MBA2121 Can You Run More Than One Business?

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Hey oh welcome to the $1 RMBA Show. Powerful business lessons you can count on every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of Webinar Ninja, an inhibited software company I started with my co founder back in 2014. And in today's lesson we're going to discuss the question can you run more than one business at a time? I get asked this question a lot because I run two businesses. I run this, the hundred dollar MBA as well as my software company Webinar Ninja. I also other smaller projects like local events. I also have like a part time speaking career where I speak on stages. So I'm juggling a few things, a few responsibilities. We're going to dive into this topic because I know a lot of people, they start a business, they might have some traction, they might get interested in starting something new while they have a business and they wonder should they jump on that opportunity while they still have this business or do they need to do one at a time? I'll also share what to look out for, some of the things that I fel to, the mistakes I made, issues you might face, and some things you might want to consider before you decide to have more Than one business. But also I'll share with you some of the advantages because there are two sides to every coin. Of course. So let's get into it. Let's get down to business. Gas, snacks, tolls. This trip is draining my wallet.

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I want to begin today's lesson by just making sure we clarify. Running a business or running more than one business is different than owning more than one business. You can own several businesses, but what I'm talking about is the day to day involvement. Are you involved in the business every single day? Are you leading the team? Are you doing work in this business? Some of us will start a business, we'll scale it, and then we'll hire a team and even a CEO or a general manager to take care of it. You might meet with the general manager once a week or even once a month to see everything's going, the numbers are going in the right direction and you're good to go. And you're more like a business owner slash investor. This is not what I'm talking about today because this is totally doable because your time is not being used on that business. What I'm talking about is you being the owner and the creator and the operator of more than one business. For example, I run the $100 MBA, which is this podcast. It's webinars, it's courses, it's all kinds of stuff. But I also run a software company called Webinar Ninja. These are two separate businesses that have separate teams that run and do different things. There's different strategies for growing each of these businesses. What's required of me for each business, what it needs from me is different for each of these businesses. And technically, yes, I'm running two businesses, but I have a co founder, Nicole, my partner in life and business is my co founder in both businesses. So we have two people running two businesses. So it's not like I'm a single founder running two businesses. So I just want to make sure that's clear. Why is this important? It's because there's more than one decision maker. Somebody that can make decisions and take on some of the work and load and responsibility. This makes running more than one business so much easier. Even if we had a third business, both of us wouldn't be taking on a second business. We'd be taking on half a second business. Nevertheless, there are challenges, even though we are co founders in both businesses and I have double the energy and effort because I have somebody with me. Because you still have to make a decision of where you and your co founder dedicates their time. What are the things that are important that I need to do in this company versus the other? How much time am I spending, how much of my resources am I spending? Money, talent, all that kind of stuff into each business. And my number one advice to people that run more than one business is you need to keep the books separate. You need to separate. These businesses have a P and L, a profit and loss sheet for both of them. Separate bank accounts, separate entities, legally. Because if one day you sell one business or one goes out of business, the other one is not affected. But it also allows you to look at each business objectively. Why? Because a lot of founders, they kind of mush everything together and they can't see clearly which business is actually the winning business and the one they should focus on or add more resources to. They just lump all the revenue into one thing and that revenue pays for all the bills. But when you separate, you see, oh, this business is actually growing 50% month over month. Its expenses are low, there's high profitability, this business is doing well versus maybe another business that is, maybe a vampire that is taking the revenue, the profits that you're making from the business that's successful to feed its needs, to feed its bills and hasn't been profitable. And you kind of start getting a little bit unclear about where you should back your horses. Okay, so this is why it's important to separate these businesses totally. So you can see them living on their own. This includes as well, as much as possible, the team members that you have. Sometimes you're going to have team members that work on both because you want to use a shared resources to save money. I understand that. But for the most part, you should kind of earmark players on each team. Why? Because salaries are part of your expenses. And if one business is not profitable, is not doing well and you need to make some cuts, you don't want to cut somebody that's actually helping you with the Business that's doing well. And the reason why I'm giving the example of one business doing well, one not doing so well is because this usually the case and this is where we're going to get to in today's lesson. Most of the founders that I speak to that have more than one business, there's one standout business that's doing very well. The other ones are kind of being welfared behind the other business and not doing as well. In rare cases, there are founders that are involved in many businesses and all of them are doing well. Two or three businesses. The one that comes to mind is Peter Levels who runs Remote okay and Nomad List. He has all these other projects. He's a solo founder. It's incredibly rare what he does. He is not an example that is probably prevalent. I would say that he's the exception to the rule. He does everything himself for the most part. He has a couple vas and he chooses business models that are incredibly simple and efficient to run. So separating the businesses in all aspects, super important. Now, there are advantages. The first advantage is that usually one business can help the other. In terms of marketing, if you have success in one area and you want to promote your other project, you might notice that I promote my software company, Webinar Ninja. This helps on the show, I promote it on the show and it really helps leverage the audience. I already have here to have some awareness of what else I do. But also on Webinar Ninja, when I do webinars and I do demos, I mentioned the $100 MBA show. So it's cross pollination. We kind of help each other out. Two opportunities. Marketing partnerships are those opportunities basically double. I go to conferences where people just know me for Webinar Ninja, they know that I'm the founder of this software company and they have no idea on the host of this podcast. And when they do find out, they're like, oh, awesome, I'd like to get involved, partner up, sponsor whatever it is, vice versa. I go to speak at a lot of podcasting conference and they have no idea I'm the founder of a software company. So there you have it. There are opportunities that just come about because I have two feet on each side of the equation. Right. You get it. So in many ways, when I go to these conferences or meet us or talk to people, I have a foot in each side and it allows me to bridge that gap, introduce them to other things that I do. This opens up opportunities for, like I mentioned, sponsorships, partnerships, marketing opportunities, opportunities to get on Stages, things like that. The other huge advantage is that when you're working on one business or you have experience in one business, that experience often can help you with the next business or the business that you're doing with that business. The lessons you've learned, the choices, the resources you found, whether they're agencies or services or even skills that you picked up along the way. The other advantage that you have by having two businesses is that it diversifies your investments. Maybe one business that is in a market will crash, the other business survives. You have a backup plan, you have something to fall back on, you have some sort of safety net. Now, having said all that, here are some things you need to watch out for. Sometimes we have a successful business that's doing well, that's earning us good revenue, and then we start another business while we have this business because it gets boring. Often the things that make us successful are just boring. The things we have to do may not excite us every day. This is a big, big trap. It's a warning for you all. Sometimes it's okay to tell yourself to do something that's boring, to make it happen, to put in the work, because this is what pays the bills. This is what's growing your business. This is what's helping you be successful is a tedious, consistent tasks. By the way, this is applicable to any kind of skill or mastery in any field or career. The things that make them great are the steady, slow practices that they do that are kind of boring. And what we do is we almost self sabotage. Pretty much where we start another business, we challenge ourselves with something completely new. We're struggling or we feel like we're growing because of all these struggles. But really what we might have done is made problems for ourselves that are unnecessary and also it's detracting us or it's distracting us from the business that actually is working. So you gotta be very careful about starting a new business. And the reasons why they say part time efforts give you part time results, well, that's what's gonna happen when you split your time between two businesses. This is especially true if you are a solo founder.

