Small Business Revolution E-Book

Barry C. McCarthy

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 407

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Equip your small business for dramatic growth and success in any environment InSmall Business Revolution: How Owners and Entrepreneurs Can Succeed, small business expertand President and CEO of Deluxe Corp. Barry C. McCarthy delivers a stirring combination of uplifting narrative and small business instruction manual. Featuring inspiring stories from the company's 106-year history and anecdotes from its Emmy-nominated TV show Small Business Revolution, this book offers readers the opportunity to learn how to grow and thrive in their business in any environment, from a booming economy to a post-pandemic marketplace. Whether you're just starting to plan your new business or you are a seasoned veteran in the small business trenches, you'll discover a wealth of information to help you structure your business to reach customers, find talent, understand finances, and so much more. You'll find guidance on: * How to get your costs in line when your expenses have changed * Mastering new tools to manage payments and payroll, including contactless and remote payments * Maintaining relationships with your existing customers while reaching out to new ones * How to manage cash and, how to retain employees through lean times, and more Perfect for the millions of brave, courageous, and strong individuals who plan to start or run a small business during one of the most challenging times in recent memory,Small Business Revolutionis an indispensable guide to helping your enterprise survive and succeed during unprecedented challenges.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

1 The Small Business: You Are a Very Big Part of America

We're in Your Corner

Seismic Events

The

Small Business Revolution

Leader to Leader

Companion Site

You Are Part of a Worthy Tradition

This Guide Can Also Help You to Start a Business

How

SBR

Analyzed Businesses, and How This Book Is Organized

Note

2 Why? Tough Questions, Tough Decisions

When a Hobby Becomes a Business

When It's Right to Be Brutal

Course Corrections

Seeing the World as It Really Is

Four Crucial Decisions

Be Like a Duck

Work-Life Integration

Put Your Mask on First

3 Crucial Numbers

Back-Pocket Accounting

One-Sheet Accounting

Hobby Hell

The Balance Sheet

Lengthen the Time Span

Let's Do Some Basic Analysis

Cost of Goods Sold

What's Your Capacity and True Market Demand?

Golden Ratios

SCORE Mentoring Program

Notes

4 Concentric Circles

About You

About Your Co-Workers

Your Brand

Note

5 Getting Visible

16 Common Mistakes Business Owners Make with Their Online Presence

Two Big Visibility Boosters

Notes

6 Bringing in Business

A Chiropractor's Secret

Community-Based Business-Building Methods

Other Physical Business-Building Methods

Online Methods

Note

7 The Craft of Persuasion

11 Principles of Business Persuasion

Notes

8 Relationships

The Contact

The Thread

Name Capture

Turning a Lead into a Prospect

When Prospects Become Customers

Where You Keep Customer Data

Testimonials

Awards and Other Recognition

Notes

9 Vulnerabilities

Your Physical Locations

Business Risks

Your Competition

10 The Power of Email

What Are You Sitting On?

When to Use Email Marketing for Maximum Effect

The Mechanics of Good Email Marketing

Note

11 The Right Way to Use Social Media

Social Media Myths and Realities

Notes

12 Power Tools

A Robust Payment System

Targeted Promotional Merchandise

Tools for Competitive Intelligence

Tools for Intelligence on Your Own Site

Using Video Effectively

Note

13 Your Team

The Question Before the Question

Your Hiring Process

Traits We Look for in New Hires

References

Alternatives to Hiring

Notes

14 Eyes Wide Open

Small Hinges Swing Big Doors

When Circumstances Change, Take Time to Think

Count Yourself In

Execute on the Fundamentals, Even When They Are Tiresome to You

Don't Suffer in Silence

Beware of Shiny Objects

Notes

Epilogue: When to Abandon the Dream?

