Starting a business in Australia - what you need to know with Chris Davis

This whopper episode covers just about everything you need to know about starting and building a business in Australia.

I talk to Chris Davis about what someone needs to know and do when they're starting a business in Australia. This is the longest episode I've ever recorded and it's so full of tips and advice for anyone who has a business so tune in today.

Chris has had over thirty years’ of experience building new businesses and initiatives, as well as refining existing approaches for impact and growth. He has a breadth of knowledge in the areas of governance, commercial solutions, and entrepreneurial advice, which he openly shares so he can help businesses and individuals make the most of their opportunities.

Tune in to hear all about starting a business 🎧

Links mentioned:
vdp.com.au
moneysmart
ABN lookup
ASIC
Rhuby Delights

Connect with me

Website: www.newschoolofmarketing.com
Facebook: @newschoolofmarketing
Facebook group: @newschoolofmarketing
Instagram: @bianca_mckenzie

Work with me:

🟠 NEW SCHOOL OF MARKETING BUSINESS CLUB: a supportive, action-focused community where business owners get weekly coaching, expert feedback, and co-working sessions to stay consistent, accountable, and strategic with their marketing—so they can finally see real results.
https://newschoolofmarketing.com/club

🔵 MARKETING STRATEGY & COACHING: customised marketing strategies, expert guidance, and hands-on support to help business owners attract more leads, increase sales, and grow sustainably—without the guesswork. https://www.biancamckenzie.com/coaching/

⚫️ CHECK MY WEBSITE: https://www.biancamckenzie.com/

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Transcript

[00:00] Speaker A: You. Welcome to the New School of Marketing podcast. The place for smart, simple strategies that will amplify your business results. Sharing practical tips, insider knowledge and actionable advice. Because marketing is something that every business owner can do. Now, let's get started. Introducing your host, Bianca McKenzie. Mum, lover of snow, sports, camping, horse riding and in demand launch strategist and Facebook advertising knowledge bank. Welcome to the New School of Marketing podcast. I'm Bianca McKenzie, and today I'm talking about starting a business in Australia. What you need to know with Chris Davis. Chris has had over 30 years of experience building new businesses and initiatives, as well as refining existing approaches for impact and growth. He has a breadth of knowledge in the areas of governance, commercial solutions and entrepreneurial advice, which he openly shares so he can help businesses and individuals make the most of their opportunities. Welcome to the show, Chris.

[01:03] Speaker B: Hi, Bianca.

[01:05] Speaker A: So good to have this chat with you. It's great.

[01:09] Speaker B: Fantastic. Help people start or grow businesses. That's what we're all about, making opportunities matter.

[01:17] Speaker A: Yes, and I really love this. So, a little bit of backstory. Chris and I met a local event. So Chris is based in Launceston most of the time. He's in Queensland right now, and I'm in the northwest coast of Tassie. So, yeah, we got chatting and yeah, you have so much knowledge. So you're part of the Van Diemen Project? Part of Digital Solutions Tasmania. You do a lot of business advice. I'm pretty sure you have another business in.

[01:46] Speaker B: Yes, we're part of the Convergence Next group. So my business partner, Adam and I own three businesses together. We own the Van Diemen Project, which is a business based out of lawn system, but services right across Australia, but predominantly in Tasmania. We run government programs and programs for industry, business and the like with that. So, as we said, we do that because opportunities matter and we want to help industry and businesses and regions make the most of their opportunities. We also run a business that we purchased just over twelve months ago called National First Aid Training Institute. And the mission for Nifty, as we call it, in FTI, which is the acronym, is saving Lives Through Quality First Aid Education. And so we offer first aid training in Southeast Queensland, issue about 15,001st aid certificates a year, which makes us one of the largest providers of first aid training in Australia. Not just you. So we operate on a model whereby we employ predominantly paramedics and nurses with that. So that's why I'm in Queensland at the moment. Head office is on the wonderful Sunshine Coast, so I get the best of both worlds. I get the beautiful home in Launceston in Tasmania, or anywhere in Tasmania is beautiful, but there and I also get to spend a reasonable amount of time on the wonderful Sunshine Coast in Queensland. I'm fairly lucky. And the third business that we own is a business called Illuminate Education Australia, which empowers and grows the capacity and capability of young people through experiences in schools. And we work with students from as low as grade four right through to high school students. And we also do some work in the disability sector and the like with that as well. And to date, that business has worked with more than 20,000 students right across Australia, coming up with entrepreneurial ideas and programs and projects that make a life and make a difference in the lives of young people throughout Australia.

[04:05] Speaker A: That is fabulous. I'm going to have to talk to you about that at some point. But it's like, oh my God. Yeah. World of knowledge. Wow. You must be kept very busy.

[04:20] Speaker B: Sleepy for when we no longer on the earth. No, just joking. We do need plenty of sleep, but you're making the most of that time and I might be just a little bit of a workaholic.

[04:31] Speaker A: Hey, don't we start businesses because we love what we do most of the time?

[04:38] Speaker B: It certainly makes being in business easier by doing something that you love. And certainly I would never, ever suggest to anyone being in business to do something that they hate. And indeed, we find many, many successful businesses are found out of people finding a problem that they have in their own lives and their own situation. And they develop a solution for that. And then all of a sudden they realize, hey, maybe someone else has that problem and I can sell the solution that I found to someone else. And we move from there and we learned, I'm a business nerd. I love business. It doesn't matter what it is. And we consultants. That's fantastic. But lots of people just want to solve a problem and that problem might be their own. That problem might be a friends or relatives or just a friend or a problem they see in their community that they say and they just want to solve a problem for that. And they're not in love with business, but they're in love with solving that problem and making a difference. When you're in love with something, it makes it very easy to do business. And I can't remember who said it, and I'm hopeless at remembering quotes, but if you do something you love, you'll never work a day in your life.

[05:57] Speaker A: Yeah, it is true, isn't it?

[05:59] Speaker B: And I should remember who said that, but I don't I don't remember it either.

[06:04] Speaker A: But I know the quote. I can look it up and put it in the show notes. Well, to dive into that knowledge, literally, let's set up a business from scratch. Like, let's say we're setting up a business from scratch. What is one of the first things someone should do?

[06:23] Speaker B: Does someone want to buy it? Is it you buy your buy, your production, your idea, solution, your service, your product, what it is you want to see? Does someone want to buy that? And are they willing to pay enough money to make it a profitable business?

[06:42] Speaker A: Yeah.

[06:44] Speaker B: And so we start with market research and understanding who our customers are and what is the problems that they actually have. Because there are lots and lots what seem on the surface as really good business ideas and really good products or services, but people don't want to pay for them. We need to understand. So we start with two things in my mind market research and understanding who our customer is and what are their problems. And then understanding what they're prepared to pay. And that tells us a couple of things. How big is our market and what is our business model likely to be? As in our finance business model.

[07:27] Speaker A: Yeah.

[07:27] Speaker B: So how do we get our how is the customer going to pay? And in 2023, there are thousands of different ways we can make that happen. 20 years ago. We didn't have subscription based businesses. We now do in a really solid way of a business is a subscription based business. So people are paying bits and pieces off at a time and buying a product over at once. A barrier to entry for one of your great courses, Bianca, might be the overall cost of it, but when we sell it on a subscription, it's chunk down the throat. For as little as $3 a week, you can be part of. And that sales strategy has now taken come away. I mean, once upon a time, way back when so nearly 30 years ago, I was involved in selling cars. And we sold cars by payments. The way we can sell is a way we can actually then makes a difference to the business model that we're going to adapt. Therefore, what are we going to start now? If we have to get $10,000 per item, well, then that's a very difficult sell. As opposed to getting $10 per item that we sell. So there's a difference. And will customers pay that? So you need to start with market research and not people you know. Real market research is not somebody you know. It's someone that you think has a problem. And that might be someone who knows someone who knows someone who knows the person that's buying your potential product. That's okay, because we've got to find them somehow. But we should do with market research, understanding who is their customer and what is their problem. And therefore, do we have the right solution for their problem?

[09:19] Speaker A: Yeah. Is there a viable market? I'm just thinking because I know those kind of things where people kind of go and ask a group of people, would you buy this? And people are like, oh, yes, I love it. But then when push comes to shove.

[09:37] Speaker B: They don't buy it.

[09:38] Speaker A: They don't buy it.

[09:39] Speaker B: And that's why you need to talk to people you don't know. Because your friends and your family will do one of two things. They will tell you exactly what they think you want to hear and they love it and they go, Great, you're so talented, you'll bring it. Or they'll be exactly the opposite. No, that sucks. You can't give you a good job and you couldn't do that.

[09:56] Speaker A: Now there's fear talking, right?

