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How to Start a Business with Purpose: Practical Tips for New Entrepreneurs

Episode 37 · 18 August 2025 · 1 hr 0 min

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How to Start a Business: Honest Advice for New Entrepreneurs

How do you start a business, and should you? Randy Lorensen, Dr. John Oberg and Anthony Marino have each started and run several businesses, and they talk about the good, the bad and the parts nobody warns you about.

Their answer to "Should I start a business?" has changed over the years. They start with your situation: how much cash you have, your time and temperament, and what kind of business you mean, since a lawn-care business, an auto shop and a venture-backed startup are very different things. One theme keeps coming back: rehearse it before you do it.

They also cover buying a franchise, Michael Gerber's E-Myth, outsourcing the work you hate, why working in a business before starting one helps, and having a service attitude toward customers and employees.

The second half is about partners and mistakes: choosing A players, writing the exit plan before you partner, knowing your industry's failure rate, not admitting a mistake, ignoring competition, and remembering that culture eats strategy for lunch. They finish with books to start with and why it's fine to decide this isn't for you.

Should I Start a Business? E-Myth Lessons, Franchises and Partners

What you'll discover:

  • The questions to ask first: cash, time, temperament and what kind of business
  • Why you should rehearse your business before you launch it
  • Should you buy a franchise? Lessons from the E-Myth
  • Choosing partners, A players, and planning the exit up front
  • Common mistakes, from ignoring competition to the wrong culture
  • Books to start with: Simple Numbers, E-Myth Mastery and Traction

Timestamps

  • [00:00] Welcome: Randy, John and Anthony on how to start a business
  • [00:57] Two people in one week asked Randy how to start a business
  • [01:50] "Should I start a business?" Why their answer has changed
  • [03:21] What's your current situation? Cash, time and temperament
  • [04:16] Not all businesses are the same: lawn care, an auto shop or a startup
  • [06:06] Is it for you? Knowing what running a business really means
  • [08:47] Use AI to ask the right questions first
  • [09:38] First you need cash: self-funding and the bank
  • [10:36] Rehearse it before you do it
  • [13:01] Why do people want a business? Freedom and control
  • [14:47] A boss of what? Is this the right market?
  • [15:48] Would you buy a franchise?
  • [18:17] Time management, discipline and the E-Myth
  • [20:14] Starting a business because you love the craft
  • [21:56] Outsourcing the work you hate: Upwork and Fiverr
  • [22:53] What do you like to do, and what are you good at?
  • [24:37] Work in the business before you start one
  • [25:17] Skills you'll need: books, seminars and coaches
  • [27:14] Understanding your whole business, and reading founder biographies
  • [28:12] It's okay to decide a business isn't for you
  • [28:58] Sponsor break: Premium Cabinets
  • [29:49] What type of business? From a home kitchen to a bread factory
  • [32:26] Few businesses grow just because of a great idea
  • [34:19] Retail or wholesale, product or service, and Mr. Beast
  • [36:16] Today's skills: prompting AI, and a service attitude
  • [37:07] Is there any business that doesn't need a service attitude?
  • [39:37] Servant leadership and company culture
  • [40:35] Should you have partners?
  • [41:26] Picking the right people: A players and B players
  • [42:16] Plan the exit before you partner: the business prenup
  • [44:19] Most businesses fail: know your industry's odds
  • [45:10] Be willing to fail and learn: plan for months, not years
  • [46:57] Mistakes: not admitting you made one
  • [48:31] Ignoring the competition
  • [49:26] Friends say it's a great idea until you ask them to pay
  • [50:22] Culture eats strategy for lunch
  • [51:12] "I always worry about the little guy": be scrappy
  • [53:03] Arthur Blank and Home Depot
  • [54:41] Pursue your happy place
  • [55:49] Still want to start? Where to begin
  • [57:26] Books: Simple Numbers, E-Myth Mastery and Traction
  • [58:16] Talk to people who've done it, and filter the advice
  • [1:00:05] Wrap-up

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About the hosts

This is a hosts-only episode with no guest: Randy Lorensen, Dr. John Oberg and Anthony Marino. (Host bios are on the host pages linked below.)

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Meet the hosts: Randy Lorensen · Dr. John Oberg · Anthony Marino

Transcript

A full transcript is below. It was generated automatically from the episode audio, so expect some spelling errors in names and terms.

[00:02] you today. How do I start a business? Where do I even start? John Anthony and I, all of which have started and ran multiple successful businesses, we just sit down and we talk about it. And we talk about the good, we talk about the bad, the challenges, and try to give you information that you can figure out is this the route for me. So, if you're thinking about running your own business or starting your own business, this is the episode for you. Abundance. Once again, I'm here with uh Dr. John Oberg and uh frequent contributor Anthony Marino. And today, we're going to talk about starting a business and is it right for you? Should everybody start a business? And and we're just we're going to just going to deep into it. So, all — Don't do it. Don't do it. Oh, sorry. — Not the worst advice. Okay, podcast over. Here we go. — And thank you for being here. Make sure you like, subscribe, and tell a friend. — Yes, exactly. Um so, you know, this came up I had two people in a week just reach out to me or talk to me about starting a business and how do I start a business and where do I start and what type of business do I start? So, I thought this would be a good good topic.