Common Causes of Business Failure

Determining If You Should Abandon the Dream

If You Decide to Stop

Note

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Index

End User License Agreement

List of Illustrations

Chapter 3

Figure 3.1 How much Mike can expect to bring in per year

Figure 3.2 What happens if Mike does two more tintings per month

Guide

Cover Page

Table of Contents

Begin Reading

Pages

i

ii

v

vi

vii

xi

xii

xiii

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

76

77

78

79

80

81

82

83

84

85

86

87

88

89

90

91

92

93

94

95

96

97

98

99

100

101

102

103

104

105

106

107

108

109

110

111

112

113

114

115

116

117

118

119

120

121

123

124

125

126

127

128

129

130

131

132

133

134

135

136

137

138

139

140

141

142

143

144

145

146

147

148

149

150

151

152

153

154

155

156

157

158

159

161

162

163

164

165

166

167

168

169

170

171

172

173

175

176

177

178

179

180

181

182

183

184

185

186

187

188

189

191

192

193

194

195

196

197

198

199

201

202

203

204

205

206

207

208

209

210

211

217

218

219

221

222

223

224

225

226

227

228

229

230

231

232

233

234

235

236

237

Praise for Small Business Revolution

“The cornerstone of Deluxe has always been the success of small business. As the landscape of the world continually changes, Deluxe adapts and evolves to keep that as their top priority, bringing innovative ways for these businesses to survive and ultimately thrive. The tapestry of America would be far less colorful if we don't all work to keep this part of our country alive and well.”

—Ty Pennington,renovation icon, TV personality

“Small business owners need this book now more than ever. There are few things more rewarding and more challenging than running a small business, and Barry McCarthy and his team at Deluxe are proven experts at how to do it. This comprehensive book will help you improve your game and successfully deal with the challenges small business leaders have always faced as well as the new challenges created by Covid and seismic change. I recommend it.”

—Mark Sanborn,award-winning speaker and bestselling author of The Fred Factor and You Don't Need a Title to be a Leader; President of Sanborn & Associates

“Powerful curation insights every entrepreneur and their allies need to understand.”

—Ramon Ray,founder, SmartHustle.com; Entrepreneur in Residence, Oracle NetSuite

“Every day, entrepreneurs take the plunge to start their own business, taking a life's passion and turning it into a dream. With Small Business Revolution, Barry McCarthy showcases what it takes to succeed in an ever-changing world, while providing tangible, practical examples of business owners who are doing it every day. Few books capture the spirit of the business owner like this one does.”

—Katie Kirkpatrick,President and CEO, Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce

“Barry's book is a reliable roadmap for the business builder and lifelong learner in all of us. It's a quality series of best practices from a fellow CEO who has clearly listened to and responded to the small business community. Entrepreneurial life is not for everyone, but if it is your path of joy Barry can help you find practices to better face the adversity and chaos inherent in new ventures.”

—Ryan Millsap,Entrepreneur in Entertainment, Real Estate, and Private Equity Industries, Chairman and CEO of the Blackhall Group, founder of Blackhall Studios

“This book is full of insights and stories from the head of a company that's been in business for over a century. Barry's book will nourish you with the resources and resilience to make it big in the small business world.”

—Michael J. Coles,cofounder of the Great American Cookie Company, former CEO of Caribou Coffee, and author of Time to Get Tough: How Cookies, Coffee, and a Crash Led to Success in Business and Life

“These are challenging times for small business owners and this book helps those owners navigate these uncharted waters. With his commonsense approach, Barry charts a course for success, helping entrepreneurs understand how to better position their business, reach new customers, and understand when it is time to ask for help.”

—Charlie Weaver,Executive Director, Minnesota Business Partnership

“As a founder of several small businesses and a current small business co-owner, I know first-hand the value that these business owners bring to every community and the country. This book captures the challenges and triumphs of being a small business owner with specific examples and insights from a company that has been helping small businesses for more than 100 years.”

—Cheryl Mayberry McKissack,President and co-owner of Black Opal LLC, founder and CEO of Nia Enterprises, LLC; Chair, Deluxe Corporation

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of communities. They employ our friends and neighbors. The tips and tools that Barry and Deluxe have amassed over the past 106 years can help entrepreneurs learn how to grow their businesses and reach new audiences.”

—Keith Ferrazzi,American entrepreneur, recognized global thought leader and New York Times bestselling author of Who's Got Your Back and Never Eat Alone

BARRY C. MCCARTHY

CEO, DELUXE

HOW OWNERS AND ENTREPRENEURS CAN SUCCEED

Copyright © 2022 by Deluxe Corporation. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone], or on the Web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

For general information on our other products and services or for technical support, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at [phone], outside the United States at [phone] or fax [phone].

Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is Available:

ISBN 9781119802648 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781119802655 (ePDF)

ISBN 9781119802662 (ePub)

Cover Design: Wiley

Cover Image: © MicrovOne/Getty Images

To my fellow Deluxers, for always having the grit and perseverance to put customers first, helping small businesses succeed, for more than 100 years.

To my beautiful wife, Jean Ann. You have always been my rock and my inspiration, my partner, my best friend, and you have always encouraged me to strive-to help others succeed. Thank you.

To my amazing children, Will, Matt, and Katie, who put up with a dedicated businessman and committed community leader as a father.

To my parents and in-laws, Tom & Lori McCarthy and Ron & Mary Ann Hood, teachers and small businesspeople, who taught me about faith, integrity, the dignity of labor, the importance of hard work, and perseverance—to always believe in yourself, and to never, ever give up.

Introduction

IN TAKING ON this endeavor, I thought a lot about W.R. Hotchkiss, who himself was an entrepreneur and small-business owner. Today I have the privilege to be the president and CEO of Deluxe, the company he founded in 1915. Mr. Hotchkiss created many new products and tried to start numerous businesses until he landed on a product that worked—the checkbook.

He took a $300 small-business loan and went door-to-door with his invention, selling the checkbook to businesses, banks—anyone who needed this new payment system—the same thing other small-business owners have done over the years with their inventions and ideas.

Mr. Hotchkiss took his product to the masses and, in doing so, found an audience and created the original payments company. From there, he improved the check and the checkbook, created other business forms, and built a company that was innovative and responsive. He did what any small-business owner would do: he learned and developed and grew his skills and his business.

Now to be clear, this book isn't about becoming the next Elon Musk or the next W.R. Hotchkiss. This book is about being a better small-businessperson, about taking what we have learned at Deluxe after more than 100 years serving small businesses and putting it together into tools, techniques, and tips to help businesses grow and thrive. It is about helping you learn and develop and grow your businesses, too.

Believe me, I know being a small-business owner is no small task. It takes a Herculean effort just to keep the doors open each day. And I mean it when I use that word: small-business owners are heroes. You employ millions of people. You keep commerce moving in your small town, community, or large city. You innovate and create. You inspire. Being a small-business owner is heroic, and our communities—locally and nationally—depend on you.

I believe strongly in how businesses, no matter the size, impact their communities. One of the things we talk about a lot at Deluxe is that we champion businesses so their communities can thrive. When people ask me what that means, I tell them our goal—and frankly it should be everyone's goal—is that businesses, no matter where they are located, have the help and resources they need to thrive so their communities can thrive.

The best way I can explain it is through an example from the reality TV show Deluxe produces called Small Business Revolution. Throughout this book, I share examples not only from the many customers we have helped in the past 100-plus years, but from the first five years of the series itself. Our concept is simple: we pick one small town or community to receive a $500,000 makeover from Deluxe, and we help six businesses and the community with business advice and physical makeovers.

In the first year in Wabash, Indiana, as we worked with the town, one business owner shared with us that he didn't see the point of what we were doing. He said the only businesses benefiting were those featured on the show. Yet a few weeks after his comments, his landscape business was hired by the city to build a new park on an empty lot downtown. Our team, in working with the community of Wabash, asked what needs the town had for aesthetic improvement. One was to improve this one corner where a burned building used to stand. So, Deluxe provided the funds, helped create the look, and then hired this small-business owner to bring the vision to life.

This small-business owner was able to build this beautiful park and pay his workers and himself, who in turn invested those dollars in other small businesses, and the cycle continued. He changed his tune when he saw that every dollar that goes into a small business—no matter where it comes from—in turn, cycles through the community in so many different ways. The small-business ecosystem sustains itself with each new dollar that comes in. Only when business succeeds are there funds for roads, schools, parks, health care, and more. In this way business is the core of a community's success.

That's why this book exists. After more than 100 years helping small businesses, we have learned a few things that can help your business, that can keep you on track or get you thinking differently about your next steps. In the following pages, I hope you'll find the advice, knowledge, and encouragement to follow in Mr. Hotchkiss's footsteps. Because when you do, it's not just you who benefits—our communities and country do too.

1The Small Business: You Are a Very Big Part of America

YOU'VE JUST PICKED UP this book and you're wondering if it's worth reading. The way I figure it, I have roughly 60 seconds before you decide, one way or the other. So, allow me to make that task unusually easy for you.