[10:00] Speaker B: That's exactly right. That's exactly right. So you have the two ends of the spectrum. You never have the truth. And what you need for market research is the truth. So that's why getting feedback off people you know and who love you can be important and can be a good way to start. But it is not market research, it is feedback.

[10:22] Speaker A: And then there's the other side of things. Sometimes that's how people start their business. They start making some things for themselves and then other people, like their friends and things want it as well, so they start making a few for them and that kind of like it grows like that.

[10:37] Speaker B: It grows like that and it grows organically like that. Fantastic. It's not a business at that starting level, though, yes? No, it's not a business. It's when we go. Well, okay, then. Is there someone if I walked into if I put a website up or if I went and did? And I think markets are a fantastic market research tool. A horrible sales reliability tool and a fantastic market research tool because we get to look at if I make some for my friends and family. And all of a sudden we see this all the time with people with jewelry as an example, handmade jewelry, and in that makers category, and it's growing and growing and growing. So many clever people out there making things and we see this quite regularly with people as they'll start. Yes, they'll do it for themselves because it's a stress reliever, it's a hobby or it's whatever, and then all of a sudden people start paying for it. Or they've got so many that they've taken up the spare room and they need the spare room for other things, or they're kicking the car out of the garage and all of a sudden there's friction happening and there's a whole range of different things. So we go to a market and we sell things, or we put up some ads on Facebook and we start selling things on marketplace. So we then start and you've probably grown in from what is a grown into a hobby? And then we've gone, well, okay, then I now need to have to instead of making what I want to make, customers are buying this particular item. And we go, well, okay, then we now have a category, or we now have product line.

[12:10] Speaker A: Yeah, it turns into a bit of a business, but for most people it's not going to replace their salary just yet.

[12:19] Speaker B: Just yet. That's exactly right. I said two things we needed to know, but you've led to a thing that we must have that happens fairly shortly. One of the things we next need is a budget. And you've led me that path is to and the budget is not the business budget, it's the personal budget we need to do because you've got that point now where we've got a hobby. We're selling a few items to clear them out of our out of the house. Also we can buy some more craft supplies or whatever reason we're turning them over and selling the items that we're making. We're doing that. It's not a business. We're just doing it a bit ad hoc. We've not gone into price. We're not solving a problem for a customer or whatever it may be. But we're selling some stuff that we make and we think, well, let's start with we then need to know a budget of our own personal thing. Now that might mean what the total is we need. Well, the budget is so we need what living expenses we need to do. And in this day and age most households need to have two incomes coming in or the like. So we go, well, okay then what budget does our household need and our household might need? And I'll just use $1,000 because it makes it really simple for my poor little brain. $1,000 a week exactly right to live. So $52,000 a year. So of $1,000 a week we have $400 go in mortgage payment or rent, we have $100 go to a vehicle, maybe payments and a bit of fuel and the like and so on and so forth. And it turns out that partner earns $900, brings $900 a week home and there's $100 a week shortfall. So we can do with $100. Now we might be already collecting that from centerlink or through family tax benefit A and B or whatever it may be. We may be working part time. There's a whole range of ways we're going to do that. So what we need to do the first point of call is our household needs to the business to earn $100 a week because we have $100 shortfall at this point for a house to maintain its current goals and the like. Now moneysmart. Gov. Au has a really good budget planner and even if you're not going to start a business or you're five years into your business, go to Moneysmart Gov. Au, download their Money, their planner and you can actually then have a budget planner for that. If you have any issues, drop us a note@vdp.com Au and we'll email it out to you. But Moneysmart, it's not as we don't believe in recreating. Money Smart, which is an Australian government thing, has a really good budget planning tool. And you can split up. And the reason I like it, you can split up through drop down boxes, your weekly or monthly or quarterly bills. So if your rates notice comes in once a quarter, you don't have to divide it by 13. You can split it up by a quarter, but you get paid weekly and then you have other bills coming monthly and the whole range. You can actually work out what is real. And so it's a really cool I.

[15:36] Speaker A: Might go and have a look at that too. Yeah.

[15:39] Speaker B: As I said, team at Vdp would be happy to email out to anyone that has that and now they're going to growl at me if they have that. So you've got the budget you've undergot, your customers happening. We then go, well, okay, then we're going to start a business because everything looks good. We've got some good feedback from people we don't know. We know we're going to solve a problem that our customers have. We've got a budget, we know what we need to earn. We know that we're right in the early days, we then need to go, well, okay, then we need some insurances.

[16:11] Speaker A: Yeah. Like you've got your personal budget and then there's like setting up a business.

[16:17] Speaker B: That's exactly right. It's going to take money. That's right. So we need some insurances. Public liability insurance is the minimum you're going to need and you can buy that online. I always recommend that you go and see an insurance broker. Not because they'll get you cheaper insurance, because often they won't, but where a broker is worth their weight in gold ten times over is in an event that you have to have a claim.

[16:48] Speaker A: Yeah, okay.

[16:49] Speaker B: Because we buy insurance policies. When we buy insurance policy, that's stressful enough for us average people. Imagine having an insurance claim and what you're going to have to do and dealing with an insurance company or dealing with a solicitor of the other party that wants to sue you or do.

[17:06] Speaker A: Whatever to I don't know if it happens a lot, especially I guess it depends on the business that you set up. But yes, definitely need to cover your backside.

[17:16] Speaker B: That's exactly right. And indeed in many places. So if you've got a maker's business and you want to go and do a local market that's run by a set of volunteers, we can take the Exeter market or you have one in there, in La Tribe where? You're based? There's a couple of different options that happen there in La Trobe for Makers. Really vibrant makers community there on the Northwest coast. And they will want a certificate of currency for your insurance, just for you to attend that and be a stall holder there. And that will be because their insurance company will say to them, you can't let anyone not have public liability insurance when that there's this perpetuating thing. So yes, you need insurance cover from that.

[18:05] Speaker A: Sorry to interrupt. Even if you have there's so many businesses out there that have physical locations, you need to be covered for that as well.

[18:15] Speaker B: With a physical location, your landlord is going to want insurance if they're going to want several. You'll need more than insurance. You'll need building insurance or confidence insurance because you'll need to ensure at least their glass so there'll be some business cover insurance there that you'll need to need to have as well. So again, a broker can help not because they'll save you money and often they won't. You'll often be particularly now. Ten years ago commercial insurance was pretty hard to buy online, now it's far easier. There are a number of different providers providing online and if you Google business insurance from that you can do that. But an insurance broker, if you have to have a claim, to me that is the big benefit because they deal in claims every day. Every insurance broker has more than 1000 clients on their books and claims have to happen. That many people claims have to happen so they're used to dealing with claims, so they do that. So insurance so we've got a budget, we've solved the problem. We have a product that people want to buy, we then have a budget of insurance, we then need an ABN.

[19:26] Speaker A: So you get the insurance before the ABN?

[19:28] Speaker B: No.

[19:30] Speaker A: You kind of need it all at the same time, don't you?

[19:32] Speaker B: Yeah. Your ABN first because the insurance company will ask you for your ABN number.

[19:36] Speaker A: Yeah. And that's really easy to register for.

[19:40] Speaker B: Really easy ABR gov Au again, the Australian government have done a fantastic job or you can go to business gov au registering an ABN is free, anybody.

[19:51] Speaker A: And simple and simple.

[19:53] Speaker B: So make sure when you sit down to do your ABN and you can do it on your phone or you can do it on your laptop or your iPad or whatever, and you have your tax file number with you. And if you've ever paid tax in Australia, you'll have the tax phone number, or you've ever had centrelink payment, you'll have had a tax file number. So have your tax file number with you and your ABN. 99 times out of 100 if you supply them your tax phone number and your taxes are relatively up to date, you'll get your ABN automatically for free at either business gov Au or ABR gov Au either or they link into each other.

[20:34] Speaker A: Yeah.

[20:35] Speaker B: Then you need to register your business name.

[20:37] Speaker A: Yes, that's also pretty straightforward.

[20:40] Speaker B: So if you go to business gov business gov Au and register your ABN it will then ask you do you want to register a business name?

[20:49] Speaker A: Yeah.

[20:51] Speaker B: And you can tick the box. Yes. It will send you straight through to ASIC Connect and that's asicconnect Au.

[20:57] Speaker A: I have to follow the steps and it's easy. It's actually not always that easy.

[21:06] Speaker B: Give yourself some headspace, give yourself some time. So this is the time when 08:00 at night and the kids are hopefully down at night, down for the night and everything's done and you've got an hour to sit down and do some stuff.

[21:19] Speaker A: So you have some focus because yeah, sometimes it's not that straightforward.

