Opportunity Awaits podcast Episode Transcript
Aaron Henriques: [00:00:00] So most online startup businesses, as we all know, they are going to fail. And in fact, you know, the stats, they are absolutely staggering, but it doesn't have to be that way. And you know, most entrepreneurs think that they can even one it must be easy because it's online or two that if they build it, that people will just come and free.
[00:00:26] And it won't take much time and effort to build a sustainable online business. Now, none of those things are true at all. Okay. You're never going to create a successful online business. That's sustainable without getting a few core things in place before you know, all the strategies and stuff going to work for you.
[00:00:46] So let I say welcome to anyone here. Sort of just doing it podcast. I'm Aaron Henriques recording today live actually for clubhouse, but it's also being streamed out onto Facebook as well. Now I'm going to do a quick overview of what you need to know before you even tried to start your own online business.
[00:01:04] And it's going to be quick hopefully about 20 minutes. So 20 past seven should be done. And for those on clubhouse, after that, I will then take some Q and a if anyone has any questions. So first thing that people need to think about is of course the idea, and that's the problem that you've had that nobody else has solved yet.
[00:01:24] That's what lots of people start with for their first online business idea. Now, the other thing that people can do is if they're an expert in something already. And perhaps you've got a job and you can, and perhaps you use those skills for your own business and you want to go it alone. That's what sometimes people do it.
[00:01:44] And you can do that potentially as a side business, depending on your contract. But there's also for people who don't have any ideas at all they don't have an idea of what product or they having an idea of what service to sell. They can do things like get involved in a franchise. And that's how I [00:02:00] started my first.
[00:02:01]Sort of what I call real business was in a franchise and there are other things like partnerships. One of my friends had just got into a partnership with a tech company and is selling their licenses. There's affiliate programs that are quite similar, but you, you're not so involved. The Germany, we have an affiliate program once you've sent someone over and they've purchased you just didn't get, you get the credit for it.
[00:02:23] And whoever they've purchased from has to then fulfill all the services. So one of the first things you need to really do is yeah. Plan. And one thing I'd say is avoid asking your friends and family for their advice. Okay. Cause they're just going to put you off, right. That they're going to say things and they're going to mean, well, and they're going to say things like it's a bit risky.
[00:02:49] It's going to cost a lot of money. You know, you might lose everything and all this stuff, but they're, they're, they're talking from a place. Of trying to protect you, but unless they've been there before and done it themselves, they're probably not a great place to start. Now. You need to get your business plan written out.
[00:03:05] You need to have an idea of how your business is going to look. Okay. Does the idea make sense on paper and then you need to look at your finances, do a cashflow forecast, you know, did a numbers actually stack up, you know, if you've got this pie in the sky dream where you're going to go from zero to like a million customers in two months, Sort of thing, you know, it's, it's probably not going to happen like that guys.
[00:03:28] So you always gotta think about your pricing as well. So one of the things that lots of people do which can be a problem is they have like one-off sales now probably one of sales is every time you need to keep finding a new customer, you know, to, and in particular, if your product lasts for a long time it's not like a repeat purchase where they're gonna keep coming back to buy that one thing, which when it's really not one off sale, you might as well have a subscription.
[00:03:54] So you got to think about ways that you can sort of implement a subscription model into your business as well. [00:04:00] That is going to be really helpful for you. And who will buy from you, you know, how, how do they know, how, how do you know that they're going to buy from you and. Have you been, how are you going to do your market research?
[00:04:11] So you need to go out there asking actual people who are potentially your customers and that's not your friends. Okay. Not your friends, not your family. Find other people who you don't know to validate your idea. Okay. Are they going to buy it from you? And you're going to come back to those same people a bit later, which I'll get onto shortly.
[00:04:29] Now, you also got to think about things like how are you going to manage your business? Where it's an online business you know, shop from business, whatever is it something you're going to need to be in full time? You know, do you need to be, do you need to be there full time? How are you going to solve the problem?