If you're a small-business owner, you are most likely working yourself to exhaustion on most days (and weekends). You have basically no time for your family, and you feel bad about that. But you're trying to support your family and community through your business.

The problem is that you've plowed your savings into your business and also may be close to maxing out your credit cards. You may not even be paying yourself a salary at this point, because you put yourself last in line. You care so very deeply about your employees and others who look to you to make this business carry on.

And you have secret doubts. How can I work any harder? What can I do differently? Would somebody who knows about small-business success please give me some advice that I can believe in, advice that can help me? Or should I maybe throw in the towel at this point?

If this does not sound like your situation, then maybe you don't need to read this book. But if my description sounds anything like the situation you're in, then this book may very well be the thing that changes the direction of your business.

We're in Your Corner

You may put on a strong and confident face to your family and employees, but I know the challenges you're facing as a small-business owner. I've started and run two successful small businesses, one when I was 15 years old painting houses and another in my thirties in the Silicon Valley around electronic payments. While I don't own a small business anymore, I run a big one. I'm the President and CEO of Deluxe, a Trusted Payments and Business Technology™ company that has been around for more than a century helping businesses succeed. Nearly 6,000 employees and their families look to me and my team for their livelihood, and millions of investors have trusted that their savings will grow by investing in our stock.

Your great-great-grandparents and every generation since has purchased checks from us, because we've been around since 1915. In fact, the founder of this company, W.R. Hotchkiss, invented the checkbook, making Deluxe the original payment company.

I wrote this book because Deluxe has an extremely unusual vantage point into the workings of small businesses. It's true, we provide services to literally thousands of some of the largest businesses on the planet. But we have more than four million customers, and millions of them are small businesses. They call us every day, not just to order more checks, but also to find out how we can help to grow their businesses. In fact, you might say that small businesses are our bread and butter.

We've evolved from being a check printer into providing many of the services that small businesses need to survive and thrive. Here's a short list of some of the services we offer to small businesses:

Incorporation and business licensing services

Checks and forms

Logo design

Trademark filing

Designing, building, and hosting your website

Marketing—both online and in print

Promotional products

Retail packaging

Payroll solutions

Online payments

Merchant services (credit card acceptance and processing)

The list goes on. But here's what I want you to understand right from the start: this is NOT a book about promoting Deluxe products and services, like some long sales pitch. We have a great set of products and services, and you should check them out. There, that's my pitch.

But the truth is, you have bigger fish to fry at the moment. You're trying to keep your business afloat and the many other challenges that small businesses face.

This book is about how small businesses can successfully navigate big challenges.

If I'm able to help you through those challenges, I figure that you'll have gotten your money's worth from this book, and then some.

Seismic Events

On one level, we're still recovering from something of epic proportions with COVID. The world has had cases of deadly influenza before, in addition to plagues and such. Even so, the speed with which the coronavirus spread across the world has no precedent, with never-before-seen impact on small business.

So without any warning, you may have been having your best year ever, and the next month was your worst month ever. With no end in sight. Now your business may be recovering well, or still struggling for survival.

I don't need to recount all the COVID upheavals and lessons, but I want to point something out: if the only challenges small businesses faced were COVID or macroeconomic events, there might not be a need for this book. But there are so many other major challenges—which I call seismic events—that you also have to contend with. How many of these have happened to you?

One or more big-box stores moved into town, and they slashed prices. In some cases, they can sell a product for less than you pay for the same product, wholesale.

Amazon now sells just about everything, and there too it's almost impossible to match some of the prices. You know that in some cases your product is superior to the no-name item someone may buy on Amazon, but it's hard for customers to know the difference.

When Washington, DC gets into a trade war with some country, the prices of raw materials can skyrocket. You sometimes see those roller-coaster prices in what you must buy.

On a local level, one or more major employers downsized big time, or closed altogether, sending shockwaves throughout the community.

Whether you have a 100 percent online business or yours is in a physical storefront, you're up against a bunch of competitors who are undercutting your prices or otherwise taking market share.

It's never been easy to start and run a business, but just one of these seismic events can put you out of business, never mind being in a situation where you're dealing with more than one.

I've written this book with these factors in mind. We're going to discuss several ways to counteract these pressures.