[21:23] Speaker B: Yeah, it's not that it's difficult. It just needs focus. You did right, Bianca, in that, that it's a focus process. So we've registered and we registered before we've actually registered a business name. We've probably gone on to Asics website, ASIC gov, and check whether a business name is available or not.

[21:46] Speaker A: Yeah, that's an important one, isn't it?

[21:49] Speaker B: Otherwise you can't register it. And you can't register things that are very similar to things. Now, other things let's use something in Tasmania. I might want to start a carpet cleaning business in Tasmania, and so I might want to call ourselves Carpet Cleaners R US, and that name is taken. Now, if I add Lawn System to it, or Tasmania to it, chances are it won't be. So you can add a place to that. Now, that's all very well and good if you're just creating yourself your own job. And you're only ever going to operate in one geographical location that will allow you to register that business name in. That if you've got a business, and you got plans to grow bigger and you may have more geographical locations.

[22:42] Speaker A: Or.

[22:43] Speaker B: Your business will operate across borders. Having a location based business is not a great idea. Be careful with your business name. Do some research around that. The paper is called business name availability. Business names to register are $38.50, I think, for the first year, or I think for $83 you can register for three years.

[23:07] Speaker A: Yeah, I think they're different options.

[23:10] Speaker B: The number of people I've dealt with over the years that get hung up and spend weeks and weeks and weeks and months on registering, on thinking the right business name. I've seen people almost not do businesses just because they get hung up on a business name. Can I suggest to start and come back to the business name later on? Now, the way that's dangerous is if you start registering domain names and social accounts.

[23:38] Speaker A: Yeah, that's how I usually think about it. It's like when you start a business, I would suggest that you got to think about business name that you can register. So when you check if that is available, I would also check if the domain name is available, like in an easy way, the easiest way possible, without hyphens and without don't make it hard.

[24:01] Speaker B: Think of what someone's going to type into Google. And sometimes it's not always that you'll use your business name as your domain name.

[24:10] Speaker A: No, that's true.

[24:13] Speaker B: And lots of people have different discussions about I think your business name is better focused if you can get it to what someone might type into Google than what your business name is. If I've got something weird and wonderful as my business name, but it doesn't mean anything to my customers. If I think in the old days apple. Well, I'd never googled looking for a computer. Apple.

[24:37] Speaker A: No.

[24:37] Speaker B: Mind you, but Apple is a brand now. But if we were starting a new computer business, we wouldn't call it Apple, we wouldn't call it Apple.

[24:46] Speaker A: Yeah, it can be nondescriptive because sometimes descriptive can be too long and too tricky.

[25:00] Speaker B: So I started trading when I started consulting in 2008 as business advice. Tasmania huge, long domain name. Van Diemen Project was another one huge long domain name. And what invariably happens. And Van Demon project is a really good example because people would type for Demon, D-E-M-O-N as opposed to D-I-E-M-A-N. Thank goodness we could eventually acquire the domain as Vdp.com.

[25:39] Speaker A: You can get multiple domain names as well. Yeah, exactly. I have a client right now that I've created a website for, and they've got their business name, but they also have their brand name. And I said, it's such a memorable brand name. I'm like, you need to register the brand sorry, the product. I'm not going to mention any names. You need to register that and just redirect it. So, yeah, you can just buy multiple domains.

[26:10] Speaker B: You can, and they're not expensive. $15 buys a.com or thereabouts generally, depending on where you're buying them from. I think I saw an email the other day from Venture IP, who an Australian based domain reseller that are selling some domains, and no doubt they'll be a specialized domain. I didn't really look at 795 a domain. So you can buy them, but as a business, because you need to buy the.com you need to buy the.com au if you're going to sell if you're not an ecommerce store that has and you're not just going to sell in Australia, if Australia is your only market, the.com dot au and the.com are compulsory. I think you can get away without the.com, but I think you should have it if you can get it. And if you start adding five and six domains, you get to a couple of $100 in domain registry pretty quickly. And when you're starting out and you're just testing ideas, sometimes you don't want to invest the $200 in domains. You prefer to go, well, okay, then I'd sooner throw $100 at some ads as opposed to to get this out or some packaging layouts or running a thing on fiverr or elancer or something. Logo design. There are a number of ways to spend money, and you can come back to that as you go. But yes, I agree that you can register multiple domains. Doesn't have to be your business name, doesn't have to be your product name, in my view. And I think when you're starting out, I think you need to consider what people will type in Google, because that's I agree.

[27:42] Speaker A: Search engine optimization, I 100% agree. Plus, obviously, if you have a business name, I think you also need to have that business name. If you're building a business under your own brand, like I have, then you need to have your own name. I think that is important as well, but it can start to add up. Here's the thing. A lot of local businesses don't do this. This is how we kind of got to know each other as well. We're working together in a way. There are a lot of local businesses that have businesses, but no websites. I don't want to go on a rant.

[28:32] Speaker B: Well, we'll probably disagree on this, Bianca, because I think most businesses should. 99.9% of businesses should have a website. Totally, totally agree. However, if I'm a 60 year old mechanic or a lawn mowing person or all that, and I'm never, ever going to and I've had this real life situation in the last six months, I've met a client that says, don't do email, mate, if I have to do business, I'm not going to do business. I have to do email. Exact might have been a few expletives tossed into that, and obviously not the target audience for this podcast, but should that guy not do business? And some people would say, no, he shouldn't. But he was a qualified horticulturalist. He'd have been the others. He's older than me, so he's very much he's probably 60 or maybe even slightly older. He wanted to work three days a week in his local area, mowing lawns, roses and fruit trees and doing gardening and the like.

[29:30] Speaker A: Yes. He doesn't need a website. I agree with you.

[29:33] Speaker B: He needs to claim his Google My Business, which is another thing that people need to do. Can't do that till you've got your business name. Can't do that till you've got your AB in, because you need both of those. Needs to claim his Google My Business, and it just has his phone number on there. I would argue he should have a landing page with his phone number on there and some pictures of before and after stuff and the like. I would argue that he should have that, but I agree. I don't think he needs socials. I don't think he needs what he does need is a great looking business card and probably some flyers.

[30:04] Speaker A: He needs to get away. He needs to think of ways to get traffic. I'm not saying foot traffic, but traffic to his business card, traffic to his.

[30:16] Speaker B: Phone number, traffic to his phone number. And that's exactly the principles that we talk about when we talk to online businesses and we talk to businesses around generating online. It's still traffic. It's just the traffic is not directed to your website or to your socials. The traffic is directed to his phone number.

[30:37] Speaker A: I 100% agree. And I think some people I'm kind of going off track here, but some people set up their Facebook page and they set up their Instagram, and they think that that's it. I've got my socials, I've got marketing, and then they wonder why they're not making any sales. You need traffic.

[30:59] Speaker B: Yes. And there's no. Point in just having likes, because likes are what we call what I call the vanity metrics. They're fantastic for the ego, not too good for the bottom line.

[31:09] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. I 100% agree.

[31:13] Speaker B: Anyway, so we'll move back on to what do we need to start a business? Yeah, we've got a budget for ourselves, we've got some insurance, we've got a business name, we've now got our domain names and our socials done. If we've said it on that, we then go, well, okay, then we need some form of a plan as to identify that market research we did upfront. Okay, then how am I actually going to find those customers and how are they going to find me? And we just talked about old Mate, the lawn mowing guy that's not online. Well, he needs to claim Google my business because people will go to Google first. Yes, 90% of searches are still in Australia or close to are still done on Google and we don't have yellow pages anymore. But for that type of business, word of mouth is critical. So he needs to be able to have and that's why he needs a great business card and some great flyers. And I have built businesses pre internet age. Yes, I am that old, where we built them solely on flyers and we didn't pay for the flies to be distributed in that home services market. So cleaners, lawn mowing, window cleaning, carpet cleaning, that domestic services market. We would go and drop flyers in the letter boxes of five doors down the road, ten doors up the road, cross the road five doors down the road in that repeat business model where you're going back every week, fortnight, month, whatever it may be. It is critical to your business that you build local profitability business, that you build that local area business. And it's exactly how the VIPs, the gyms and those lawn mowing guys build their businesses. And successful franchisees in that market will actually build it. And there are franchisees and there are law mowing guys that earn 150 grand a year and they deal in two suburbs. And that happens all over Australia. In every city in Australia, including in Tassie and the towns in Tassie, there are guys that because they've developed that traffic model by driving people to however they want them to drive, to contact them, by having some brochures that are relevant and continually putting them in letter boxes. Every time they go, they continue and eventually people make them. What is the online statistic is that you've got to touch a person how many times?

[34:00] Speaker A: I think it's increased. It used to be seven, but I think it's like twelve times now or something like that.

