The Sweaty Startup

In today's episode, Nick talks about three sales strategies that most people don't talk about. These are strategies that can really make your company stand out from others as desirable, credible, and sustainable.

Way back in early 2015, I planned and developed my self-storage business with my partner Dan. It took a total of 2 years to prepare and set this thing up right. From finding property and looking for the right deals and LPs, in May 2017, we opened our doors for business with 5 outside investors. Fast forward to today, we have 4,930 self-storage units, 24 properties, 642,000 sq/ft all in properties in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut, and aren't stopping there. With four acquisition employees, we are making offers in Georgia, Kentucky, and Indiana, and our goal is to have 50 units in 30+ states. Find out more on how self storage investing work in this episode!

When it comes to entrepreneurship, big or small business ownership, you hear the same advice all the time: Do what you say you are going to do, and you will succeed as a business owner. It sounds so easy, but the real problem is that most of us are terrible at managing expectations. It's bad business advice to just do what you said you'd do regardless of the evolving circumstances. Find out in this episode on what to do instead!

The painful truth is that not everyone is cut out to be a business owner. Another hard pill to swallow is that people cling to ideas, and concepts they think will get them ahead. I've said it before and I'll say it again, but my fear through all of this is that people who are listening to the show 10 years from now, will wake up one day, having started a business, are underpaid, overworked, and have a business that's not worth very much--that they just gave themselves a job. That's my fear, because the bottom line is that owning a business is tough. Roughly 95% of business owners fall into the rhythm of owning a business that they're involved in, where they work and get paid. Sounds easy. That's because they're not entrepreneurs. They own a job. Or, to put it frankly, that job owns them--they are the property of their business. Being a business owner is often glorified while we shame W2 employees. However, a lot of business owners are working 70 or more hours a week. They hardly ever see or know their children. Many haven't made it to a family dinner the last four nights in a row. Many are divorced, unhappy, alcoholics, or have some other addiction. All this is sadly a big problem with entrepreneurship--not knowing how to have a balanced work-life relationship. So how do you achieve success? Better yet, how do you achieve happiness? If you have a job, how do you avoid being one of those people that complain about their work-life balance, their crappy bosses, and what they're doing? How do you avoid that? Well, you delegate. Every business owner will lean on their best employees to get the job done. They'll hand more clients and problems over to their best producers and problem-solvers, and most employees will just trudge along and accept it all. But, the next thing you know is the employee is working 80 hours a week for 5 years straight, making good money for their company, but they likely are not making much money for themselves. Whether it be a business owner or a solid employee, both need to understand the power of delegating--how to assign work to other people within the organization or team and know when to say that they have too much on their plate. This is why surrounding yourself with solid people is essential when building a business or hiring the right employees for your team because then you can properly delegate and still get the job done. So let me tell you one more time that if your job or business owns you and you have no work balance, it's your fault--you need to know when to say "no" and delegate, managing the expectations of your customers, your boss, and your coworkers. You always hear about the successes of running a business. But the truth is, being an entrepreneur is not for everyone. You have to make hard decisions. You need to figure out where you're most comfortable, what your strengths and weaknesses are, and build on and around them. You need to figure out if you want to get paid building a career working for somebody else, possibly doing what you love, or if you want to start a business and see if you have what it takes.

Nick / Dan / Max discuss businesses they love.

Things are changing fast in my world! I have hired 8 folks from the Philippines using https://www.supportshepherd.com/. I launched a new podcast today called The Nick Huber Show. Apple podcasts: https://apple.co/3r9O5BW Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2Ta5IoC Show notes: https://sweatystartup.com/the-nick-huber-show/ Also a real estate community: https://sweatystartup.com/rec/

Nick / Dan / Max discuss business ideas and how they would launch them.

Nick and Max go over their 10 favorite business books and what they like about each.

John Warrillow comes on the show to discuss the things you can do now to make your business more valuable and maximize the return if you ever sell. Sponsor: getjobber.com/sweaty Learn more about John: builttosell.com/sweaty

What businesses are you competing against? How good are they? Well, in the service sector, it isn't much. Nick gives you an example.