to pull off a successful webinar. In order to run a webinar, you have to market the webinar with landing pages, collect email addresses, send out emails so that people know where to go. You have to have a live stream. You need to record that live stream, you need to send out that replay. You need to see some statistics. You may want to have some sort of interaction during the actual webinar. So as you can see, there's a lot of moving parts, a lot of pieces of software coming together to make this event happen. So what I decided to do to make sure that people actually want when I'm creating a better solution to running webinars is I pre sold webinar Ninja before building it. I created a simple landing page and offered early access to people. And this helped me prove two things. This is what I mean by gathering evidence, making sure I have facts on my side. Again, I did this to prove two things. People wanted a better solution like they were looking for it and when they saw it, they're like, hey, I want to try this out. And they're willing to pay for it before it's even in existence. So people put down $250 in my case as a deposit so that they can get a spot to get a license to my software when it was ready in four months. So the learning here and the action step for you to take action right now is to run a quick test. Create a simple landing page explaining your and collect email addresses to gauge interest. By the way, a landing page is a simple page on a website where it's just describing what you're offering. Give me your name and email address as like a waiting list. This is a good kind of primer. And then when you have the email addresses, you can make an offer to them and say, hey, would you like to pre buy or would you like to get early access? Please put a deposit. This is a rubber meeting the road and you can see people are willing to pay for it.
- [08:04]
Ramp Ad
What if you could use your home equity to pay off your debt without monthly payments so you could focus on reaching your other financial goals? With a home equity investment from Hometap you can get access to your home equity in cash. Get closer to financial freedom and get more out of life. Learn more and see if you pre qualify for an investment@hometap.com subject to eligibility terms and conditions apply. Get access to your home equity in cash. Visit hometap.com to apply in minutes. That's hometap.com and we're back folks.
- [08:37]
Jim
It looks like Jim from sales just got in from his client lunch and he's got receipts. His next meeting is in two minutes. The team is asking can he get through his expenses in that time? He's going for it. Is that his phone? He's snapping a pic. He's texting Ramp Jim is fast, but this is unheard of. That's it. He's done it. It's unbelievable.
- [08:56]
Ramp Ad
On ramp, expenses are faster than ever. Just submit them with a text. Switch your business to ramp.com.
- [09:08]
Omar Zenhom
Part three, prove there's money to be made. All right, we're now gathering more and more evidence that, hey, this idea has legs and it could potentially help me succeed as an entrepreneur. So if your business idea doesn't have a path of profitability, it's not a business, it's a hobby. That's just the bottom line. So you need to make sure that there's money being made here. So how do you prove that? Start small. You do what I did. Pre sell your product or your service, guarantee some customers where they can just even put like a 10% deposit and then they can pay the rest. It just shows that they're willing to part with some money to get a solution to they're interested enough to actually just put some money down. Another thing you could do is talk to potential customers and ask if they would pay for something that you're offering just one on one on a video call or in person or via email. And then if they say yes, your next thing is say, great. Would you mind putting down a deposit? If I was selling a T shirt and somebody said, I love your T shirts, I'd love to buy one. Awesome. How about you give me $25? It's $45 for the t shirt. Give me $25. And then when the T shirt is created and is delivered, you can give me the rest of the money. If somebody says yes to that, you know, they are a customer. There's money to be made here. The whole point I'm trying to drill in here in this third part of proving that money can be made is you want a business that's easy to run. You want a business that's easy to sell a product and service. You don't have to convince your customers constantly and cajole them into buying it. You want customers, when they discover your product, they're like throwing money at you. They're like, hey, I need this. Can you please give it to me? I'm willing to part money right now and give you money that I worked hard for for you to, you know, give me a spot, give me early access, or, you know, send it to me as soon as it's available. That's the type of business you want. If you don't have that on your side, you're going to have a very hard time moving forward. But if you do have that, then you have proven that this business is worth pursuing. When I pre sold Open Ranger, I sent out an email to my email list. People bought access to the software before it was ready. I used that money as seed capital