The Small Business Revolution

Deluxe has been a household name for generations, and we have been working with small businesses since day one back in 1915. Even so, you may not have heard about the Small Business Revolution.

It started as a marketing project to showcase the power of small businesses in our economy. To celebrate our 100th anniversary, we told the stories of 100 small businesses from across the country some years ago. It's kind of amazing that Deluxe has been around and helping businesses for almost half of America's history. Deluxe hired a brilliant marketer and brand expert, Amanda Brinkman, to create and guide that project. The result is an award-winning, beautifully produced video/television program viewed annually by millions of small business owners like you.

Long story short, we got a great response from the business community about the business lessons presented in a captivating and entertaining format.

You can watch the multiyear series from our website at deluxe.com/sbr and also on Hulu and Amazon Prime Video. If you haven't seen the series, you're in for a treat, if I do say so myself. You get a practical business education with real-world solutions to very real problems faced by a variety of businesses. You also get the benefit of the insights of the series host, our own Amanda Brinkman, and many of the experts she draws upon when constructing solutions for each business.

Not many people know this, but one of the factors that persuaded me to become CEO of Deluxe was my watching some seasons of Small Business Revolution, also known as SBR. I thought that if a corporation could share its 100-plus-year knowledge about business success, then it's a special place full of potential. I knew I wanted to be a part of that team, and I continue to be humbled to lead the Deluxe team and family.

I'm also humble enough to know that I don't personally have all the answers. So even though my name may be on the cover of this book, you should focus on the Deluxe name as the real source of the insights you will find on these pages. I think I'm reasonably good at certain aspects of business, and, as noted earlier, I built two small businesses myself years ago. The collective knowledge presented here draws from the experience of a whole team of specialists working together.

Leader to Leader

I do have another reason for writing this book, and it's to have a discussion with you, one-on-one, as much as can be done in a book.

There's a saying in our Deluxe company culture: “It's not about you.” It's meant to make people with overly big egos stop and realize that they're not the center of the universe and accept the reality that they are part of something much bigger than themselves. That's certainly a message some people need to hear. However, senior leaders on our team have heard me say the opposite, and for a very good reason. I'll say: “It's all about you.”

I don't mean that statement in the egotistical sense, but in the sense that you must step up and be leaders. As a business owner, it really is all about you. When you decide to hire people and therefore build an organization, everyone is looking to you as the owner of the business to chart a course. You need to be inspirational at times and tough at times. People look to you not just to be managed, but to be led.

I can speak from experience that it's very difficult to do. As the business owner, you get to see all the inadequacies of your situation at one time: you need to pay bills, fill open positions, compete with the new shop down the block, and bring in next month's revenues to make payroll.

You need to set prices that are low enough to not drive away your customers, but high enough to keep the doors open. You need to keep an eye on the competition and somehow find a way to keep your customers coming back.

And after long, fitful nights with all these pressures weighing on you, somehow you need to keep your team thinking and acting positively, when that is the last thing you're feeling. Does this ring a bell?

I, too, answered the calling to start and run a small business. I started a painting company in the middle of a recession, because there were no jobs for unskilled young people. Later, I was working in a well-paying safe corporate job at the time, but the urge to build something of my own was just too strong. I took the leap.

And a big leap it was. Talk about an emotional roller-coaster. Over the course of a relatively short period, I felt elation and despair. I was proud at times and at the end of my rope too many times to count. You know what I'm talking about, so I don't have to explain this to you, other than to say that it really can be the best feeling and the worst. And sometimes those feelings can happen on the same day, right?

I sold that business and didn't find another opportunity that I felt strongly enough to create another business around. These days I'm trying to make a difference in a big company. I certainly don't have all the answers, and I have my share of nights with not much sleep leading our global team. But I've learned a few things in my long career, and I will share them with you in this book.

One thing I've discovered: no matter how small your business is, or how large, there are certain surprising similarities. In other words, when you're starting out, you may think that if you eventually become a million-dollar business, or a Fortune 500 business, that you'll have arrived and your major problems will be solved. You'll be on the business equivalent of Easy Street.

