10 Reasons Your Business Will Fail

Hey, folks, this is Kimberly Hobshed with Entrepreneurs Rocket Fuel. I've got a top 10 list for you today. Top 10 reasons your business is going to fail. I know that sounds kind of negative, right? But we can switch this around and just make sure that we don't make these mistakes. At least we don't make these mistakes over and over again. Or at least we don't stay in these mistakes. Because as Zig Ziglar says, you don't actually drown by falling into water. You drown by staying there. So if you found that you've made some of these mistakes, just realize that you've fallen in the water, get out, take a towel yourself off, and make sure that you don't make that mistake again. Or at least don't stay in that mistake. All right, we're going to do this top 10 style. So we're going to be the we're going to do reason number 10 first, and then all the way down to the biggest reason that your business is going to fail. Whether it's during COVID whether it's during good times, bad times, whatever, these are the top 10 reasons your business is going to fail. So we're going to start with number 10. You ready? All right, so the number 10 reason is trying something once and giving up, right? That's trying something and like, I don't know, say, virtual summits or virtual meetings or something like that. And being like, ah, that was a passing phase. Guess what? Not a passing phase. It's actually going to be a thing from now on. So virtual meetings, you got to have that. The idea to figure that out and keep making it happen. Don't just try something once and give up on it. And this goes for anything in your business, right? So maybe you tried a Facebook ad, it didn't work. Tweak it, try it again. Maybe you tried doing, you know, some online meetings or a meetup or creating a Facebook group or creating something, and it just didn't work. Just tweak it and try it again. Don't give up just because you tried something once. All right, so that's number 10. Trying something once and giving up. Mistake number nine, not asking for help. Oh, this is a big one. And this one actually hits home a little bit. Sometimes entrepreneurs as solopreneurs, they think, oh, we got to do it all ourselves. We got to put on that armor and act like everything's totally fine, and we got it all together and not reaching out and asking for help from other people who know what they're doing from A mentor or a guide or a coach or somebody who knows what they're doing or who's been through it before or who is a little bit better at it than we are and asking them for help. So reaching out and asking for help is not a bad thing. It's actually what is going to help you not have your business fail. So don't forget number nine, asking for help. Make sure that you do that. Number nine, reason not to fail. Number nine, reason that your business will fail is not asking for help. Number eight, looking the other way. Okay, so now that is like when you have something that is due or when you have something that's out there and you're like, okay, I passed off my QuickBooks and I sure hope somebody takes that and runs with it or I passed off my website and I sure hope all those links work or all of those things looking the other way and not focusing on what might break in your business. So don't just pass things off, but make sure when you do ask for help and you allocate those to somebody else that you make sure that you follow up and it actually is working. So a lot of mistakes are made just by looking the other way and not watching your business. All right, number, number seven, biggest mistake is focusing on busyness instead of business. Now I used to call this when I was in corporate, focusing on color coding your files, meaning that, okay, all my files are pretty and they're color coded now. But really no business actually got done that day because you're moving things around on your desk. You're not actually accomplishing things that are going to lead to revenue or profit or sales of any or lead to advancing your business. You're focusing on being really busy and sometimes we're really good at that. Like, oh yeah, I did so much today and you walk away and you're like, yeah, but what actually got done. So a good analysis at the end of the day is what got done to advance your cause or advance your business or advance your revenue and make things move forward in your business. Because if you're busy all day every day, but you're actually not getting any sales, that will kill your business. A big, big reason that your business will fail. Alright, the next one. Number six, treating your business like a hobby. So this is a mistake that a lot of entrepreneurs make and that is like, I'm all about fun. I really, really am. If it's not fun, it's not worth doing. But at the end of the day, it is a business, right? It's Not a hobby. If you treat your hob, your business like a hobby, it will be a very expensive hobby and not a business. So you want to be sure that you treat your business like a business. If you had a boss, would you fire you would be a good example of ways to look at that. Or you know, are you doing the things that are going to adv your business for the cause of the business each day? All right, number six, number five, Waiting for the perfect time. Now this goes for all of you who are afraid to get content out there or who are afraid to launch or who are thinking, you know, like, let me just make the perfect copywriting copy before I send it out and announce that I have this brand new thing or you know, first I'm going to get all my hair done and my makeup done and my, I'm going to lose £20 before I do a Facebook Live. And then I'm going to, after I lose those 20 pounds, I'm really going to do Facebook Live. But then first I'm going to get a new iPhone because my iPhone is now outdated because it took me that long to do to lose £20 and then do the Facebook Live. And now that I've waited to get the new iPhone, now Facebook is actually not a thing anymore because it's now some other thing, other platform and I don't know how to use that now I have to learn how to use that. As soon as I learn how to use that new platform, then I'm going to do a live but not before. And really done is better than perfect. You need to get yourself out there and not wait for the perfect time because there will never be a perfect time. We're not perfect. We're just going to get out there and we're going to test things, see if they work and if they don't work, no big deal, we're just going to do something else. Test it again. Alright, so waiting for the perfect time is number five. Number four is not building a team. Failing to build yourself a team. Now a team. As a solopreneur, you're like, wow, I don't want to hire employees. I don't want to, you know, I'm not ready to. I haven't not made enough money yet. But guess what? If you don't already have a virtual assistant, it's you probably already need one by the time you probably already need two by the time you decide that you might need one. Too late. You actually already need a virtual assistant. Think of how much you could get