[01:15] Uh all three of us have run multiple businesses and uh you know, all of us have that entrepreneurial spirit. So, let's let's jump in. Um Step — Step one, entrepreneurs who think that everyone should start a business just it's just not like everyone should like there are people that should start businesses, there are people that shouldn't, but I definitely fell victim to a period of my life where I was running a business and thought that everybody in the world should have to run a business at one one point in their life and I couldn't have been more — I 100% agree. I had the same feeling probably five to eight years ago. — And now now, by the way, my standard response when somebody says, "Should I start a business?" And it used to be like, well, yes, and you let let's go, right? I I like I thought everybody did too. Now my standard response is do you have to? — What did Elon Musk say about that if you need more validation or something as an entrepreneur? Do you Do you remember that quote? — No, I do not. — I'll look it up. Do you remember what it was? Okay, I'll find it. — I literally ask people now if they have to, right? And that's the way I feel about it is life is probably easier being an employee, working for somebody else. You lose control and some other stuff we'll talk about, but but it either is in you or it's not. So, um is it for me? What are some of the things, Anthony, that you think people need to consider? Cuz I know you've thought over a lot about this. We have a blog that, you know, people can find on the website about starting a business and you it's very practical steps, but what are some of the things people should be considering if they're just saying, "Should I start a business?"

[02:52] than it was pre- pre-gig economy and so forth. So, my answer 10 years ago would have been very, very different because you can dabble a little bit with starting a business to see if it's something that you want to do. You know, if you've got you know, you're making potholders at home, you know, you can try to sell those online to see if it's something that, you know, the world wants with a world view to path your door. So, it's very, very different. Um there's so much there's so much to consider. Consider it you know, it's What is What is your What is your current circumstance? I you know, there are there are people that are uh working for big companies that are doing very well that, you know, are choosing not to start a business, but they might be the perfect person to start a business. They may have the temperament, they may they have they may have the cash reserves, they may have a great idea. it's it's a matter of uh and I don't know that I would agree with you that, you know, do you have to?

[03:59] It's it's Is it Is there an itch? Do you have an itch? Uh and if you have that itch, I I highly recommend scratching it. — Well, there's so many different like startup businesses probably a super unfair topic. Like starting a a lawn, you know, maintenance business as a high school or or even as an adult having your own lawn care business where it's just you is one type of business or having an auto repair shop with 15 employees is a different type of business. Having, you know, an attempted, you know, venture-backed startup unicorn is a different kind of So, I mean, there's a little bit of disservice for us being tongue in cheek and saying start a business as if they all belong in one category. They definitely do not all belong in the same Having a babysitting or a dog sitting business as a high schooler is a totally different set of risks, rewards, things, experiences than than, you know, jumping out of a 25-year career and and and jumping into, you know, a venture-backed startup situation. even even that situation, not not many people are going to be able to get venture capital unless they've been part of something uh adjacent to what they're considering starting. You know, they would if you know, someone wants to hire an expert in a particular field and wants to back that expert, um I imagine there'll be hundreds of startup AI businesses with, you know, the talent that's out there that's creating the AI infrastructure and and um technology. People want to will back, you know, the smartest guy in the room.

[05:37] Sure. Um so, there'll be a lot of that going on. But, you know, I I talk about the itch. The itch is, you know, it it's, you know, our last episode we talked talked about happiness. If if if that itch to be on your own and be your own boss, uh which you never really are, by the way. We should we'll talk about that later about what's the downside of of operating your own business. if you don't scratch it, you'll you'll likely regret it. — So, one person we we wrote down in our notes like is it for me? One way to know if it's for you is do you have a hankering for running your own business? But, do you also have to know like what it means to run your own business? Like like I think are there And I'm just I've done it a couple of times, so I'm I'm a little bit removed from this, but like is it is it true or not true that when people think about running their own business before they've done it that they understand what it means? — Well, I would point you to the article that's on our website called keys to starting your own business that talks in depth about um the steps that you have to go through. And one of the And one of those steps is what you're talking about. Is do am I am I an expert at this? Do I have Is there something unique? Is the market uh is there a market for it? And and then it talks of course all about what it isn't.

[06:55] You know, starting your own business doesn't put you in control of of your — Instead of one boss, every single customer of your company becomes your — Well, every single customer, every single vendor, — uh the bank, um your savings account, your 401k, your IRA, your Uncle John, — your spouse. But, but let's let's let's be more specific here. I mean, what Anthony's talking about, I think all of us have experienced this. I know I have the business all of a sudden, if it's not making money, and you got payroll to make, guess what? I've had I've had where I didn't pay myself for over a year because the business couldn't afford to pay me, but I had to pay everybody else, and I had to take savings to make Like that's one of the realities of running a business. So, when you think about it, if you're willing to start, are you committed enough to do this that you're willing to do that if push comes to shove? Because — Or or are you willing to run a business that won't ever need that? Because there are some structures for businesses where you may never have like if I don't hire people, I don't have payroll, I don't have to manage people. Like so that's that's a type of business to run, right?

[08:00] So, I think that's the Those are the big questions. It's It's not just start a business, it's what am I starting, how am I going to do it, and am I qualified to do those things, and and many times do I have the right team of people around me. You know, there was a uh research article I read years ago where it had like 700 private equity firms that did a bunch of research on all their portfolios. And for private they found the most successful entrepreneurs were typically 30 20 or 30 years in their field, a team of two to three people, and that's how those private equity firms invested. But I think that really pooh-poohs the again, the person who's living in, you the Midwest who has a really successful, you know, auto repair shop in a small town. Like that is just as an entrepreneurial person in my mind as anybody else. — Yeah, and I'm just thinking if people really want to explore should they start a business, we have AI today. I think a great thing to do would be just go have a conversation with AI and start asking it, "Say, hey, I'm interested in starting a business. What questions should I be asking? What should I be considering? And help me decide if this is the right path for me." And I think people I mean, you could do the same thing with a friend, — right? Make sure you're getting advice from the right place, and not everything that comes out of AI is perfect. It hallucinates and everything else, too.