[34:08] Speaker B: Why would it be any different for a leaflet or anything like that? Multiple touch points continue that the next thing you need is discipline to be able to hear and know not to get a response, to go, oh, that hasn't worked. If I've only done it once. Doing it once is not a failure.

[34:33] Speaker A: It's still market research.

[34:35] Speaker B: It's still market research. It's touch points you need to get continually in front of people. We have this in our business still. Van Deemer project has been offering operating for seven years. And I'll talk to a client that the asphalt that I had worked with a couple of years ago. And I'll have run into them in the street in Launceston or I will send a social post and I will have commented on a social post that they've had, and they'll then shoot me a message and go, oh, Chris, we should have thought of you. We had XYZ done, and you guys should have done it for us.

[35:14] Speaker A: Being that front of mind.

[35:16] Speaker B: Being front of mind of people. Yes, exactly right. So we've got to keep recapping and sorry.

[35:22] Speaker A: That's all right. We've got all of that now.

[35:24] Speaker B: We've got all that now. We're starting to get our first customers. How are we going to get ourselves in front of customers? How are we going to get the customers to us? So we do a bit of a business plan, and if people Google business model canvas and it gives you a nine step process and it's a business plan on an a three sheet, you could do a business plan with a mind map.

[35:53] Speaker A: Yeah, I think this is where a lot of people get hung up. As soon as I hear the word business plan, you're like, no.

[35:59] Speaker B: If you Google business plan template, invariably you'll get a 36 page template with an 80 page accompanying guide to how to fill the template out.

[36:08] Speaker A: And you'll never start a business.

[36:09] Speaker B: Waste of ****** time. Don't do it. Even if you do complete that business plan, you'll have talked yourself out of doing it by the time you do it. I think one of the best business plans you could do is a mind map. So you sit there with the business in the middle and then off this it's my version of my map, and I love drawing on whiteboards. And we often in the office, even with clients, get in front of a whiteboard and whiteboard things out brain dump. So we'll go, okay, then we'll put the business in the middle and we'll go, okay, then customers. Who's our customer? And a customer might be 35 year old women that are educated, young children, health conscious, don't watch TV, but watch Netflix, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[37:00] Speaker A: Know them well.

[37:02] Speaker B: I thought you might have done. We've got those as one customer seat. The next customer group might be the mothers of those women.

[37:14] Speaker A: I would say not do more than two or three, because otherwise end up with the whole world can be a.

[37:19] Speaker B: Customer, and then they're not simply so keep that, particularly when you're starting, and.

[37:27] Speaker A: Give them a name. Give them a name is what I say.

[37:30] Speaker B: A persona. So totally agree with you on that. And then the reason we've done that is we then can start at our marketing plan, how are we going to get to them? And then we have our finance. So wonder and come around our circle a little bit. We've got our circle in the middle of our mind map. I'm drawing here in the air in the my brain. So I've got that. I always start with the customers because people can start with that. They can start with it, with what they know. And the answer is never everyone, I agree with you totally. Two people, two lots of customer sect and if you don't think there are and it depending on where you are, but if you don't think there are 500 people within your area, whether that be online or whether that be local area, if you're a local business, it's probably not a big enough customer seat. It's probably not a customer seat. Find another one. So we've got the customers, we then come around to finance and we have our personal budget so we know how much we need to earn as a wage and then we've set goals on top of that, which I didn't talk about earlier. And then we need to understand our business costs. So what's it going to cost us to run the business and to run it, set it up. So two different costs. We have our startup costs, which is the things we need to start that's our insurance, that might be a new computer, that might be we have to buy some stock, that might be a whole range of different have a website developed, it might be. Or you might be able to boots what we call bootstrap it and get it up and done and do it all yourself. Squarespace, fantastic resource to build your own website. And I would argue that anyone that can use Microsoft Word can build a Squarespace website as a starting point. Building an ecommerce, completely different story. But even then, first website I built, I built on WordPress and I sat there with a YouTube clip and that's.

[39:33] Speaker A: Not easy because WordPress is tricky. I built on WordPress, but WordPress is definitely not as easy as someone that drag and drop stuff.

[39:40] Speaker B: That's exactly right, it was that easy. And again, I'm talking 2008 or nine when I built my first website. So shopify wasn't around, squarespace wasn't around from that. So we've got lost my train of thought. So we're building a budget. What do we need to cost our startup costs do we have to have before we can start selling everything? And I use have to have and nice to have, yes, and categorize them.

[40:14] Speaker A: If you like starting for example in a hair salon, you need a lot more in terms of setting up your business. Well, it depends if you do it from home and you need one chair kind of thing.

[40:29] Speaker B: Well, even if you do it mobile and you go to people's houses, then.

[40:32] Speaker A: You need a good insurance.

[40:34] Speaker B: Yeah, you do have to have good insurance, but you also have to have a great pair of scissors.

[40:39] Speaker A: Yes.

[40:42] Speaker B: Depending on what you're going to do, you may need to have a portable sink and a portable situation and some other stuff. You still need a hairdryer. You still need some other things. So there's still costs that you're going to do. So what are the costs that you have to have to start your business? It'd be really critical. Do I really need that to start? If the answer is maybe it's no, you don't have to have it. There's a book, how to Start a Business 100 Business Ideas to start with less than $100, I think it's called. And particularly in the tech world, many business start of the founders labor, they start with no zero cost because they're building an It solution from that. Not all businesses will do that, but so you build your cost. What do you have to have? What's the nice to haves and categorize them to have to haves? Okay, then. So how much money do I need to start? Do I need $2,000? Do I need $1,000? Do I need $10,000? And how are you going to get that? And where do we go for that? So that's part of it. And what's it going to cost us to run our business on a month by month basis or a week by week basis? And I say month by month basis because I think that's the minimum you should junk it down to. If you're just running as I said, if you're running a hobby business that you're starting from something you make or you're running a consulting business or you're running that type of thing, a month by month is enough. If you're running a cafe where you have perishable foods, you're relying on volume of customers or a food truck or that type of thing, I would go week by week. I chunk that down. When I'm doing what we're effectively talking about is doing a budget, I chunk that back down into weeks because guessing how many meals I'm going to serve or how many coffees I'm going to serve or how many whatever I'm going to do with the high volume customers on a month by month basis is fairly difficult. If I bring it back down to weekly, and indeed, how I work with it, when I work with a customer, I'll talk about daily, how many are we going to do, how many days a week we're going to trade, how many coffees we're going to make a day? And if they're going to tell me that they're going to make 180 coffees a day and do it all by themselves, I'm going to say, no, you're not.

[43:15] Speaker A: No.

[43:16] Speaker B: Because coffee takes two minutes on average to make.

[43:18] Speaker A: Yeah.

[43:21] Speaker B: And if you're doing it all by yourself. You're going to have a line there fairly quick that you're going to really soft because they're not going to come back because you can't keep up. Make your 180 coffees a day.

[43:33] Speaker A: It's a bit like reverse engineering. Most that's exactly how much do I want to make? How much can I do? That's right. Like I said, most of it's like glorified math, just reverse engineer it, think about but sadly, a lot of people don't sit down and do this. They've got this idea like, I'm going to start a business and they dive into it and then they spent 20.

[43:57] Speaker B: Grand all of a sudden and they've got yeah, and we see it quite regularly. The worst I've seen is $150,000 on an app development. And they thought they were in the tourism business, but they are really in the advertising business. They talked to lots of users, because all the theory around an app says about user experience, but understanding who your user is and who your customer is, and regularly, that's two different people. The customer is always the person that pays the bill. The only exception to that is if you're advertising to children. And that puts a whole range of other ethical and moral dilemmas on it, whether you should or you shouldn't do that. But if you're in toys, fast food, we see McDonald's, a whole McHappy meal and toys in the meals, and a whole range of other things targeted to kids. The whole range of things. When we're targeting paddle pop, you didn't grow up in Australia, you may not remember the paddle pop lion, the gimmicks that were targeted kids, so that they've done that now in 2023, we probably shouldn't do that anymore.

[45:10] Speaker A: There are a lot of things we shouldn't do anymore.

[45:14] Speaker B: Yes, correct.

[45:16] Speaker A: But back then it was TV and it wasn't.

[45:18] Speaker B: That's exactly right. That's exactly right. And the complaints level could be was pretty hard to lodge a complaint. There's certainly no way for us to get a viral TikTok video out on the complaint of XYZ, but as we can do now, or an insta reel or whatever it may be. So we need to advertise in that particular instance, if I go back to what McDonald's and paddle pop lion and a whole range of other people that advertise, and some still do promote to children, they see their customers as the children through pest power for their adults in 2023. We need to make parents understand the value in the product that we're selling, that they want to give it to their kids.

[46:08] Speaker A: Yeah.