That's when I think about Walter Annenberg, a businessman who was so wealthy he gave away more than $2 billion in his lifetime.1 Here's what he had to say about success:

I want to remind you that success in life is based on hard slogging. There will be periods when discouragement is great and upsetting, and the antidote for this is calmness and fortitude and a modest yet firm belief in your competence. Be sure that your priorities are in order so that you can proceed in a logical manner and be ever mindful that nothing will take the place of persistence.

As leaders of businesses large or small, we can meet our challenges by applying hard-learned lessons from others to help us succeed. In this book we're sharing 100 years of our own hard-learned lessons, so you don't have to endure the same pain.

You May Be Thinking This

I'm not surprised that the businesses chosen by Deluxe on SBR did well. If I had Deluxe appear at my door and pay for stuff plus bring a huge team to work with me, I could improve a lot, too.

It may be true that you'd improve much if you were featured on SBR, but that's not the point. Even when we select a small town or neighborhood in a big city, only a handful of businesses get the chance to work directly with us. I agree that it's pretty cool for a business to get chosen, but the coolness does not stop with them.

This book will give you far more than what is in the television series, in two very important ways. We're limited in terms of what we can pack into episodes. Television does not lend itself to an in-depth treatment of a dozen or so aspects of each business—but this book will do that for you. The book also summarizes common themes and provides integrated advice about common business challenges supported by multiple examples.

In addition, you do not have to go through an application and interview process, with long odds that your business will be chosen. In reality, we receive nominations from thousands of towns each year, and in each of those towns, there are hundreds of eligible small businesses. In the end, millions of votes are cast to help us choose the area to highlight for a new season. Being one of the handful chosen for SBR is like winning the lottery.

This book stacks the odds in your favor, because you're holding the playbook for recognizing certain situations, and you have an easy reference guide detailing the best practices for handling those situations.

In a way, you're in the same situation as even those lucky businesses were, when we were done filming and had to go home. The most fundamental success factor of all is in taking regular and effective action toward a worthy goal. Our personalized boost is certainly a big help to those businesses, but is by no means enough to create long-lasting success. That can only come from the many regular actions that they must take, and that you must also take. By the end of this book, you'll know exactly what steps you must follow to create that long-term success.

Companion Site

I have more good news for you. We have developed a companion website to this book. Some best practices in business are timeless, like certain effective leadership techniques. Other best practices are highly dynamic, like the best ways to be found by search engines.

In this book we give you a wide variety of these techniques. As those practices change, or we identify additional ones, we'll update the companion site accordingly. You can find it at deluxe.com/SBRbook.

You Are Part of a Worthy Tradition

I'm a huge believer that small businesses are the bedrock foundation of our communities, and also of our country. In any large or small city in America, the number of small businesses is much greater than the number of big employers. Small businesses create the majority of new jobs in our country and provide essential services to fellow citizens on a local and national level. Clearly, I don't want to take anything away from the big employers, because we are one of them! Large companies were once small companies too, and they also have a key role in community success, employing hundreds or even many thousands of people.

However, it's the small businesses that make up Main Street, before the big employers come to town and after they leave. It's where all the services are created that a community needs: auto repair, hair salon, watering hole, pizza parlor, health service, literacy center, and dozens of others. And it's where a huge variety of jobs are formed, money changes hands, and taxes get paid to pave the streets, build schools and parks, and deliver health care. In fact, big businesses don't move into towns unless the small businesses have already provided the solid foundation of people and services to make it all work.

This Guide Can Also Help You to Start a Business

One of the Deluxe companies is MyCorp, which offers cloud-based incorporation services for people who want to start businesses. That company gives us a unique window into the state of business formation in the United States. It was remarkable to see: in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the number of businesses formed skyrocketed. According to our data from MyCorp, business incorporations were up 11 percent year-over-year during the pandemic.

Clearly this pandemic caused people to stop and think about the jobs they had, or lost, and what other options there were. In some cases, they decided that this was the time to make their business dreams come true.

If you're one of those people, and you picked up this book in the hope that it might give you a boost to your brand-new business, you're absolutely right.

Our Deluxe team found in producing SBR virtually every business either was not using certain powerful business practices at all or they were using them ineffectively. For example, many businesses had no website, or their site was ancient and by no means presented the operation in the best light. In some cases, their site was solid, but the business was not using some other business-building method effectively, like email marketing.