[09:15] But but either way, finding the right friend, mentor, or if that's not available, I think that's a great tool for a lot of people to just go in and just start talking to it. Yeah, so let's let's assume for a second that you have the itch, that you're, you know, you're ready to do it. You've you're you've got a particular industry that you're, you know, you're confident in Um the first thing you need is cash You don't have cash, you're not going to start a business. Uh and generally, a bank isn't going to lend you money for a startup business. So, you're going to have to self-fund it somehow, either Uncle John or your savings account or you're going to push your chips in the table from your 401k, whatever it's going to be. And then you got to determine how much time does that cash give you? And does your business plan the cash and the time align? — And how many assumptions are in that business plan? — Well, right. Yeah, and and I was going to go there, you know, the sensitivity analysis around those three things. If Oh, what if I have to spend more cash, what does that do to time? If this if the market slows down, what does it do to cash and time?

[10:30] So, that these levers are moving back and forth. And before you jump in, you've got to do that analysis and be very comfortable and confident in that analysis because if you're unsure of it, it's time to put it on pause, rethink it, build up some more cash reserve maybe, find more time, whatever you have to do, do market research and so on and so — Or find a business that doesn't need as much cash and maybe somebody can work a part-time job and use their evenings and weekends to build the business until they're able to leave their full-time — Yeah, I think we're I think we're past the point in the discussion of what the business is going to be. We're I'm assuming at this point that the individual or the family has decided this is the industry we want to be in. We want to be in the automotive repair business. We're we're we're good at it and we grew up in it, you know, we wrenched on our cars all my life. I'm ready to do this. What does it take to do that? And then you do all the market analysis, all the financial analysis, and like you say, seek advice and counsel from AI and plenty of tools out there to figure this out. Do I have to buy a site or can I, you know, take over an abandoned barn somewhere, you know, whatever the whatever the situation is.

[11:43] And but before you say yes, you've done that analysis and you're saying, "Okay, it's going to take us a year. It's going to cost this much money. I'm going to need this much help or no help at all depending on the business." You've done the work. You've done the legwork. You've It's like a Broadway play. You rehearse, rehearse, rehearse, rehearse until you're ready for opening night. And if you don't do the believe me, it's going to you're going to pay for it. I can think of a very specific example where I didn't do the rehearsal and I'm paying for it. But nonetheless, I think that's the way I would I would frame the discussion is I'm going to rehearse this. I'm going to plan it. Doesn't mean it's going to all happen the the way it you thought, but you'll you'll have found your trap doors, many of your trap doors along the way by doing that. — You were going to go to side hustle. Don't lose that point cuz I think there are businesses you can do as a side hustle and there are businesses you shouldn't do as a side hustle. But — but the right business you can get into it and start on and build it while you're working a full-time job. Like it doesn't have to be this big risk thing.

[12:50] And by the way, Anthony, you you can I mean, we made the assumption like, "Okay, they've already figured out it wants to be an auto shop." The two people that asked me a question that kind of inspired this episode had no idea what type of business they wanted to be in. They just they started with I want a business and you know, for me it was, you know, asking them some questions about — ask why? I'm curious though. Did you ask why they I mean, I'm just fascinated about why they — That's a that's a great question, okay? So, I think you know, it it's it's freedom. It's control. Some people like, you know, I'm recruiting people, right? Like for for premium cabinets, I'm looking for dealers. I mean, one of the one of the avatars that we're looking for is somebody that's in the corporate world. They're They're doing well in the corporate world, but they're tired of it. They're sick of it. They're fed up. They want to get They They want to be their own boss, right? And they want to go build something. They don't want to build somebody else's business. They want to build their business. — That's a That's a really common avatar for us. — I found that quote, by the way. It's a good place for it. What about the the reporter said to Elon Musk, "What would you say to encourage people who want to start a business?" And Elon said, "If you need encouraging words, don't do a startup."

[14:01] — Yeah, there isn't going to be much encouragement. That's true. You know what I mean? You're You're out there on an island and you know, you might be networking with other business owners, but other people aren't going to — So, these people they came to you and you asked them why and they talked they gave these couple reasons about freedom, wanting to be my own boss, and — But it's different for everybody and everybody has their own reason, right? But I think a lot of people it is freedom, control, not somebody else can't lay you off. You don't have to deal with an boss, whatever it happens to be, right? Everybody's got their own reasons that they want to get out of that grind. But for a lot of people I find I think it's It's Yeah, they just don't want to build somebody else's business. They want to build their business. — Yeah. Yeah, I agree with all that, but they've got to You've got to get past the Pollyanna part of it. I want to be in business I want to I want to be my own boss. You still got to go through the work of Okay, a boss of what? You know, what are you good at? You know, you have to go through all that and then you Again, I'll beat it to a dead horse. You've got to figure out You've got to rehearse it. — Is this the right market? — You say that, by the way, and I'm not disagreeing with you. In fact, I think you're I'm going to I'm going to tell listeners I think Anthony's right.

[15:07] Listen to what Anthony's saying. But I will also tell you almost every business I've ever started has been more — Seat of the pants. — throw at the wall and see what sticks and figure it out. Like for me, it's been more Let me just go see if I can sell this thing. And I figure out how to sell it and then I build the business around it after proof of concept. I have I have dove into the deep end. I mean it's the I instead of ready aim fire, I'm more of a ready fire aim guy. — Oh, come on now. Fire ready aim. I don't know about ready fire You just fire, then you get ready. — ready and then I fire. It's all right. But I fire before I I aim after firing a lot of times. — Okay, so so serious question to both of you, would you consider buying a franchise business ownership? and I would now. when I was younger I just I don't know. There was there was more of a I could figure everything out and I could. And now I think back and I was like, why do I want to pay somebody else for that expertise? Now I think that was pretty stupid cuz if I bought a franchise and somebody else and all I have to do is execute their game plan and the time and the energy and the headaches it saved.