[46:09] Speaker B: So it's a different marketing message that we're going to display in 2023 to what we did when I was a child in the 1970s, 80s, very long time ago, understand who our users and our customers are and understand that they may be different. So, as an example, we run a program called Digital Solutions Tasmania, which is an Australian government program to give small businesses 3 hours of one on one advice for the principal sum of $44. Now, in that particular instance, you might go, well, the small business who comes and gets advice is our customer. They're actually not. We want to make them happy. We want them to feel as though they're valued and want them to see value in what we provide. But the government is our customer because the government is the one that really pays the bill. So we have two masters in that situation for our business when we do that, and that's okay, but you just need to understand that when you're in your business, who is your customer and who is your user, and they may not be the same thing.

[47:15] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly.

[47:18] Speaker B: And we see lots of people get that really wrong along the way. Schools, private schools is another example. Parents for the customers, the students for the users. So we've got the numbers and we've gone there. Then how many of those are we going to sell and what's it going to cost us to sell them? So we've got our numbers taken care of as we're working around. We then go, well, okay, then the traditional things around our business, what is our business structure? And most people start out as sole traders, unless they start business with a friend or a family member or somebody they know. And then you would probably start as a partnership. There are a number of different structures. I'm probably not going to go into those here now, ask me to, but I'm not.

[48:03] Speaker A: Legal advice.

[48:04] Speaker B: Yeah, get some proper advice. Get some proper advice on that because there is some things that varies. There are some overall generics. The ATO has some good resources on business structure, ado, Gov, Au or Google business structure. And there's quite a number of solicitors and accountants now putting out really good info on that because they're engaging in podcasting and social providing information on that. So there is lots of information online. Make sure what you're watching is what you're looking for is Australian because it varies from country to country. It doesn't vary state to state in Australia, but it does vary from country to country and from that. The other thing to be aware, and I'm not an expert in this space, is if you're going to export your product overseas, what are the rules that happen in that country?

[48:57] Speaker A: Yeah, especially engineering type things. I remember my husband, who's an engineer, his company imported a mold for something to create it and then they spend all this money on it and then they found out it's not what is it? They can't use it in Australia because it's not to Australian standards.

[49:23] Speaker B: So what are the requirements for the country? And indeed, if you can sell it in Australia, the chances are you will be able to sell it internationally. As far as standards and quality goes, however, do you have the requirements from a legal perspective to have that. I was listening to a podcast the other day, her guy who has silk pillowcases implemented with silver. So that for dermatitis and acne on your skin. He did really well in Australia and did some stuff through Europe. And when he went to go into the States, someone put a cease and desist order on him. And when he got legal advice on it, they said he'd probably lose. And if he did win, it would be expensive.

[50:20] Speaker A: Yeah.

[50:20] Speaker B: And he shipped hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stock into the States and launched with it. And this is a fairly experienced ecommerce guy who does ecom quite well and done and has done a number of businesses and built an exit number of businesses in a profitable way and got caught with that because he didn't understand the legalities of what happened in the United States and they were different to what happened in Australia and in Europe and indeed Canada, because what he ended up doing was shipping stock into Canada and taking it out of the United States and putting it into Canada and realizing taking it. The problem with that is he allowed the Australian shipping rates because he figured these Australian shipping rates would cover reasonably worldwide. And normally that's not too bad, except in the dead of winter in Canada. Delivering stuff is really hard.

[51:20] Speaker A: I think, when you set it up or when you start exporting, rather than simply shipping one or two or whatever, how many products to a country. But when you start exporting and running it as a business in another country, it's like setting up a completely new business. You kind of have to do the whole thing all over again in a way. Like you've got your proven product, but you got to still find out all the other dynamics again.

[51:47] Speaker B: Yes, that's exactly. And those dynamics that you don't think of like shipping and you'll go, well, okay, then it's and it is fairly expensive to ship in Australia.

[51:57] Speaker A: It is, yeah.

[51:59] Speaker B: So so these are reasonable assumption to make. Okay, then if it cost me X amount of dollars in Australia, it'll cost me similar dollars or not. I've got enough margin to wear any extra cost it cost me in Canada except DHL or Ups or whoever, the delivery driver delivery company in the States, in the Canada that they use, have a massive price rise in winter because delivery is so much harder.

[52:24] Speaker A: And likewise it could kind of apply for Australia as well. Like if you think about perishables sending that in summer in Australia, don't send chocolates.

[52:35] Speaker B: No, if you are sending chocolates and there is a way to be able to do that, make sure you've researched how to send chocolates through. Because if you send a Mars bar in the mail, it'll be a Flat bar. It'll be a flat bar. Yeah. It'll be just a gooey mess. Still tastes pretty good, but it will be used to be a gooey mess, as opposed to some of the tassie chocolate teas have developed ways to be able to do that in their processing, to be able to export chocolate off island, out of Tasmania, mainland Australia and indeed internationally. If we look at ambers and even people like Ruby Delights in Tassie. And if you like rhubarb chocolate, people, google Ruby Delights. Ruby is R-H-U-B-Y.

[53:25] Speaker A: I'm going to google it.

[53:27] Speaker B: Free dried fruit and other things into chocolate and encased in chocolate. Magnificent.

[53:33] Speaker A: Delicious. I kind of lost track where we're at now with all the things.

[53:45] Speaker B: How we're going from that we've mind mapped it out or flowcharted it out or I said Google before business model canvas. So we've got a plan of where we're going. Don't spend a huge amount of time on that, but have an idea of where we're going. The reason I don't say do a huge amount of time, I will absolutely guarantee that your business won't work how you think it will.

[54:08] Speaker A: I agree. But you still need to think, you need a plan. Yeah. And you need to think about the money.

[54:16] Speaker B: Yes, that's exactly right. But you will find new markets or something, a different product line will sell more of than what you think will sell off and your assumptions will be tested. So when you're doing your plan, make sure you're not only writing out what you think is going to happen, but why you think that is going to happen. So that you come back and go six months down the track and that hasn't happened, you'll go, Why did I think that there's those assumptions. So noting your assumptions. If you're going to the bank or to someone else to get some investment, to get this going or then or to get your next stage going, it's really important they will look at the assumptions. As much as they'll look at the plan because they want to know what you're thinking and how do you back up what you're saying? So really important to do that. And then you should just start selling stuff, sell ****. And don't keep it a secret because you can't sell a secret.

[55:12] Speaker A: No, this is the issue with marketing and think the other thing is that if you think that you've talked about it enough, you haven't.

[55:21] Speaker B: No. So you then got to start networking. Not just networking. I'm saying to talk about networking in two ways. There is the vertical network. I use the term vertical and horizontal. Vertical networking is when we network with our peers, they're probably in the same industry. So for you, for your marketing, you go to social media conferences and you go to mentors.

[55:49] Speaker A: Mentor.

[55:51] Speaker B: Fantastic. For education, really important part of our business to be actually doing that, whether it be whether it be networking. And amongst if you're a tourism business, networking with other tourism operators to understand what they're going and learning off them. It is for education, though, to improve yourself and to improve your education, and.

[56:11] Speaker A: Collaboration is another one. I like that you said you can't sell a secret, because a lot of people tend to do business from the old school. I don't know, I hate the word competition. I don't believe in competition. There is space for everyone, and everyone gets their slice of the market, because people often do business with someone that they resonate with. No one can replicate you.

[56:40] Speaker B: Well, the reality is, if you're talking to well, they can't replicate you. And if your idea is that easy replicatable, you're not going to have it for too long anyway.

[56:50] Speaker A: Not yet. Exactly.

[56:52] Speaker B: You might be first to market, you might be so you need to need to move through. I was talking about networking now on the second level and the vertical one, which I think is more critical when you're starting out, because you're actually looking for customers and you may be looking for suppliers, that horizontal networking is where you're networking with people that are not from your industry. So that might be a chamber of commerce event, it might be a business association event, it might be a whole range of different things, but they're not people that you would normally consider in your industry or an associated of your industry. You can talk. So that's exactly how you and I met at the caliber launch in the tribe. And the number of people that I met at that night have gone, oh, and the number of people I've heard that go to those types of things, oh, I've met a new supplier. Somebody could supply this. Or I met a cleaner who could clean my accommodation. Or I met I met someone. And there are dozens and dozens and dozens of examples of people, I call it horizontal networking. It don't know where I come up.

[57:57] Speaker A: With, no where I go with it, because even if you're not going to sell to that person specifically, sometimes they know someone who might need what you do. I don't know, you come up in conversation, it's like, oh yeah, I know someone who does that.