[00:04:47] Now, there are ways to do it. You know, you can have a VA to help you out. You can have cool answering services. You can look at automation software to sort of help you run your business. Staff as well, you know, maybe not when you first start out, if you don't have the budget for that, but you can look at staff as well.
[00:05:07] And then you need tools to think about the sort of tech skills and sort of, I don't know, getting help from people who can, you know, who've been there before and can help you along your path to sort of keep it on your path, to get to where you want to be. So if you're going to build a website, so you're going to start an online business.
[00:05:26] You're going to need a website. Right? So what are you, what's the website for? Are you selling from it? Are you, is it like a brochure? You expected them to call you for it, you know, or do you need like a full on e-commerce sort of sales platform and card processing payment system in your, in your site? If you need to think about how you're going to actually get that in place.
[00:05:46] Okay. And your start up strategy. Okay. So if you're going to have a website, then you're going to need to think about how you're going to get people to that website, because it's not a case of build the website and people are going to come to it. It just doesn't work [00:06:00] like that. Right. I've got a SEO company myself and, you know, I'd always say to people and it's something I do.
[00:06:07] If I, if I start up a new website is new company or anything like that. I start SEO probably six months or so before it's even launched. Okay. And that's because SEO takes quite a while to start kicking in, but it's the best overall strategy for the medium to long-term. It's not going to get you instant sales, but it will get you consistent sales later down the line.
[00:06:31] Okay. Now SEO is particularly important if you're selling low ticket products. So I'll give you an example of a chocolate company. Who came to me was this about three years ago now. And this is because this was not for SEO. This was for another service that she wanted. But the problem was is that her average basket was about 12 pounds, 10, 10 to 12 pounds, something like that.
[00:06:55] And to acquire a customer free, the means that she wanted to would have sort of worked out about the same cost as the basket, but then obviously, then she's actually has to ship them out. And then she has to And she also has to pay for products as well. She wasn't making the chocolates herself. She was buying them in.
[00:07:11] So she would've been operating at a loss with that. Yeah. Then unfortunately, you know, and one of the, the things that she needed to do was to sort of create some sort of subscription process in that the, you know, something to compliment the chocolate, I don't know, like a coffee and chocolate subscription once a month.
[00:07:28] Something like that would sort of solve that problem. But when you're getting that one time purchase and then these people aren't coming back, that's a problem. So paid ads, paid ads are super expensive but they can get you instant results. It's just, they're expensive. So if you are going to be running paid ads is what most people do.
[00:07:48] And this is what kills their business is the run, the paid ads doesn't quite get attraction that they expected. Haven't put enough budget in to sort of do the optimizations on it. They haven't started [00:08:00] any SEO and then they run out of money. Okay. That is what kills a lot of businesses online. Okay. So it's much easier for me to sell like Google ads and Facebook ads than it is for SEO.
[00:08:14] I create my company called handler SEO. Okay. For, for a reason, because SEO is by far the strongest, the strongest long, medium to long-term strategy that you're ever going to have for your website. Now. We do also offer a pay per click and Facebook ads. Okay. Alongside that. But if all I would recommend is if you're starting up a site, make sure you've got your SEO in place.
[00:08:41] Okay. Now you've got to think about how you're going to create and manage your social media as well. And you know that there's literally tons of stuff that you're gonna have to think about when you're starting up and when you're planning your first online business. Now, this is something I actually cover in a course, which I'll tell you about a bit later.
[00:09:00] So once you've sort of planned out your business and you know, everything looks right on paper and you've got your startup funding in place, the cases of, so you're going to need some cash to start. You may not need loads may not be as much as you think, but you're going to need some cash to start out.
[00:09:15] Okay. Then you need to look out, sort of invest in, in freelancers to help you potentially. So a place like fiverr.com as F I V E R r.com. Nothing to do with me, wish it was, but it's not where you will find freelancers for everything I was on there the other day. Trying to find someone who can do some video editing for me, because if you do editing is not my strong point.