[16:23] — You're betting on execution. You're not betting on product market fit. You're not betting on process development. You're just betting on on execution. — It's a proven So I would say yes now and no when I was younger because I was — Yeah, and three about you? — I just did. — For all intents and purposes, it isn't it isn't a franchise relationship but we just did that. We we hooked up with someone that has all the back end um all the established processes and all we have to be is a sales and marketing With a little bit of ex um little bit of — that like a real business ownership? — Yeah, I do. — All right. — Yeah, I and the and to answer your question specifically, yeah, I would consider a franchise model. Sure. The Obviously, it would depend on what it is. Is it good for me? Do I understand that business? Is the you know, a franchise is not generally going to be a one-man band. It's going to be something — Oh, they can be. Like there's there's it's a whole industry. They have a ton of one-man band franchises. — Like give me an example. — Like my there's like you know you've got the big maid services that are not the one-man band, but then you have like some I think maid services that are just a single person, — Yeah, I guess what I'm thinking of a a franchise I'm thinking of a fast food or a you know a — A lot of people in Sandler training have franchises that are just one person.

[17:38] Like there's there's a lot of I mean you know I I know some people I've met people along the years that are like like recruiters, right? They go out and they recruit franchisees and they do all these assessments and they try to help you find the perfect role. So for someone who's like I want to own a business and I don't know what business to own, like talking to one of these franchise brokers or franchise agents, if you find a good one, they're going to help you find something that really fits the right way. But there's still a lot of diligence to your point about market and all this other stuff. Like you still have to be just as diligent about doing all the homework, right? Even if someone's got a system that — Well, when it comes to managing people, it it it doesn't matter if it's a group of people or managing yourself. — You better have a a discipline around time management, uh organizational structure, um you know, what needs to be you know, earlier you talked about um what what what do you have on the wall that's telling me what to do next? You know, being really, you know, deliberate about what you're doing every day. So. — What about So one of the best books I've ever read about this was the E-Myth.

[18:45] Um have you you both read this book? — all of his stuff. Gerber's great. What are your takeaway? What would you tell listeners just to give them a summary John of the E-Myth? — Yes, I mean the E-Myth Revisited is the book that's kind of most current and his his basic book and that book is about how do you think about working on the business versus working in the business. And it talks about being the technician, the manager, and then the owner of the business and how you really divide your time between those things and how you scale through that as the business grows. And then I think, you know, E-Myth Mastery, which is a follow-on book to that, walks through all the key systems you have to have in your business from lead generation to brand marketing to lead conversion, how you do leadership and performance management, how you handle strategy, and he gives you like the seven key things from his perspective that you have to excellent like excellently execute on. And so I think those two books together are just fantastic views into how to view entrepreneurship and then how to look at the key systems of any business. — Yeah, I think I think what I remember it's been years since I read or actually listened to the book.

[19:49] But what I really remember about it was like the example of the woman that wanted to start a bakery because she loved to bake. And then she started the bakery and she found she didn't hardly have time to bake. She was spending all of her time ordering and paying bills and paying taxes and filling out forms and all of the crap that goes with it business that sometimes people that that's what I really remember that from the book, right? Is if you're starting something because you like it, is maybe starting the business doesn't it's not what you think it is. — like running the like running a business or managing people, those are professions. Playing baseball could be a profession. Coaching baseball is a different profession. Owning a baseball team is a different profession. Like managing people is a different profession than doing whatever it was you did before you managed people. And running a business is a different skill set. Like consulting is another great example. If you want to run a consulting business, you better know how to run a business and how to do the thing and how to consult for the thing because consulting is a skill set, running a business is a skill set, managing people. And so you'd better make sure you come with the right skill sets for whatever it is you're going to do.

[20:57] — Yeah, and including the stuff So for me, one of the lessons I've learned in recent years is hiring for the things that you're not good at or in my case a lot of times, it's just I don't like doing. I hate government paperwork and all of the filing this despise it, right? And it's like I'm object It's morally objectionable and I don't like doing it. So, now — And you do it. — I did it, but now I've hired somebody else that does it better than me and I don't have to do it. She enjoys it and at some point you learn to hire for those weaknesses, right? Whatever that is, but that might be hard as a a startup if you don't Anthony's talking about the cash earlier, right? If you don't have the cash, you can't afford to hire people in those positions. — Yeah, I'm going to shout out to a couple of my friends over at Zen Business. You know, great way to kind of get that off the ground stuff you have to get done that you don't need to figure it out on your own because you're going to do it once if you do it right and you don't have to do it all the time and and you can just get them to help you start your And I think all three of us have used people overseas, right? With Upwork or whatever else.

[22:01] — Fiverr, yeah. 99 designs. — To to get a lot of that — a lot of that stuff done. Well, what about if somebody's trying to figure out what type of business? Like what we I mean, we kind of hand-waved over that. Like that's not I mean, Anthony, you talked about in broad sense, right? You talked about market research and are you an expert or I might say, are you willing to become an expert if you're not, right? Um What else? What else should they consider when they're when they're trying to figure out what is the right business for them? — Working in the business for a year or two, doing it with somebody else before they actually jump off into their own. Like that that because at that point you're actually trying it on. You're seeing if you enjoy the day-to-day work and so that I I would say that in most businesses, not all, but in most businesses, you can actually go work with somebody else before you actually do it and take all that risk on your own. — You know, I would answer it this way, um what do you like to do and what are you good at? And you know, I I use that when deciding, you know, where to place somebody in a role inside the job. Where What are they good at and what do they like to do? Because you know what?