[58:14] Speaker B: Now, I've never joined B and I in my life, I've been running businesses since I was 18, and that is a very long time ago. I've been to a number of B and I meetings across various different in fact, going to A, there's a group called Bx, I don't know whether in Tasmania or not, there's certainly quite a number of chapters in Queensland. I'm going to a Bx meeting in Toowoomba tomorrow morning, and horizontal networking fantastic for that particular reason, so we can build networks and so that they can do that. They've built their whole business model on that horizontal networking, and they get together once a fortnight or once a month or however and have breakfast together or the groups that do lunch together. And you need to find as a business owner, you need to find what you're comfortable with. But that's not at home, or it's not in your office. You need to get out and find a way to get amongst other people that are not in your industry, because people in your industry will tell you about your industry. You want to learn about people outside of your industry and you want to inform people outside of your industry. Chances are people inside your industry are not your customers.

[59:34] Speaker A: No. And I love the whole I'm just thinking, literally, my brain is going, how does it work in my business? And I'm like, I know how that works in my business. I have a little business mastermind with other people. There's a social media person in the group, there's a copywriter. And this is literally the horizontal thing. It's like, I don't do copywriting, but I know someone. He's like, I don't do Facebook stuff, but I know someone. And this is how things sort of.

[01:00:08] Speaker B: Spread, especially if you're a fantastic way in that particular instance for that you guys all have your own unique expertise, which the outside world would go, oh, one person to do it, one person to build my website, and can do the whole lot well. There's three different things that happens in a website. There's the development, there's the graphic design, and then there's the content. And I've never met anyone that can do all three.

[01:00:32] Speaker A: No, not well.

[01:00:34] Speaker B: I think there are very few agencies, and agencies are going to howl me down at this that do all well, all three well. I think there are a number of amazing agencies that do two of the three well. And I think there are a number of individuals that do two of the three well. They might do design and content well, or they might do design and development well, but they can't develop the content. There's a whole range of similarly with what you're saying around marketing there with people go, oh, that's just marketing. But marketing is very specialized, and indeed, even digital marketing is exceptionally specialized. And to be able to have that group to go, we can collaborate together to solve clients problems that we wouldn't look at, projects we wouldn't look at as individuals, but we may look at as a group. Fantastic. And as I said, that ability to be able to find suppliers, collaborators and customers isn't found, generally speaking, in your vertical networks, in your peer to peer networking with people. They are found from looking outside of your industry. And businesses build on trust. We like to do business with people we trust and people we know.

[01:01:50] Speaker A: Exactly.

[01:01:51] Speaker B: And if I've shaken someone's hand and it's 2023, so I probably don't do that anymore, but in 2019 I did, yeah. Um, if you've looked someone in the eye and said, hello yeah, and and you're more likely to trust, you're more likely to go. Okay, then what did they do? I really need to go back and catch up with them because I think they might be able to help me with getting that message out there and getting yourself heard is a really powerful thing to be able to do.

[01:02:32] Speaker A: I agree. And there's ways to do that offline and there's ways to do that online. And it doesn't mean that you have to be online. That's another thing. I've just ditched instagram. Literally. I've just put up a static nine thing. The nine grid. Yeah. I just put that up because I was like, right now that's not where I am in my business.

[01:02:58] Speaker B: It's never where I've been.

[01:03:02] Speaker A: This is the thing. It is online. There's offline and it doesn't mean you have to do all of the things. That is another thing. But you need to get out there. It's not what is it? You build it and they will come.

[01:03:13] Speaker B: Not happening unless you're McDonald's.

[01:03:17] Speaker A: Yeah, but they've already built the brand.

[01:03:20] Speaker B: That's exactly right. Number one, to start off with, they didn't build it and they didn't come. Eventually they found something and someone to actually make it come.

[01:03:33] Speaker A: Exactly. And that's the thing. Everyone starts from zero. That's another thing. When you look at other brands, everyone starts from zero. And I love that you use McDonald's because I'm just thinking like if you just open a new cafe, it's not build it and they will come. Sure. People will probably dumble traffic.

[01:03:50] Speaker B: The reason you've offered opened up hopefully is because you've done your market research.

[01:03:54] Speaker A: Yes.

[01:03:55] Speaker B: And you've looked at how much foot traffic there is.

[01:03:57] Speaker A: Yeah. You got to go and sit there and literally click one of those clicker things. How many people? But then you also got to make sure that they're the right people. You still need to invite them in because a lot of people, when they see a new building, they're not going to go in. They are like I don't walk into a door if I don't know what's inside.

[01:04:14] Speaker B: Because all they might come in the first time and not have their expectations met.

[01:04:19] Speaker A: Exactly.

[01:04:20] Speaker B: And not come back a second time. And we need to be better at having customer retention.

[01:04:27] Speaker A: That's a whole different.

[01:04:30] Speaker B: But what we do need to not remember is selling to a customer once is expensive.

[01:04:36] Speaker A: Yes.

[01:04:37] Speaker B: It's about quarter of the price to sell to that same customer again.

[01:04:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. So just to keep going, is there anything else they need to know?

[01:04:50] Speaker B: How much? There's probably MBAs to do on this? For me, the key highlights have a plan. Know your budget, personal and business budget. Don't overcomplicate your plan. Register your business name. Have some insurance. Understand your customers. And when I say understand your customers, I come back again to what we started out. What problem are you solving for that customer?

[01:05:18] Speaker A: And it doesn't have to be a problem. Sometimes I like to look at it as what desire are you satisfying?

[01:05:25] Speaker B: Because I have that problem. I'm hungry, do I need to go and buy a $50 steak or can I just go and go to Kohl's and buy a salad packet as an example? They're still going to solve my hunger problem. Yes, but it's about being but when.

[01:05:48] Speaker A: I look at indulgences, like I'm just looking at my shelf here, there's like super nice candles in it, those kind of things. I don't know, I feel like they satisfy an indulgence versus a problem.

[01:06:03] Speaker B: Well, they satisfied the use of the credit card if you bought them online, or more importantly, if you're making those candles and you're doing market testing on those candles so you can get feedback. Having those available in places where people can smell and you can actually get feedback. And if I think I was running a market now, I would actually try and get permission to have a webcam available on my market store.

[01:06:33] Speaker A: See people's reactions.

[01:06:35] Speaker B: See people's reactions because that's the reason you do markets. That is to me the value. Hopefully you've made enough sales to have done really well and whatever else. But you can't rely on that. It's not a business model. It is a market research model for markets. And for me, being able to capture that in some way, shape or form as I sit here and talk to you, if there's a way you could capture that with a webcam and see the expression on people's faces and that being able to now, then you'd need model disclosure forms.

[01:07:12] Speaker A: I was going to say before, you.

[01:07:14] Speaker B: Can do a whole range of other things. There's a whole range of things that are so wrong with what I propose.

[01:07:20] Speaker A: I was going to say pretty tricky to get that through. But now I know where you're coming from and I do see markets that way as well. Markets are not to sell, generally not. Markets are there for market research to see how your customer interacts with the product, how they respond to it, that kind of thing.

[01:07:38] Speaker B: And they also, they're there for to collect information, whether that be likes on your socials or email addresses. So having a sign up form for your email, if you're an ecommerce business or your party business or you're looking to go. Emails are so valuable. Emails are still the most valuable type, most profitable type of digital marketing.

[01:08:03] Speaker A: I talk about this all the time, so I love it. I think it's great.

[01:08:08] Speaker B: And this wasn't the reiterate everything Bianca has ever studied.

[01:08:11] Speaker A: Podcast. No. I'm loving this conversation and part of my brain is going it's easier than ever to start a business, but it is also still a whole lot of stuff that you have to wade through.

[01:08:27] Speaker B: And there is so much support around there, particularly Tasmania, and I know the audience is way beyond Tasmania. So business gov Au is a fantastic resource with lots of help. But if you're in Tasmania, there's so much help. There's Australian government programs, there are Tasmanian government programs, and even in some local government areas, there are local government programs. So starting a business and then getting some help within that business is easier than it ever has been. The Australian Small Business Advisory Service is about to start a new round right across Australia. So no matter where you are, there will be a program for available and you get a whole range of different things for only $44.

[01:09:11] Speaker A: Yeah.

[01:09:11] Speaker B: I think it's incredible how in that program, to be able to have content and advice and a whole range of stuff that builds your capability and capacity in your own business, in your own time, and then using resources. We could go for hours.

[01:09:34] Speaker A: Yeah. No, I think it's great because there's a lot of grants, like government grants, and I know other countries, other states have them as well. It's just that a lot of business owners are often not aware of them.