[00:09:36] You know, I spent three or four hours of my day trying to work out this bit of software to do something that would be really basic. Probably a video editor could redo and face seconds and I couldn't work out. And I was like, why am I wasting so much time on this thing that has got nothing to do with me or business, nothing to do video editing, but you know what I mean?
[00:09:55] So. Source out those, those tasks that are sort of [00:10:00] going to eat into your time. Cause if there's only one of you, you've only got so many hours in the day and if you're going to spend hours and hours, like I did the other day trying to work out with video editing, or I don't know how to edit some audio or how to create a bit of artwork that you need for your social ads or something like that.
[00:10:17] If you can spend hours of time on that, you're not spending time on your actual business, what you actually do. Now you're also going to have to sell to people who said they would buy your stuff. Okay. So you're gonna hold these people to account. These people said they would buy your products and services if you launched them.
[00:10:35] Right. So go back to them, make them your first house, you know, say, Hey guy, you said that you would buy this. If I ever launched what I've launched now, how would you like to pay, you know Get constant feedback, tweak your sort of marketing campaigns all the time and your product offerings. Let's look at how you can package things up.
[00:10:53] That's more attractive to the customer and how you can make it more convenient. Okay. That's, that's the thing. So when you're working, when you're starting your business from home, trying to keep things convenient is obviously very important and don't go around in circles by listening to customers too much.
[00:11:08] Okay. Now, and that sort of contradicts what I just said. Okay. But what can happen is you'll get one customer saying, you know, no, I think it should be black. And then they'll, I don't know whatever it is you're doing. And then they'll another customer. No, it should be like another customer. No, it should be yellow sort of thing.
[00:11:24] And you can just find yourself going around in circles and actually getting nowhere. So that's one thing that you really should sort of have a think about. Yeah. So don't go. Any circles, listen to customers too much, you know? Set path go down at tweak things, but don't go off track too much. You know, you're gonna have to find new customers because then they're not going to come to you.
[00:11:45] Right. So you're going to have to find ways to get them there wherever that's like organically for your socials, or if you're going to be hitting people on LinkedIn, don't hit me on LinkedIn with some spanning message. I will just block you. I personally don't like that strategy. It must maybe it works for some people.
[00:12:00] [00:11:59] Maybe people have read books, like never eat alone. And there's too many people doing that sort of thing. Yeah, I'm not a fan of that personally, but it does work for some people or you're gonna be looking at ads, you know, or referrals, you know, asking your customers. Is there someone else, you know, if you've got a customer, ask them, is there someone else that you know, who would also benefit from this?
[00:12:22] Okay. So you don't need to look at some sales training. Now you don't have to go out there and spend tens of thousands of pounds on a sales coach. You can, it would help you get there faster. But when you're just starting out initially, you know, you've got eBooks, you've got podcasts, you've got online training courses that you can do to stay motivated.
[00:12:44]You know, you can look at coaching, you can get group coaching that tends to be a bit cheaper, and also you get access to other people in a similar sort of position to you which can be really helpful. And you can, if you're lucky enough to have a business partner, then it's fantastic as well too. So beyond that, you're going to be looking at scaling now to scale your, they can't just be you anymore.
[00:13:07] Okay. You're going to have, you have to have a team. You're gonna have to have people doing some of the work for you. Okay. You're probably going to increase your spending on your ads and increase your SEO investment and find ways to sort of package and repurpose some of your core best-selling products or services to different audiences that you're not currently attracting.
[00:13:28] Now, what I'm going to say here is don't blow your offerings. So, you know, when you go to a restaurant, right, and you see. You've got pages and pages and pages of stuff, and you just don't know what to have. You can sit there for 20 minutes and then you'll just go back to page one and just be like, oh, just have that for Christ's sake.
[00:13:46] You know, there's just too much stuff. Okay. And now the problem with that is, you know, in a restaurant, that's fine to an extent you're already sat down, but your customers online then not then, well, they might be, they might be sat down, but [00:14:00] they're not like in your shop as such like, so they might be looking at your site.
