One Bow, Many Strings
One common thread links all the prosperous entrepreneurs and successful owners of small businesses that I have met.
This is the determination to own and run ‘bolt-on’ businesses in addition to their mainstream activities. Consider the following true and very recent story.
Recently a friend of mine went home on Friday the proud owner of a thriving business. It had taken him three years to establish and grow the enterprise not to mention the thousands of pounds that he had invested in training himself.
On Monday morning he returned to his office. He was now a man with no business worth mentioning. What had he done wrong? The answer is, absolutely nothing!
You may have guessed that he was a fully trained provider of HIPs (Home Information Packs). Overnight the new Con -Lib government had done away with the requirement for HIPs and left thousands of well run, professional businesses ruined.
This kind of overnight annihilation of a whole business sector is thankfully rare but many businesses can find themselves in a shrinking or dying market.
What Can You do to Protect Your Business?
The answer is simple, have more than one business !
Now I’m not suggesting for one minute that you go out and start another enterprise of the size and complexity of your main business. What I am recommending is adding some additional strings to your existing bow.
You are already set up to to do it!
You already have the structure in place to support business. You must have in order to function as a small business or sole trader. Having gone to all the trouble, not to mention expense, of setting up this infrastructure it makes sense to use it to its absolute maximum.
No doubt you already have transport, business phone lines, the ability to invoice, existing customers or prospects plus a host of other valuable business assets – so why not get the most from them?
Irrespective of the type of trade or enterprise you already operate there is always something that you can add to bring in additional revenue. The great thing is that you have already covered your fixed costs so this additional revenue is virtually all profit. Yes it is all destined for your pockets (less taxes of course).
All that remains is to find the product that suits your kind of business. Note here that I say product and NOT service. Whilst you can benefit from adding services to your normal business offering they invariably require a considerable amount of time and effort on your part. A product will involve you in delivering the goods, taking the money and that’s all. It will not distract you from your main enterprise. In some cases delivering the goods will be done for you, what could be easier?
But I don’t want to sell to people.
That’s the beauty of it – you don’t need to. This is not your main source of income therefore you are not under pressure to make sales. It is sufficient to let your contacts know what you are able to offer and then let them decide. It’s quite amazing but you will find that because they have already learnt to trust you and you have proven to be reliable most customers will take additional products with very little thought.
So where do I start?
There are two distinct types of product that you could consider.
The first is one that is related to your existing business. As in the case of a Landscape Gardener who can finish the job off by supplying a range of garden furniture and ornaments.
The second is a product that has nothing to do with what you already offer. In this case you are simply using the fact that you are trusted by your existing and past customers to give you credibility and a simple sale. There exists a wide choice of this type of product and we will look at this in greater detail in the full report Increase Small Business Profits Overnight.
If you are interested in finding an add-on product that suits you then the full copy of this article in our members area, contains details and evaluations of some of the best additional products of both types that are available.
Set Up and Grow are providing a whole new section dedicated to introducing you to ‘bolt-on’ businesses. The opportunities covered will be analysed and their revenue-generating potential examined so that you can find something that will work for you.
Brian Gregory
www.setupandgrow.co.uk
