Not everyone is ready to grow their service or technology practice or is even looking to grow.
Over the years I have worked with businesses in the startup phase to owners looking to exit and one thing is consistent — there are certain things that have to be in place to grow.
Business is the ultimate competitive game. Very few rules exist, and somebody wants to put you out of business every day.
Competition is always getting better and they want to see you fail.
It takes the kind of grit few people have, and it’s not right for everybody.
Effort means nothing and results are all that counts.
If that didn’t freak you out, keep reading.
Here’s a short list of the 5 reasons you are not ready to grow your service or technology firm.
1. You already know everything about marketing and sales and how to do it.
This one gets my goat all the time.
Nothing is worse than having somebody explain in graphic detail how they are going to build their service or technology firm to a zillion dollars the easy way.
It’s not that easy, and if it was you would already be there.
Check out this quote from Ben Horowitz.
“There is no silver bullet that’s going to fix that. No, we are going to have to use a lot of lead bullets.”
Knowing in theory is not the same as experience.
Until you have done it and made decisions that keep you up at night, you don’t know.
Stop telling people what you are going to and just do it. Otherwise, you have a dream.
You will go to your grave not knowing if you had what it takes.
2. Trying to do everything yourself.
We live in a crazy world where working 80 hours a week is worn like a badge of honor.
Hearing things like just 10X it, hustle harder, and “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” are dangerous and laughable at best.
I know what it feels like to be so tired that you can’t think, propping up myself with Red Bulls and refusing to slow down.
Yes, hard work is required and that’s a barrier to entry.
Once your service or technology business is off the ground, wake up and smell the coffee.
What got you here won’t take your service or technology firm where you have never been.
Stop trying to do it all and get systems in place to buy you time and freedom.
Stop thinking like an entrepreneur and start acting like a CEO. You invest your time and expect an ROI on it. Just the same way other businesses come to you for help with their service or technology you need to go to a marketing and growth expert for their expert guidance.
3. It’s too expensive.
If you think investing in your business is expensive, look at the cost of failure on you and your family.
People who are successful know the value of time. I can buy about anything except my time.
At least once a week I get nasty emails from people who are MAD that I will not get on the phone and let them pick my brain for free.
I’m happy to pay it forward, but not at the expense of my time.
Every hour you give away is one hour less with your family.
I’ve been involved in guiding 7, 8, 9 and 10 figure businesses.
Do you think this experience and access is going to come cheap?
4. You can’t see your own roadblocks.
I got started in 1999 and it’s only taken me 20 years of blood, sweat and tears to get to where I am.
My growth started when I got to the end of me. I was frustrated by the amount of work I was doing yet growth was stalled.
I had buddies who were getting advice from me breaking growth records, yet I couldn’t.
It made no sense. I know how to do this. But something was not working.
It wasn’t until a buddy dropped a bomb on me.
He told me that I was a freaking genius marketer, but you can’t see your business clearly from behind the wheel.
You are too close to it, and you’re emotionally attached to it.
Until you work with someone who has the 20,000 foot view, you’ll never break free. On top of that, most of the information you read is all from the same people doing the exact same thing.
I hate to say this, but 95% of service or technology firms we talk to have been using the exact same type of marketing and wondering why the results have not been stellar.
To stand out in your marketing it requires breaking free from what everybody else is doing.
Look at almost any service or technology website and you’ll be shocked that most of them are designed to impress other accountants, not your target market. How crazy is that?!
Unless other accountants are your clients and pay most of your bills, it’s time to focus your marketing on the client’s needs.
5. You think generic advice will work for you.
I read or listen to one book a week.
You will find some gold nuggets in books.
But they are generic and don’t apply to your specific service or technology business.
When you hear about somebody doing X and Y and you think you need to copy them, ask yourself:
Did they have a staff doing it for them?
Did they hire just your run-of-the-mill marketing agency around the corner?
Did they hire the top guns on service or technology firm growth?
Will that even work now?
Did they already have connections in place?
How is your business different?
What are they not telling you about the process?
How much real world business experience do they have?
Run all the generic advice through those filters and most of the time you see that it really doesn’t fit your business.
Every day I’m faced with decisions and take calculated risks that are hard.
Let’s book a time and work on creating a custom marketing plan and roadmap for your service or technology firm.
Click here to book a time with me and get ready to take your firm to the next level.
Talk soon,
Charles Kirkland
P.S. It’s time to let go and start using some battle-tested strategies that can give you a true competitive advantage in your service or technology firm.