[23:12] That's what they're going to do. You know, if they if if you give them a job if I give that person the job Randy described of of doing government paperwork and they're a sales and marketing person, guess what's not going to get done? The government paperwork's not going to get done. They're going to be, you know, on social media, they're going to be doing ad copy and so on and so forth because that's what they're good at and that's what they like to do. So, what is it? What is it that you like? What is it that you're good at? And try to leverage that. Don't try I mean, it can work and it has and I've seen it work, a square peg in a round You know, I could probably figure out how to run an automotive uh business. I could barely change the battery in my motorcycle, but I could probably figure it out. Is that Is that the best highest and best use of my time? Is that going to be the fastest way to success? Probably not cuz there's going to be a lot of nuance in that business that I don't understand. that that's that would be my advice. Try to Try to, you know, be a be a round peg in a round hole first and then you cuz you're going to have a you're going to be enjoy that.

[24:19] You know, you're going to understand it, you're going to enjoy it and probably — Is it fair to say there's a difference between what you think you're good at and think you enjoy versus actually doing it long enough to figure out if you really cuz I I've I've met a number of people who thought they knew what they enjoyed, they thought they knew what they were good at and then they did it for a while and realized it was neither one of those things. — Well, they didn't do the rehearsal. — Yeah, that's right. — They didn't rehearse. And And yet that's what you have to figure out. Yeah, I mean, there Look, I was an operator my whole career and then found marketing later on in and I said, I should have done this 15 years ago cuz I'm I like this and I am actually good at it. You know, I figured it out. It It It It just came to me. I was still a a pretty good operator, but boy, I really like this other stuff and got very attached to it and, you know, the rest is current history. So You were you've been willing to learn, too. I think this is a skill set maybe we should talk about is, you know, I think both of you have been willing to learn cuz if you go into a business, there's going to be skill sets that you don't have. No matter how much of that shit's going to happen and you're going to need a skill set. So both of you are willing to read a book, attend a seminar, get a coach.

[25:32] — Well, if you own a business, it's more than learning skills. It's also learning, you know, to listen to markets and listen to people and Anthony I had a conversation earlier today where he gave me feedback on something where I had a blind spot and that, you know, and and in my reaction was thank you and please keep looking for my blind spots and now I'm going to go try to work on that and that means listening to a customer or listening to, you know, like there's all these different So it's not just — learning skills. — It's learning a lot of things. — Well, and it's also let let's be honest with anyone thinking about doing this. Let's say you're the person who doesn't like government paperwork. You will find yourself up at 2:00 in the morning doing government paperwork because there's nobody else around to do it. That's the kind of commitment that you better be ready to make if you're going to go off on your own. There are going to be days and weeks and months where it's hundreds of hours back to back to back to back to back and and doing things that you have no interest in doing. it's going to happen. — We're really we're really selling the hell out of this startup business.

[26:35] There's no vitriol there. I didn't didn't hear any animosity, acid, negativity. Just didn't didn't sense it at all. All right. Well — Wait a minute. Hold on. There is a tremendous reward for that because to your point about learning something now you know how to do it, now you can teach somebody how to do it, and you can take it off your plate. It's really difficult to to to grow a grow and scale a business if you don't know what you're growing, and you don't know what you're scaling. So, you know, doing it yourself first doesn't mean you have to be an expert at it, but now at least you can explain it. And not only can you explain it, you can supervise it, and you can follow up to make sure it gets done. So, understanding your whole business as an owner is so important it you know, read some books on Steve Jobs. That would be one piece of advice I would give. Read Read three Pick any three biographies, you know, outside, you know, anti-biographies. Read Read how the he grew Apple. Read something about PayPal and the way those guys operated, and things they did, the hands-on grimy things that they did, and how they built teams, and who they selected, and how they selected people to join them, how they selected vendors, how they searched for quality vendors, quality people, A players. Their are absolutely applicable to a side — Yeah. Biographies of business owners are fascinating. Like there's a lot to be learned from those. They really are. So, let's go to let's go to — Hold on. Wait. I before I went to Ty Bow on the Anthony stuff cuz we started here at the very beginning of the podcast. It was like I think it's okay Like you have to give people permission to say this isn't for — Like if that sounds awful to me, if I don't want to have to do all that, I just want to bake bread, then you really need to know that like there's a role for just baking bread. Like I know a guy who used to run a billion-dollar bakery, you know, for one of the biggest grocery stores in the country. And and you know, it's it's so you can bake bread. If you love baking bread, you can So, it it's okay. Like we need to You people permission. Like there's no badge of courage for a grinding through having a business when you don't love it.

[28:50] — Let's talk more about that when we come back from break. So, uh listeners will hear will be right back after the break. — Hey, it's Randy from Tales of Abundance. Is starting a business part of your journey? Do you have ambition but no clear path? Maybe you feel trapped in your current career. Do you want a real business that can produce $250,000 or more income for you and your family? We have an opportunity for a profitable business that can be part of your path to abundance. I want to personally invite you to see the proven system we've built. It's designed to give you that freedom and control you've been searching for. Visit to learn more. That's Abundance. Why settle for less? And before the break, John had brought up the example of bread. And I think that's I think it's a really interesting thread to pull on a little bit, right? — to bake a bread, right? — Well, you Okay, anyway. I I think that could go anywheres from somebody in their kitchen at home baking bread and selling it to their right? To having a huge factory making bread and selling it to, you know, grocery stores and everybody in the world. And there's a whole bunch of things in the middle, right? It could It could be opening a bakery, it could be a food truck, it could be a lot of different things. So, let's just pull on that. Let's dig into that a little bit. Like, how do people figure out which one of those is right for them?