[01:09:48] Speaker B: That's exactly right. So up here in Queensland, if your revenue is below 300,000 and there's some boxes there was I'm not sure, I think it's still available. Some small business grants available in Queensland. Victoria has some stuff happening, too, and I think New South Wales well, they're in election mode at the moment. Yes. So there'll be some stuff happening there, no doubt. But certainly right throughout Australia, there is help available around the place. And what a great way to network, too. If you go into Eventbrite Humanitix or meet up, you will find networking situations all over the place. Make yourself once a month, initially go out and get involved in your local business community and not just the community that you're comfortable with. Try and talk to someone new every day. One person. Just one person.

[01:10:44] Speaker A: I like that. And don't go with the mindset of trying to sell. I think that's another thing with the whole business meeting things. That's how you go. Go with the mindset of, I'm going to make a connection. You never know who you're going to meet. You never know how it's going to pay off if it doesn't. You've just met a new person.

[01:11:05] Speaker B: So really important, you said the next important thing that you need to have is your elevator pitch. And that's not a 32nd elevator pitch, that's a ten second elevator pitch. G'day. I'm Chris from the Van Diemen project. We help businesses solve problems. What's the biggest problem in your business?

[01:11:27] Speaker A: That's a fully loaded question. Straight up, though.

[01:11:31] Speaker B: I've introduced myself well, but it is a loaded question up front. But guess what, Bianca? People talk about it. If you're in a room of small business owners, they will tell you and they will go for 1520 minutes.

[01:11:43] Speaker A: True.

[01:11:43] Speaker B: And as a consultant, I've already now go, well, okay, then. Yes, I can work. I'm not trying to sell them anything. I'm getting them to talk about themselves. And two thirds of the skill in networking is to getting other people to talk about them.

[01:11:55] Speaker A: Yes.

[01:11:56] Speaker B: And listen and listen to be able, which is a whole range of different I feel like we've talked a lot about networking and we're running a how to start a business podcast.

[01:12:07] Speaker A: That's part of it, right?

[01:12:08] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. You can't sell a secret on day one you're not found on Google.

[01:12:15] Speaker A: Yes, google is still so important. It's so simple to set up. Google my business and then yeah. This is the thing, though. There are so many steps. It is not hard setting up a business, but there are a lot of steps to go through. I think having the foundations in place, like you said, knowing who your customer is, having your insurance, figuring out your budget, all those foundations are super important. Everything else on top for me is marketing. Without marketing, your business is not going to survive or move forward. And actually, that was another question that I wanted to ask you. Because you've seen so much, I feel like you've seen it all. What do you see as the top three contributors to a business failing or closing? Because I see them closing here. I was thinking about local business here. They've been operating for twelve months and they decided to hang up their boots because they basically failed anyway.

[01:13:21] Speaker B: So for me, it'd be interesting to have a chat to them. But I would think that they didn't understand their customers to start off with. They didn't do their research, they probably didn't understand their costs. I was talking to a business not too far from you last month or the month before, and they've outgrown their current site. But to move to their next site up, it's an extra $40,000 a year. Now they're talking low margin items, so their next margin goes well. Okay, then you have a choice if you've outgrown your current side, do we then move to an Ecom business and we move away from retail? Now, retail business, do we then move to an ecom business and service our community and just service the customers that we have? And don't try and service everyone everywhere to service the customers we have when we go to an ecom and scale down our retail just to our local people. Or do we go up and we bite the bullet and go, well, okay, then. And when we did the break even analysis on what that was, it meant moving from what is now an owner plus a casual in the business. And the casual just gives the owner off a few hours a day, three or four days a week to go and do stuff to probably needing three or four ftes. That makes the business a very different business. So not doing your research up front is number one. Number two is not focusing. So they do try to do too many things. Oh, that'll make me some money. I'll sell that. It's a completely different customer sector. There's no thought process behind it at all. And they're not understanding the margins within their business, particularly in a retail focus. People go, well, okay, then I get a 20% markup on that, when really, they probably need a 60 or 70 or 80% markup on that item to be profitable.

[01:15:29] Speaker A: Yeah. And being aware of your cash flow.

[01:15:31] Speaker B: Yes, cash flow markups because stock will kill you in retail is really hard. I would never go into retail. It's really interesting. In our first aid training business, we get daily requests for first aid kits. It would cost me $25,000 in stock for something I've got about a 20% to 30% margin on for me to do. Awful long time for me to get and you can bet your bottom dollar. I would order the wrong stock in my first order. So I'd have to do another order.

[01:16:07] Speaker A: And then you got this stock.

[01:16:09] Speaker B: But I've still got all this stock here to do that. So we are going to sell first aid kits through that business, but we're going to drop ship them and margins won't be anywhere near as high. But we have no risk, no costs. And our suppliers happy because they get paid well. They're not overly happy because hopefully they're packing lots of orders, but they have the margin because it's not our core business. And again, it's not our core business.

[01:16:37] Speaker A: That's the thing. Yeah. That is the thing. You got to focus on what is your core business. And yes, you can supplement it with other stuff. But if you were to take on the whole retail thing, then you're moving away from your core business.

[01:16:50] Speaker B: You're becoming exactly right.

[01:16:51] Speaker A: Yeah. It's a whole different business model.

[01:16:54] Speaker B: What is now a fairly lean business administration wise would need to become we need to have extra people to sell. There's a whole range of impulse that we actually don't need. But our customers, the same customer group that comes and trades their first aid, does their first aid training, would undoubtedly buy first aid kits of offers, which they can do. It's just we're going to drop ship them.

[01:17:20] Speaker A: Great Model. Hey.

[01:17:24] Speaker B: Drop shipping is a good model. If you can do that, as long.

[01:17:31] Speaker A: As you can control quality.

[01:17:33] Speaker B: That's exactly right. And you have the systems and the processes set up and it doesn't get in the way of your core business.

[01:17:40] Speaker A: Yeah.

[01:17:41] Speaker B: And so the lack of focus is the big reason people fail.

[01:17:45] Speaker A: Yeah, I would agree. It's like, oh, I can. Shiny object. I can sell this and I can sell that. Honestly, I'm a little bit guilty of that sometimes. True. But I'm not holding stock or anything. But sometimes yeah. It's like oh, squirrel. But I think it's fascinating that you were saying the whole thing about moving to a bigger site and things like that. Or do we move to ecom? Both will have cost involved. Because I can imagine that moving to an Ecom model. You might need to hire some more staff to pack with. The orders ramp up a lot. So, yeah, you still need to do your numbers.

[01:18:26] Speaker B: That's exactly right. You still need to understand the total costs, all that, and understand what the impost is on the business. And don't over promise.

[01:18:36] Speaker A: Yeah.

[01:18:37] Speaker B: So don't promise two day shipping if you can't do it in two days.

[01:18:42] Speaker A: I always reckon, what is it? Under promise? Over deliver.

[01:18:45] Speaker B: Exactly right. But it's really hard to do when you're in small business. You want to set that and you're totally right and you need to do that. But I understand the flip side of that as to why we as business owners go off again. Just give this bit extra or this bit extra, and all of a sudden we've given so much away that there is no margin anymore. So we need to give great customer service and exceed expectations as we know that plus one moment as we talk about it in marketing. But the concept is we just also need to understand what is the impulse on that, on our business and are we giving it away?

[01:19:26] Speaker A: Yeah, so many things to think about.

[01:19:30] Speaker B: There's lots. And that's why you need to seek help as early as you can. And there are lots of ways to seek help out there.

[01:19:40] Speaker A: I agree. You cannot build a business by yourself and you also cannot build a business with the advice from family members, unless.

[01:19:54] Speaker B: Great Uncle Joe or as I like.

[01:19:56] Speaker A: Has been there, done that.

[01:19:58] Speaker B: Eddie the Expert has been there, done that. And indeed, it's 2023. If he did it, he'd been there, done that in 1970. The principles of business haven't changed. Margins, customer service, et cetera, they still the same. But the delivery model is so different to what it was. If someone hasn't been into business for themselves, they won't know.

[01:20:25] Speaker A: No, don't take business advice from anyone who hasn't done it or isn't doing it themselves.

[01:20:32] Speaker B: Yes.

[01:20:33] Speaker A: It's dangerous. And also don't take that kind of stuff from people who are not your ideal client.

[01:20:39] Speaker B: That's exactly right. That's the reason why we employ advisors, people like yourself, from time to time to help with their clients is that we want people to be self employed at some point in time. So all our advisors have to have had their own business at some point in time. It doesn't mean that we know everything about a business, because we don't.

[01:21:08] Speaker A: No.

[01:21:09] Speaker B: However, if we've walked in the shoes, we can have some form of empathy, hopefully.

[01:21:14] Speaker A: Yeah. We know more than someone who hasn't done it. I'm reading a book at the moment and it's talking about not taking advice from someone who isn't in the arena. Like, if you're not in the arena, it's great. The analogy was sports commentators who have not played sports, but they have a lot to say about it, but they're not on the field. They do not know what they're talking about half of the time.

