Early Progress
Restarting my progress thread as I have a real business with revenue right now. The early part of the progress thread was mostly me flailing around and looking for a solution. @ZCP gave me the idea to just start putting bids for ownership on different businesses, and this directly led me to purchasing a business. I highly recommend partnering with existing businesses as I would still be flailing around aimlessly if I had not followed his advice.
I have an informal equity agreement with an accountant. Could my partner rip me off? Yes, but if they do then I will still have the direct experience of running a shop and can just find a new partner. There’s approximately 85,000 CPA firms in the US. Most have a common problem: they suck at sales and marketing.
After writing down all the different problems in the business, the biggest bottleneck is the marketing and sales efforts. The shop is at about 180,000 per year with almost zero overhead. For bookkeeping, a mature firm would be at 250,000.
Right now, the marketing and sales process is painfully slow. However, the bar is set exceptionally low for this industry. If you can get a Wordpress website that looks aesthetically appealing, you will be lightyears ahead of the competition. Right now, I’m focused on a MacGyver marketing campaign just on LinkedIn (Add me BTW https://www.linkedin.com/in/walter-stroup/). I can source leads entirely through LinkedIn and when I figure out what sells, I can start to scale on a website.
It is pointless to AI optimize workflows if your sales and marketing process is bottlenecking the entire operation.
I’m imitating Andy Black’s outreach efforts in addition to copying Deloitte who is the largest player in the US. Generally, they produce long, dry articles on different topics in business.
My goal is to find what works, then focus my time on doing that for the business.
I find marketing comfortable, but my direct sales needs work. Thankfully, I remind myself why I’m doing this. I want to raise a big family, and I don’t want to be dependent on social security in my old age. I also find the process intrinsically rewarding.
Action Items:
3 hours of accounting study per day.
Max out LinkedIn connection requests to my target audience (Multi-location gym franchise owners).
Produce one high quality article per week about how bookkeeping/accounting can make partners more money.
Connect with IRL connections by asking if anyone knows anybody who needs a bookkeeper and accountant
Produce some content on this form as I know that business owners lurk here.
Cold call and solicit businesses directly. I weave into conversation that I do bookkeeping and accounting with real people.
Suggestions welcome!
Restarting my progress thread as I have a real business with revenue right now. The early part of the progress thread was mostly me flailing around and looking for a solution. @ZCP gave me the idea to just start putting bids for ownership on different businesses, and this directly led me to purchasing a business. I highly recommend partnering with existing businesses as I would still be flailing around aimlessly if I had not followed his advice.
I have an informal equity agreement with an accountant. Could my partner rip me off? Yes, but if they do then I will still have the direct experience of running a shop and can just find a new partner. There’s approximately 85,000 CPA firms in the US. Most have a common problem: they suck at sales and marketing.
After writing down all the different problems in the business, the biggest bottleneck is the marketing and sales efforts. The shop is at about 180,000 per year with almost zero overhead. For bookkeeping, a mature firm would be at 250,000.
Right now, the marketing and sales process is painfully slow. However, the bar is set exceptionally low for this industry. If you can get a Wordpress website that looks aesthetically appealing, you will be lightyears ahead of the competition. Right now, I’m focused on a MacGyver marketing campaign just on LinkedIn (Add me BTW https://www.linkedin.com/in/walter-stroup/). I can source leads entirely through LinkedIn and when I figure out what sells, I can start to scale on a website.
It is pointless to AI optimize workflows if your sales and marketing process is bottlenecking the entire operation.
I’m imitating Andy Black’s outreach efforts in addition to copying Deloitte who is the largest player in the US. Generally, they produce long, dry articles on different topics in business.
My goal is to find what works, then focus my time on doing that for the business.
I find marketing comfortable, but my direct sales needs work. Thankfully, I remind myself why I’m doing this. I want to raise a big family, and I don’t want to be dependent on social security in my old age. I also find the process intrinsically rewarding.
Action Items:
3 hours of accounting study per day.
Max out LinkedIn connection requests to my target audience (Multi-location gym franchise owners).
Produce one high quality article per week about how bookkeeping/accounting can make partners more money.
Connect with IRL connections by asking if anyone knows anybody who needs a bookkeeper and accountant
Produce some content on this form as I know that business owners lurk here.
Cold call and solicit businesses directly. I weave into conversation that I do bookkeeping and accounting with real people.
Suggestions welcome!
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