[30:21] Like, where should they start? I mean, we've been beating around it, but let's let's get practical for a minute. — said it. Do you like it? Are you good at it? And And And it's And are you good at it is probably a lot of different skills. Like, if you're going to manage people, like the first layer of management, you've got to know how to recruit people, and you've got to know how to train people, and you've got to know how to coach people, you've got to know how to manage them in in terms of accountability. And you've got to know how to how to help them grow through their job with you. And so those like that's just that And that's like management 101. And then when you get into like higher level management, you've got to learn how to to design and improve processes and how to, you know, you know, make strategic decisions based on markets and products and develop products. And there's I mean, depending on what level of sophistication of company you're talking about, you get more and more complicated decision sets that you have to make. And there are people that go through entire careers and advanced degrees just to figure out how to make all these decisions. And so some of those are important for a small bakery. Some of those are not. But as you get to bigger, more complicated businesses, there's more to keep your arms around. And so I think, you know, back to Anthony's point at the beginning, if you like it and you're good at it, it's a pretty good starting place.

[31:31] — Yeah, but I think you're asking the question and you at the before the you said that it's it's okay to not want to do want to run your own business. depending on where you settle down, if you're just baking bread for your yes, there's a little bit of stress associated with that, but the level of stress, it's not really a war. It's not really a battle. It's a it's a it's a uh an act of love and an act You're getting a lot of joy out of that. And so when you're making people happy in your when you choose to own a business or run a business or build a business, you're going to war with somebody generally speaking, is already doing something either similar or exactly the And every minute of every day, they're thinking about how to be better at it. How to reduce their supply chain costs. How to have hire the best people and so forth. And so we are talking you out of this, you know, and and we should. We we should talk you out of this because it is very, very difficult to do.

[32:34] So few businesses, you know, just grow because they had a great idea. I'm sure they're out there and listeners, you can email us and give us those examples. We'd love to hear them. But generally speaking, starting a business you're starting it's not an original idea or it's adjacent to an existing idea. You may be trying to uh usurp someone in a in the space because your product or your idea is better than theirs. But it is a lot of work and that's okay. It it's so fulfilling. Um the the self-actualization that you will enjoy and get out of being successful running your own business is like nothing I can describe. Having been on both sides of it personally, it there is nothing more joyous than being successful in running your own business. Other than, you know, having children and seeing them grow up and all this put all that stuff aside, which is all and I'm very happy about it. — Anthony's family's listening.

[33:37] — from a business perspective, there was nothing more joyous than watching a business grow and being successful, no matter how hard I was working. Lots of sacrifice, lots of family time lost, lots of you know, lots lots and lots of sacrifice, but it is so worth doing. So, keep that in mind as you go through it, but it is very difficult and it the um that you'll be involved in will be they're just so irritating at times that you can't believe you're having to — Yeah, it's not like you're the boss and you get to like just not worry about it and somebody else does it. You've got to worry about all of it and hope they do it right and if they don't step in and and and and and and — Which is fine. I mean, it's a lot of — Yeah. I I would also encourage people to think in today's world, you know, do you is it a is it a retail business, right? And are you or is it wholesale or is it what are you doing? But but even more than that, are we Are you selling a product? Are you selling a service? Right? Are you And and then we could get into what that customer avatar and pain pleasure and what what they're really selling, but you know, some of the best businesses today aren't doing either, really. You think of You know, I think of Mr. Beast. I mean, that guy's worth billions from making I think he's the best probably at YouTube videos. I think that's what the stats say.

[34:58] — Oh, he's selling ads. Like it it's a more complicated business we don't understand, but he's also has a customer. He's got a user. He's got — Understood, but he is making I mean, his super I don't Look, I've probably seen two of his videos in my life, but the best I can tell and from things I've listened to him and and read up on him a little bit, he has become very very excellent at beating the YouTube algorithm. Probably something we should stuff we should learn for our own benefit. — listening, welcome on to the show. Like we come on in and let's talk about it. — I don't think he's listening. But he is. there there's there's a lot of paths people could take, right? I mean, and there's more and more in AI. You know, I mean, people talk about the billion-dollar unicorn with with just a founder only or a founder and you know, one or two employees. Like that's that's going to be a thing at some point. I mean, there there's a lot of options — And and to your point earlier, I think that if somebody is interested in running a business like like an AI may hallucinate and may give, you know, not perfect answers, but boy, I I got to believe if someone is asking good questions with prompts, they're going to really good direction. Like they're they're going to be like 80 90% or more kind of in the direction of the conversation they should be having.

[36:16] — But this is another skill, right? I mean, we're talking about all the Anthony's talking about all the skills. Like I think in today's world, if you're going to run a business, you better start teaching yourself AI. — Oh, yeah. If you Yeah, I tell CEOs of businesses all the time, if you're not thinking about AI in your org chart as a part of what you're doing, then and somebody else says to your point, Anthony, like it's only a matter of time before that impacts you. I mean, don't Looks like you have something to say, Anthony. — No, I mean, total I'm in total I can't believe it. I'm in total agreement with you, too. Just shocking. — And we're done. — Um well, something something else that occurs to me is I think it's important to have a service attitude. Like you have to be there to serve customers. And if you're going to have employees, you got to be there to serve employees. I think it's I think it's very hard to have a successful business if you don't have that mindset. Would you guys agree with that? — I was trying to think of any business that couldn't do that. Like let's just think about like is there a business where you don't have to have a service attitude as a business owner? — I don't know. I mean, it's just You know, I'm thinking in the last week, I've had a couple of customer experiences. One of them with my cable company. I won't call them by name.