done if you weren't busy trying to chase people and do follow up and do all that stuff and actually advance your business and focus on the things that you are really, really good at. And you have an assistant that was helping you get all of those other things done and pick up all of those pieces. Certainly if you don't already have a virtual assistant, you probably already need one. If you have a business and it's really having a virtual assistant can really free you up to get into your zone of genius a lot faster. So not hiring a team, whether that's a virtual assistant, an assistant that's a personal assistant, or, or team members doing the sales, the activities, the delivery, whatever you need to accomplish in your day, if you're doing it all, then you're really not the most efficient you could possibly be. You need to start exploring the opportunity to pass off work to other people and be able to make sure that you stay in your zone of genius. So not hiring or building a team, even if that's a team of other people that are really good and you're doing 1099s with all of them, or partnerships with all of them, that's also a team, if they're getting paid on commission, totally fine, that's also a team. But make sure you're not doing all of it all yourself all the time, because you're going to burn out and it's not a real efficient use of your time. You're not going to be all the way in your zone of genius. Alright, so number four is not building a team. Number three is not having alternative streams of income. Hello. Right now, it's a really good example of that. This is a time when we're filming this video of COVID and a lot of people lost their jobs because of it. They got laid off or they got furloughed. Maybe they'll get their jobs back, maybe they won't. And if you don't have an alternative stream of income coming in, some sort of passive income or alternative stream of income, maybe a side hustle or something like that, you're making a big mistake. So make sure that you have alternative streams of income. Now if you're a business owner, that can be by having your regular offering, maybe you're a coach, right? And you have this coaching offering and that's great. And you do one on one coaching. But do you also have a group course that you can put lots of people in? Do you also have downloadables that people can buy that are what are called tripwires or low Ticket offers? Do you have high ticket offers? Do you have ways for people to engage with you in different ways? Are you selling a book? Are you selling an audiobook? Are you selling other ways for people to get your products or services that are not just your one and done offering? Because if it's not right for them, maybe they're not ready to engage with you at that level yet and you're not able to capitalize on having alternative streams of income. Now you can have streams of income that are completely outside of that, like passive income, such as real estate investment or investing in some sort of other sort of investment or having some sort of other passive income. Maybe you have something on as a side hustle or you're doing something with Amazon, doing products, services, whatever. If you have a side hustle, maybe your side hustle is actually a job or maybe your job is your job and then you have a side hustle as a business. All of them are good. Just make sure you have alternative streams of income. Because one stream of income, if something happens to that, you never know what's going to happen. And there were plenty of great employees who were doing a wonderful job, who were doing exactly what they were supposed to do and then suddenly something hit and they were out of a job and now they're looking for that additional stream of income. So if you have that on the side, that is a great way to make sure that you are secure. Number two is that you're focusing on revenue and not profit. All right, this is a really important one. A lot of entrepreneurs that I talk to talk about that big six figure or seven figure mark and there is nothing wrong with that. Talking about revenue capture is really, really fantastic because you're not in business unless you've actually billed somebody for something and gotten paid for it. Until you actually do that, you are in, technically you are in startup mode. You don't have a business until you have been PA for doing something in your business. Alright? So revenue is a good thing. Being paid for what you do, that's phenomenal. And having six figures or seven figures or whatever your goal is. Great goal, absolutely wonderful. Definitely, definitely do focus on, on revenue, but don't just focus on revenue because the other big, big, big number is profitability. Alright? So you may have a big market share where you are capturing finally seven figures or six figures and that's great. But if you are not checking what's going into your bank account because you are spending it marketing or you're spending it all on Facebook ads, or you are Spending it all on click funnels and all kinds of different investments that you're making. Those investments are good and they may be worthwhile. But at the end of the day, if you're not making profit and nothing is going into your bank account, that's a problem. So consider once you get to a certain level, make sure that you're paying yourself a salary. Make sure that you're allocating money for you and your family and that it's not just that you are dipping in to get cash whenever you need it from your business or you're putting money worse into your business in order to make it float to be to support those other structures. Alright? And then the number one reason why your business is going to fail or any business is going to fail is by not taking action. That's right, failing to take action because you have really good ideas, but you're just not moving forward with them. So this is a great example of it. You just heard a video of 10 reasons that your business will fail. Don't just go tell somebody else about it like hey, I just heard this person talk about 10 reasons why businesses fail will fail. It was really funny, really interesting, really creative and then not actually take action. So take a look at these 10 reasons. See which 1, 2, 3, 4 or 10. You can implement something different on. Take action on and actually take action. Because the worst thing that you can do is just educate yourself all day every day and never actually take action and do anything with it. Because then you will not be making the impact in the world that you want to make and your message is not going to get out there. Alright folks, I'm Kimberly Hobscheid with Entrepreneur Rocket Fuel. If you are not already in our community, I would encourage you to join go to www.entrepreneursrocketfuel.com Facebook and join the community and the conversation. We would love to have you in it. It's a community by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs to help entrepreneurs and experts get their business to the next level. We'd love to see you in there. Come join the conversation. I'm Kimberly Hobscheid and I would love to work with you. Chee.