In a sense, new businesses can especially benefit from this book, because they don't need to unplug or unlearn outdated practices. They can start fresh and in the direction that's been proven to work, instead of having to figure it all out the hard way.

How SBR Analyzed Businesses, and How This Book Is Organized

You can see from the Contents that most of the chapters are on specific business-growth principles. Certainly, it's possible to dip in and out, depending on what you need at the moment. However, you'll benefit the most from reading this book in the order that you find the chapters.

In the SBR series, we followed a methodical approach to helping businesses. First, we got acquainted (as we have in this first chapter). Then we sat down with the business owners and got a sense of how the business came about, and what the revenue and expense situation look like. Then we explored the assets of the business, not so much in terms of equipment but the products and services that are most successful.

Then the discussion shifted to the positioning of the business in the community: where business comes from, what we know about customers, and what the unique positioning of the business is, if any. There's also a discussion of the competition or any other seismic events facing the business.

The final part of the interview revolved around some difficult discussions and initial actions to be taken. In some cases that meant bringing in special talent to the business or making sure that written agreements existed among friends. Business has a way of testing friendships; if you have a real business, you might start with a handshake, but you need to follow up with something in writing.

In the SBR series, this is the point at which the Deluxe team of experienced professionals like Amanda, Julie Gordon, Cameron Potts, and many others rolled up their sleeves and brought their expertise to bear. Each episode is a bit different, but also similar in certain respects.

That's where this book will be particularly handy to you. The chapters do a deep dive into key business elements, and especially where many small businesses run into trouble. As you read each chapter, either make notes in the margins or have some paper handy, because you'll need it. This is a read-think-and-do kind of book, and not some new business theory that doesn't get specific.

You're likely to find one chapter may be pretty familiar information to you, and several others are not. This also will vary by business, but I can tell you this: we chose some great businesses in the many episodes of SBR, and not a single one of them was successfully using all the advice that we cover in these chapters.

Now that I've given you some perspective on what this book is about and how it can help you, it's time to ask some hard questions about your business. That's the topic of Chapter 2.

Note

1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Annenberg

.

2Why? Tough Questions, Tough Decisions

I FREQUENTLY SPEAK with small-business owners around the country. Sometimes we have the chance to sit down over coffee or a meal—or, more recently, over Zoom. I have certain questions that I've found to be most useful in understanding their businesses. Perhaps the most important question: “Why are you doing what you're doing?”

With some of the businesses we see in the SBR series, the answer may be: “I love to bake.” In the case of Ohm Nohm Bakery & Cafe in Season 5, Episode 5, we met the owner, Jessamine Daly-Griffen. She was a devoted mother of kids who needed gluten-free baked goods. For her, the original “why” was “I couldn't find healthy and delicious baked goods for my family nearby, so I decided to make them myself.” That's a wonderful example of taking matters into your own hands and solving a problem. I tip my hat to her.

Here's the interesting thing: your “why” may change over time, and that's okay.

However, I cannot overstate the importance of being clear with yourself about why you are starting or have started a business. While your “why” may adapt at different times, what cannot change is the ability of the business to create sufficient income to support its owners and workers. That is the point of a business. If it can't support the owner and workers, it probably isn't a business at all.

When we look at Jessamine's gluten-free business, she could have just continued to bake those items at home for her family. Instead, she got into business. Why? Because word spread about her excellent baked goods that solved a serious health need and were not available anywhere else in the counties surrounding Fredonia, New York. She ramped up her operation into a commercial enterprise to meet that important need for other families.

Many businesses start as a noble pursuit, to do something nice for neighbors or the community, and many owners dream about the business being able to comfortably support their families at the same time. Many groups can organize themselves like a business. Nonprofits are a great example of organizations that are organized similarly to businesses.

Every business needs to provide a source of income for the owner and team of workers helping the business succeed. Just because you want something to be a profitable business does not mean it has that potential.

Perhaps the business can be successful, but not in your location. Or perhaps the business is already successful in the current location, but it's potential for more is limited by some factor. Maybe the business is better as a hobby than a business, or maybe a hobby has the potential to become a great business.

When a Hobby Becomes a Business

Some people's businesses begin as hobbies. They let off steam (or save money) by building furniture, and then people take notice and ask to have something built. Other people have hobbies that stay hobbies, and that's cool too. In the case of Jessamine, it was not a hobby but a critical need for her family to have gluten-free food. But Jessamine can't work for free, simply to provide her neighbors gluten-free food. She needs to provide for her family and have a reasonable return on the investment of her time, talent, and treasure.