[37:25] And a router went out one night. And the all I could think is I had to enter the same information three times back to back to back. And I just thought to myself, if the CEO of this company had his cable go out, and our internet and the internet cable, whatever, went out, and he had to go through this process, it was very clear to me he's never gone through it or she's never gone through it because he they would be irritated as hell to have to enter, like I had to enter my name, address, phone number, email back to back to back three different — Right? Like that customer That that's not a service attitude. And I don't think that company started there. They're a behemoth now, and they're able to get away with it. But I don't think they started that way, — Yeah, you make that sound easy. Right? And I don't think anyone would disagree that if the best companies your your your companies that you frequent the most are the companies that treat you the best, right? In the beginning, that's much harder to do um because you're in the beginning, if you are want to satisfy every customer and give you give it your all, it's going to cost And may and may not result in revenue.

[38:41] Speaking from experience. All these companies that are fantastic, uh Nvidia, you name these giant companies. You go back to the their core value, it's exactly what you said. It's creating something for a customer that they can't get anywhere else and an experience that they will not get anywhere else and we will out experience everybody in the marketplace. But it is expensive to do out of the gate. So, yes, I agree. I would I would layer on top of that being and it was I never knew what this was when I was in the corporate world. It was only until I became an entrepreneur that I learned what it was when someone taught this to me is be a servant leader. Be the person who is willing to do for the business. Your You take your ego, you leave it in the car or the bus or the train or however you get to work. You leave it out there and just go to work. And whatever needs to be done, do it. What will happen is you will hire or bring partners on, they will see that.

[39:51] And that's your culture. We are all servant leaders and we're serving the customer. So, it's so critically important. — I think that's true for your partners, too, though. I think that's, you know, anybody who wants to start a business, I'd really encourage them to find a partner or two. And um there's different kinds of partnerships, right? There's partnerships where everyone's kind of equally yoked and jumping through it. There's times you bring in uh advisors, whatever the case may be, but but having having that core team at the very beginning um otherwise you run an even higher risk of being in an echo chamber. And so I think that, you know, I'm still stuck on this service thing. Like I think but you've got to serve your partners. You've got to really make sure that you're watching out for each other. I've I've seen it happen where um those business marriages break up and it's it's tough. — There's There's definitely added complexity if you're going to have partners, but I agree with you. I like running the business with somebody, Running the Running the race together is a lot more fun. — but I mean um anecdotally and I'm I'm guessing the science would say anything like you're you're going to be more successful if you have partners.

[40:53] — Well, if you choose the right people. — You know, of course. — Back to Steve Jobs, someone I think it was they were somewhere in the neighborhood of 20 or 30 employees at the very beginning. They were just getting started and he was spending almost all of his time recruiting and interviewing and selecting people. And one of the either it was an advisor, or an investor, or somebody said to him, "What the hell are you doing? You should be out figuring out product whatever." He said, "Look, we have 20 people here. They all are 5% of this company. That's 5 5%. Every single person we add is a piece of this company. There's nothing I should be doing more or better than picking the right people. A players will exponentially produce more than a B player. B players hire C players and perform at C level. A players are A players. — Well, that's nothing is more true than that today with when an A player is going to be using AI to, you know, I talked to an entrepreneur a couple of weeks ago who said that he's doing 50 times the amount of work output using AI than he was before. I And And he was serious. And so, to your point, A players are now like geometrically — not a little more.

[42:07] — And if you made a mistake bringing a to on or an investor figure out how to get out of it. — Well, figure out how to get out of it. It may not The The entanglement may take time for contractual reasons, or whatever the reasons might be. when you're when you're putting it put it together in a way that you know what the exit strategy is. If it's a legal document, here's how I'm going to pay you off to be done with you. Here's, you know, assume it's going to fail. And in any kind of legal entanglement, have a way out. It may Again, it may take you a year, it may take you 24 months, may take you 24 hours, whatever it's going to be. Um but, have a way out. Because if you it's going to be it's going to be a nightmare for you. Well, you've seen me at the beginning of this before, Anthony. We — Like we go through like the prenuptial agreement in businesses and really make sure that, you know, there's there's a very explicit set of conversations around like, if this starts to go south, what what do we do? And in a perfect world, you do it in such a way that the personal relationship can last past any problem like that. And it's, you know, I've seen that go both ways, too, but um — Yeah, but I don't don't Let's not hand-wave over it, to use Randy's term, because that's hard to do. You know, like it's like you're talking about a Um Oh, well, I'm in love. Um why would I ever need a pre-nup? Well, no, we're best friends. We've known each other for 15 years. John and I, you know, we've been through the the the wars together.

[43:36] — Great, then put it on paper. yeah, let's just in case, you know, just in case. I mean, take take that step. Take that step for — and and and we talk about things like, what happens if one of us dies? What happens if one of us gets hurt and disabled? What happens if one of us takes a different job? What happens if one of us isn't performing? What happens if what the company needs money? What happens if uh if the if the company gets a lot of money? What happens if one person wants to sell and the other person doesn't? What happens if Like it's like every And again, this is where AI is great, because you just go to AI and say, "Hey, what are all the things we should be talking about?" And it'll give you that list of things and then go talk about — Yeah, I mean, these conversations should be had early in the before they're reality. Early in the before the business is started. — The the main reason is most businesses fail. A much higher percentage businesses fail than it succeed. Even at the highest level, you know, investment bankers and private equity firms, they'll invest in 10 companies knowing full well seven of them are not going to make it.