[01:21:44] Speaker B: I wonder whether Bruce McEvaney or Tim Lane might disagree with that. A couple of Australian sports commentators that.

[01:21:53] Speaker A: Haven'T been on the field.

[01:21:54] Speaker B: Yes, it is very difficult. I think it's a reasonable question to ask as a small business owner, when you're paying for someone for advice. What experience do you have with small businesses when you're seeking advice from someone from that? Just because your mum, your dad, your significant other says it's a bad idea, doesn't mean it always is. Doesn't mean it's a good idea either. But seeking concept from that idea from that is a really valuable thing.

[01:22:44] Speaker A: I think crowdsourcing is always a bad way to validate certain things. Going back to my sort of area of expertise, I once worked with an ecommerce store and they kept saying, don't run carousel ads, because people say that they don't work. And I'm like, I'm not going to listen to that, I'm going to test it.

[01:23:14] Speaker B: Yes.

[01:23:17] Speaker A: They had, like a multi five figure sales month because they did work.

[01:23:24] Speaker B: Guess what? Actually listen to the same guy I was talking about the podcast with the pillowcases and get caught in America. The same guy runs thousands of Facebook ads at one time and has the budget to do so. Yeah, would do that, but he runs the concept of there is no such thing as a bad Facebook ad. It's just you haven't quite done it right. Where are they exiting your ad? Facebook ads work.

[01:23:55] Speaker A: Oh, yes.

[01:23:57] Speaker B: It's just are you running enough? Are you running the right ones?

[01:24:01] Speaker A: Are you running the right data? Is your funnel working? Sometimes the ads work, but your stuff doesn't sell because there's something not right either on your ecommerce side or either yeah, that's a whole different episode.

[01:24:19] Speaker B: Maybe we should put the show on the other foot and you can interview yourself.

[01:24:23] Speaker A: Maybe I should find someone who can interview, actually, I might bring my mentor on. That's another thing.

[01:24:27] Speaker B: It's probably a good idea. That's a good idea because it is a place where people go, well, I just run one Facebook ad and it didn't work, so therefore Facebook ads don't work.

[01:24:36] Speaker A: I know, and it hurts me so much. I'm like, Show me, show me your data. Actually, that's what I'm doing at the moment. I'm doing a couple of audits for people that have run ads and say they either didn't work or they literally stood up. Tell me I don't know what I was doing.

[01:24:55] Speaker B: That's probably more to the point, because you didn't know what you're doing properly. And that's okay, because I can't run a Facebook ad campaign. I've been in business I've been running businesses for 35 years plus, and I can't run a Facebook campaign because I'm no longer involved in Facebook. I don't even do the Facebook posts in our own businesses.

[01:25:20] Speaker A: Well, hey, everyone's got their own expertise. And isn't there's another saying somewhere as well that you have a better business if you hire the people who know more than you do?

[01:25:31] Speaker B: Well, I try to be the dumbest purpose and the person in the room when we have a staff training.

[01:25:36] Speaker A: Well, that's the thing, right? You build a great business because you hire the right people.

[01:25:41] Speaker B: Yes, that's exactly right.

[01:25:43] Speaker A: That's how you build a bigger business, in my opinion.

[01:25:47] Speaker B: I think that's how you should solve yourself lots of problems by employing people around you that have skills that you don't have.

[01:25:59] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Or getting at least advice or mentors.

[01:26:04] Speaker B: That's right.

[01:26:05] Speaker A: That kind of advice. Anyway, I'm sure we could talk about this for days on end. This is probably the longest episode I've ever done, but yeah, there's so much to consider and to think about. I will put some of the links that you've mentioned in the show notes, but I do think we should wrap it up. We might just have to do part two.

[01:26:28] Speaker B: Entirely up to you. Happy to chat.

[01:26:34] Speaker A: This is so much to talk about in terms of businesses. But this episode, I reckon people can take away and get started on building a business and also on growing a business. I think knowing a lot of those things, it's very applicable for growing businesses.

[01:26:53] Speaker B: Excellent.

[01:26:55] Speaker A: So some standard questions that I always ask at the end. What are you curious about right now?

[01:27:03] Speaker B: What am I curious about right now? Systemizing. I'm curious about getting better systems in our business.

[01:27:13] Speaker A: Yeah. That's always really important.

[01:27:14] Speaker B: Yeah.

[01:27:15] Speaker A: It's like one of those boring tasks, though, isn't it?

[01:27:18] Speaker B: It is. If you ask me the question, what would I do different for us to start all over again? I'd be noting systems down from day one.

[01:27:27] Speaker A: Sometimes it's tricky to do systems up front, though, because you don't always know how things are going to work out. Yeah.

[01:27:33] Speaker B: But you can always change it's easier to change something you've started with than if you haven't got the system there at all.

[01:27:40] Speaker A: Yeah.

[01:27:41] Speaker B: And noting them down. So if you have to repeat it, record it.

[01:27:45] Speaker A: Yes. And that's a good way to train people, too, when you make your first hire. Isn't that what McDonald's is built on? This is how we do it over and over and over and over.

[01:27:57] Speaker B: That's exactly how McDonald's is built on.

[01:28:00] Speaker A: Yeah. Still the greatest case study for marketing students. Business students.

[01:28:08] Speaker B: It is a very robust business model.

[01:28:12] Speaker A: Oh, yes. And a lot of them have replicated business model. Yes, I agree. Um, and if you had an extra $5,000 in your marketing budget, what would you spend it on?

[01:28:25] Speaker B: Email marketing.

[01:28:26] Speaker A: Yeah. Love it.

[01:28:28] Speaker B: Email marketing. I mean, socials are important, don't get me wrong. And I probably wouldn't just do email marketing. I would probably do a invest in some social templates and some social places. But then email marketing, and then email marketing and databases.

[01:28:56] Speaker A: I 100% back that I feel like that's what all roads should lead. Like, I do Facebook ads, but the majority of the Facebook ads I do is to generate leads, aka build a list of people. Build a list that you can email.

[01:29:11] Speaker B: Whether that be paying customer for first one on a lost leader, or whether that be a genuine paying customer that you've made money on. As we said earlier on, it is far easier to sell someone that you know and have already sold to or have already sold to than someone new.

[01:29:27] Speaker A: Yeah, I 100% agree. A lot of people wouldn't really know those numbers and the cost of leads and what the value of leads, but it's really important to sort of have that. What is a lead worth to you? But that's like a whole different and whole different thing.

[01:29:46] Speaker B: But don't just consider the costs of the physical costs that you actually outlay. What about the costs that you've had for your own time to do it.

[01:29:54] Speaker A: And then the stuff that you can't measure. One happy customer will talk about your product. One unhappy customer will talk about your stuff even more. That goes even further. So there's potential losses there and things like that. Anyway, we're going off again, aren't we?

[01:30:14] Speaker B: Yes. We won't be allowed back.

[01:30:17] Speaker A: Bianca, I do the same thing. There's just so much to talk about, and you've got so much experience and you've seen so many things. Normally, I talk to specific subject experts, but I feel like you're, like, across everything. So we can talk about all of the things.

[01:30:36] Speaker B: Doesn't mean we should.

[01:30:38] Speaker A: No, I know. That's why I said maybe we should do a part two. All right, well, let's wrap it up then. This is the end of this week's show. We might just bring Chris on again just to have a chat to him about something else. So if anyone has any questions, drop me a note. I am happy to bring Chris on. So, yeah, any questions about starting or growing a business in Australia, head to Vdp.com au. So the Van Diemen project. A really big thanks to you for being on the podcast, Chris. I really enjoyed this conversation. Like I said, it's like the longest podcast episode I've ever done. It was so good. Thank you.

[01:31:12] Speaker B: Fantastic. No problem. I've enjoyed it. I get a kick out of this. And as I said earlier on, opportunities matter to me. And you might gather that I have a passion for helping small business owners be better and make the most of their own opportunities.

[01:31:29] Speaker A: Exactly. And you have so much knowledge to share as well. So I'll pop everything in the show notes as well, like all the links. Like, one of the off spins of the Van Diemen Project is Digital Solutions Tasmania, which is where you can get the mentoring and things like that. So I'll pop all of it in the Show notes. There's so much help and support available, so I'll pop that in there as well. And yeah, a massive thanks to everyone who is tuning in to listen. If you like the show, don't forget to subscribe and leave a five star rating and review on itunes, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you hit the podcast. Your review will help others find the show and learn more about the amazing world of online marketing. Don't forget to check out the Show Notes. I will pop all of the links in there so you'll find that on New Schoolofmarketing.com, where you can also find out more about Chris. Check out Useful Links, download free resources and leave a comment about the show.