to clean up my software and make it ready for commercial use. About four to five months later, I gave them access, I got feedback from them. We improved the product over and over, year after year. The rest is history. You get the point. I did this because I didn't have any money, right? I didn't have investors, I didn't have any savings. I did it because I had to and because I had to. In the process, I proved that people are willing to spend money on this product and I was able to get some upfront capital to get things going. So as an action step, prove people want to buy what you have. Pre sell the idea, start an email list, get that landing page together, right? If they're willing to pay up front and they're able to sign up and get the product later, that is amazing proof that your business, your concept, is something that they want, something that they need. But if people won't pay upfront for something, you need to rethink your concept. There's a risk here that you're going to work on and build it, invest in it, and then when you do offer to people, people are not willing to pay for it. This is why I'm saying that maybe it's not all the money, but maybe just a deposit. Even if it's just like you, 10% deposit just to see if they're willing to spend some money in the promise of committing to hey, I'm going to buy this thing when it's ready. Part 4 Ignore the noise but listen to the data. Listen. Everybody in this world thinks you're an expert, including your friends and family, and there is going to be some truth to what they say. But you need to prove what's true and what's not true. You gotta listen and not get discouraged. Right? It's easy to get discouraged when people doubt your idea. But remember, skepticism can be helpful. It can force you to validate and refine your concept. So here's some tips. When it comes to this, you want to ignore opinions that aren't backed by facts. What I mean by that is that when somebody says something to you and say this idea won't work, ask them why and then if they say why, go and find out if that why is true. If it is true, then you need to find a solution to that or move on. If it isn't true, great. But you need to prove that your idea is true, your beliefs are true, your reasons for why it will work are true. Back it with facts, data. The second thing you really should just focus on is gathering as much data from potential customers and not critics. Okay? A lot of us ask our friends and family and there's a good chance that your product or service is not for your friends and family. It's for a specific type of person with specific needs. Talk to those people, get the information, get validation that they are actually serious and would love to buy what you have. And what I found is the best way to silence doubters is with results. So Hasan, who asked today's question. Building a business when everyone says it won't work, it's challenging, right? But it's not impossible. And by the way, get used to it. The more and more you start growing as an entrepreneur, the more and more you start building and achieving, the more people are going to doubt you, the more people are going to say that's impossible. They can't relate to where you want to go. Right? And this is something that I learned the hard way as I became an entrepreneur. I lost a lot of friends. I lost touch with a lot of my family members. Luckily not my close family. But the point here is that people start seeing you like an alien. They don't understand what you're doing and how you would be doing that. And why would anybody rational take the risks or believe in these ideas? But we're a special bunch, entrepreneurs. We're people that believe we can create things out of thin air. And we do it right. But we do it based on facts. We do it based on research. We don't just roll the dice and hope for the best. Don't fall in love with the idea. Prove your idea is going to have legs. Build an evidence based case for your idea. Right? Prove there's money to be made by pre selling and testing with real customers. Ignore the noise, but listen to the data. And here's the thing. You don't need everyone to believe in your idea. You just need the right customers to believe in it. Thanks for tuning in to the $100 MBA show. If today's lesson resonated with you and you want more practical business lessons, just hit that subscribe button and you get access to over 2,500 business lessons. You can check out all our archives over at 100mba.net so whether you're listening on Apple or Spotify or any podcast app or watching on YouTube, hit that subscribe or follow button so you get our next episode automatically. Remember, we publish three days a week, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. So make sure you don't miss an episode and keep moving forward in building and growing and scaling that business. I'm Omar Zenom and I'll see you in the next episode. Got a 7am meeting on a Monday? Expensing breakfast because it's in policy. Wasting all afternoon submitting an expense report for that breakfast.
- [15:38]
Jim
If your company used Ramp, you could.
- [15:40]
Omar Zenhom
Submit expenses with just a text. Yay.
- [15:45]
Ramp Ad
Free your team from expense reports today. Switch your business to ramp.com.