[00:14:04] But if there's too much stuff, you know, they're just going to get confused and go somewhere else where it's a bit simpler, so don't blame your offerings, but it doesn't stop you from repurpose in your core products. So for example, with a business planning masterclass, I have, which I'm going to mention to you in a bit you know, you could target specific ads to different types of people.
[00:14:24] So I could do something like learn how to plan, start and scale an online six figure fitness coaching business. With that course and give them the same course. And I could also have something like learn to plan start and Scallon online gardening, ornament e-commerce store, something really specific like that to sort of attract a different type of audience in, you know, garden versus a fitness trainer.
[00:14:50] You know, you can do that rather than sort of being generic, but I wouldn't say do that to start because you can have so many, you know, once you've exhausted what you're doing. Start bringing in other elements once you've got help as well from your team. And it's the biggest thing, right? Is you're gonna have to lose the fear of trying new things and spending the fear of spending money to do it.
[00:15:14] All right. So hopefully that was helpful for you. I mean, was that helpful? You know, you can see there's tons of stuff that you're going to need to know to start your own online business, but you know, honestly it's worth it. I think it's worth it anyway. And. Know, is that something that you reckon that you could go out there and start taking some steps towards starting your own online business at all?
[00:15:35] Now you can get a lot more training on this. You know, there's lots of resources out there. Like I said, there's lots of eBooks, there's podcasts, there's audio books you know, like free or quite cheap as resources, there's online courses. And like I've got the business planning, master class online course.
[00:15:52]Where I go through a ton of stuff, you know, tons of stuff. I've learned over many years of doing online businesses. [00:16:00] Now, a lot of the things are, it's not, I'm not going in there teaching you how to write a business plan or such. I'm actually discussing, opening your mind, expanding your mind in certain areas to things that you wouldn't even think about.
[00:16:13] And I know you probably didn't think about them because I know I didn't and people I've worked with didn't and it's things that can cost you a ton of money and waste a ton of your time, which is more important. Okay. You can waste a ton of your time by not by just not knowing a few things that you just don't know.
[00:16:30] Does that make sense? So the business planning masterclass I have is available on my website. It's @AaronHenray cars.com normal spelling food slash plan, and says AaronHenriques.com/plan. If you're listening to this prerecord, it that's on a prerecorded, like on the podcast, it's going to be a link.
[00:16:48] The load that you can look at now, the course will save you literally, like I say, a ton of time and money you know, I've. I cannot tell you how many thousands or tens of thousands of pounds over the years I've wasted on trying stuff that just didn't work. Right? I mean, I'll give you one example where for my cleaning company, I fought.
[00:17:13] Oh yeah. It'd be a great idea to spend 900 pounds on a yellow pages advert. And from that yellow pages, I had one customer in that one year that had that advert there. What a waste of money it's still today, the most expensive customer acquisition I've ever had. So that's just one thing, but there's literally tons of stuff to go for.
[00:17:35] I think it was like 19 or 21 lessons in that, in that in that mass class. And it's something that I will keep building on. Over time. Now, this course is actually only available for a while longer because it's actually the first module in a much bigger startup bootcamp. Now, once it starts up boot available, this isn't going to be available as a separate course anymore.
[00:17:57]So if you want to get it. The business [00:18:00] plan, master class, AaronHenriques.com/plan. And anyone on clubhouse listening. Now, if you've got startup questions if you're thinking about starting a business from home, sorry, I can't feed the clubhouse feed into Facebook. But Facebook, I'm going to say goodbye to you now and for anyone else If you want to follow me, you want to find out more about my stuff and stuff that I get up to.
[00:18:23] Lots of flying really open up Instagram and follow me. It's @AaronHenray, that's normal spelling of AaronHenray. Go on Instagram and follow me. @AaronHenray hit the bell icon and you'll get the updates whenever I'm posting new stuff or posting more business stuff coming up soon. So for those in clubhouse right now, if you expect my profile, hit follow press the bell icon.
[00:18:46] And you'll get the alert for the next, just doing it podcast life. So for now I'm going to cut the Facebook feed. Goodbye, Facebook people.
[00:19:02] Okay, so now we're back on clubhouse.