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To wrap up today's episode. Yes, it is possible for you to run more than one business at a time, but it's a lot harder. This is just the truth. It's so much harder for you to balance two businesses at a time. Make sure they're both successful given the love and the support and the resources you need. My advice is if you're going to start a new business and you have an existing business, think about bringing on a co founder, somebody that can help you with the load of that new business, that can shoulder the responsibility so that you are not solely responsible for its well being. This will help you tremendously and it will allow you to focus on just leaning into those benefits I mentioned of having two businesses. That wraps up today's lesson. Thank you so much for listening to the $100 MBA show. If you love what you hear, hit subscribe on your favorite podcast app. Do it right now. And if you love this podcast and you want to support us, share it on social media. Go ahead and share on your favorite platform, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, whatever it is. Let them know to head on over to100nba.net to subscribe to the show. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. Every business has its challenges. It has its fires, it has its emergencies, it has its potentials for problems. This is just standard. We accept this. When you take on another business while you're in a business, you're doubling the chances of that happening. That's just math. Okay, so it's not really a relaxing lifestyle to have that kind of heightened risk and issues that could happen or that you'll have to deal with fires you'll have to deal with. So just keep that in mind if you're looking for a lifestyle business, something that is going to give you maximum return for minimum effort or pain or agony. No, don't take on more than one business at a time. Thanks so much for listening to the $100 MBA show. I'll check you in tomorrow's episode where we discuss how to scale a coaching business. Can't wait for that. I'll check you tomorrow. See you then. Take care. Of gas, snacks, tolls. This trip is draining my wallet.

Yeah, but we'll be with family.

You're in a good mood. What's your deal?

What's my deal? I saved at Metro with no activation fees and I got one line of 5G for just $25 per month. Kept the phone I love and a 5 year price guarantee on my top.

Tuxt and data detour to Metro. Get that more for your money feeling only at Metro by T Mobile just.

Bring your number $30 first month and $25 after with autopay not available. If with Metro or T Mobile in the past 180 days.