So when does a fun, helpful, or important activity become a business? There are several markers for when that occurs. It starts to become a business when you:

Invest in commercial equipment to make things faster

Sign a lease

Quit your day job

Hire employees

Begin to take substantial sums from your savings, or you pay for the activity on your personal credit cards, or both

Somewhere along the line, when you've passed enough of these markers, you're a business. Becoming a small business is a very big deal. Now you have other people and their families depending on you for their very livelihood. You may be taking on liability if someone slips and falls in your establishment, or if a product you sent from your online business gets misused in some way.

It's at this point of becoming a business that people need to ask once again: “Why am I doing what I'm doing?,” but the fact is most people don't ask it again. As far as I can tell, most of the SBR businesses did not ask this critical question. They started the activity, and their “why” at the time might have been clear. Then they gradually morphed into a business, but nobody told them to ask that key question once more.

A business needs to have a purpose, and the purpose can be anything you want it to be. It can be that you're going to run a nonprofit bakery, or that your town needs a combination golf course and community center that will be run partially through donations.

The problem happens when someone is running a store or other organization that's become a business and they reach their breaking point. They get to the place where they are often overwhelmed and not making enough money to pay themselves. They're running today's larger business with the “why” or purpose that they started with five years ago, when it was just a hobby.

For the vast majority of businesses we've worked with over the years and most recently showcased in SBR, their current purpose doesn't typically involve making a fortune and becoming a national sensation; however, it does involve making a living, which certainly is a reasonable and necessary goal.

When It's Right to Be Brutal

When you ask the tough question of why you want to be in business, and if you decide that you do want to make a reasonable profit from it, then you need to ask yourself three other questions:

Is there truly a market for what I'm doing?

If there is a market, can I deliver the products or services profitably?

If so, how long will it take me to get to that profitability from where I am today?

Those are tough questions! Here you're already operating a business; am I really suggesting that you need to step back and ask these fundamental questions at the same time? Yes. You'll have the best chance of meeting your goal of making a living from your business if you have a brutally honest review at this stage.

In the case of Ellen's Bridal & Dress Boutique in Season 1, Episode 3, owner Lisa Downs was able to get a handle on the size of her potential market by finding out how many marriage licenses were issued in Wabash County each year.

When it comes to the second question of profitability, this is where you need to know your numbers, even if some of them were from your hobby days. If you've been making a profit at times, that's great. What have been your most profitable products or services? What were the least profitable? As we discuss in Chapter 3 about crucial numbers to know, do you have a handle on the maximum profitability of your operation as it exists today?

That third question requires a tough assessment: What are the numbers telling you, and are they moving in the direction of crossing over into regular profitability?

It's not the end of the world if they're not showing profitability—if you are willing to make changes.

Course Corrections

Don't get me wrong: I'm the last person to want to put a damper on people starting businesses. Those brave people are a major target market for Deluxe. But what I am suggesting is that running a business is a bit like flying a plane. If you ever look at the route that commercial pilots take when crossing the country, you will see that it is never a straight line from takeoff to landing. They're continually making course adjustments as instructed by air traffic controllers, in order to avoid other planes and skirt around bad weather.

As a business owner, you also need to get your bearings on a regular basis and analyze where you are, where you're going, and what it will take to get there. In the SBR series, we saw many times where the current course would not allow the owners—no matter how hard they worked—to make ends meet and keep the doors open, never mind pay themselves a modest sum.

Therefore, to reach the destination of staying open and paying themselves, often the SBR businesses would have to raise prices or think of ways to trim inventory, menu items, or services offered, and other creative solutions.

Much of this book is a guide to helping you through the process of asking important questions and giving you options: it's thinking about these questions that allows you to get your bearings as a business. They involve where you are financially, what your products and services are, and how you stack up to your competition, among many other considerations.

In the course of filming many seasons of SBR, the Deluxe team has conducted literally hundreds of interviews with small businesses, and our team talks to millions of small businesses every month. We have never come across a business where the owner said: “I started the business because I was a business-school graduate and I wanted to put into practice the ideas I learned in the classroom.”