[44:38] One or two, yeah, they do okay, and one is going to be their home run out of that investment of 10. So, the smartest people, and I put that in quotes, with the most money for sure, fail 60-70% of the time in their investments. So, you know, you're going to be in the healthcare business, you're going to be in the gym business, restaurants. Some industries have higher failure rates than others. That's something as you're doing your homework and you're doing your rehearsal, you want to look through and and see what your odds are. — Well, you've got to be willing to fail and learn from it, right? Like if you're not willing to fail, this probably isn't isn't the route for you. But, let's talk about you mentioned mistakes. Let's Let's get down and let's let's kind of talk about starting Let me ask a better question cuz if I say mistakes, we could cover the next 12 hours probably with the three of us talking about mistakes we've made in business. So, what are the biggest mistakes that you've made in a business or you've seen people make, right? And John, you've got a lot of experience with this. And I let's try and keep it more to the early stages just cuz we're we're talking to the person thinking about starting a business, not not the person exiting the business 20 years later or whatever, right? So, let's try and keep it in the early days. What are the two biggest mistakes you or you've seen somebody else make?

[45:55] — Yeah, so what Anthony talked about, you know, all the planning you have to do. So, too little planning and too much planning both massive mistakes. Like if you're trying to cross every bridge for the next 5 years before you're through the first 180 days, I think you have to do all the things Anthony talked about when you talk about all the analysis of what's happening, and then your plan needs to be like 12 months or less because as soon as you get started, everything's going to be changed, going to be wrong, and all that energy's going to be out the window, and you run the risk of drinking your own Kool-Aid and just, you know, being so, you know, committed to the own wrong thing because you have the sunk cost of doing the work. Like too much planning can be as big a mistake as too little — Yeah, to quote Mike Tyson, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the — And then it changes. Um I think that's for sure. Over-planning is um or thinking too far down the road. You used to use a term called shorten the — So, what's that, you know, what's going to happen in the first month, second month, third month? What are the and I think another big mistake is not recognizing when you made a mistake.

[47:02] And just trying to, oh no, that that's someone else's fault, you know, that that that's going to correct itself down the road. The other one that I've seen and we almost, in one of our businesses, almost fell victim to it was chasing Not sticking to the knitting of what the core business is. You know, you had an idea, you've picked the business, you're in you're you're in an automotive repair shop. It's not time to sell cars. You know, maybe in 3 years it's time to sell cars. You can buy you can buy, you know, classic cars from people who bring them in the to get them repaired and all that. But day one, fix the damn car. And do it really well, do it at the right price, wash it, deliver it back to the customer, and get a referral for the next customer to fix your car. Stick to the knitting is it a Who the Collins? Is that the Collins book Built to Last? — I don't remember that being in Collins book. I think he would he I remember stimulate or protect the core and stimulate progress is the thing I remember from him, but — Whoever it was.

[48:03] — He may have said it. — It you know, sticking to the knitting. — But I would argue even in that case, if you are in three years going to buy cars, fix them, and sell them up, that is a separate business. — I mean, yeah. I mean, Drucker would have said strategy is denial, right? Saying no to things. This is important. Here the other big one that we've missed though is like saying I don't have Like ignoring the competition and be like, "I don't have comp No one does what we do." It's like, "Yeah, but someone's spending money on solving that same problem." And so, you can call it a substitute or competition, but like like being so ignorant as to think that no one is solving the same problem some other way and spending some other money unless the problem just doesn't matter. Either the problem doesn't matter or someone else is trying to solve it. And if you're not willing to acknowledge that someone is competing in a way that somebody else thinks is better than the way you're doing it, that's a real mistake. — Like I think one of the mistakes I know I've made over time is trying to do something that wasn't in either my core skill set or something that I didn't enjoy doing and trying to build a business around something that just was not well aligned with me, yeah, — I've done that. It was a horrible idea.

[49:09] — Yeah. I I've also I haven't had this problem as much because I tend to start with let's go sell something and see if somebody will write a check, but I've also watched people put all this time, all this effort, and they're like, "I'm going to run this business and it's going to be great." And everybody by the way tells you, "Oh, John Anthony, that's a great idea." Right? But then when you actually ask them to write a check for the services, they're like, "Well, it's not that great of an idea." And they end up, you know, and and the business fails because they don't they haven't figured out what people are willing to pay for and how is the business going to make money. — Well, yeah. I had a guy wanted to start a business. He told me that he was going to be a product led company. He was going to save money by not having a sales organization. — I'm guessing that didn't go well. — It did not go well. — You know, one other mistake that we didn't we did we haven't touched on is a you know, off the grid, starting a business without support from the people that are closest to you.

[50:12] — It's a catastrophic mistake. — Right. And and that for if people doubt you or aren't supportive of you, it's going to drag you down emotionally. The other mistake people make, and I forget who's again, I'm not great at remembering who who said I think it was Drako did say this, culture will eat strategy for lunch. In other words, if you have the wrong culture in your business, no matter what your business is, no matter what your product, over time, you're not going to be successful. — So, be careful about that. If you don't mind, I think we should go something positive. — So, we're going to stop we're going to stop talking about starting a business? — No, no. No, actually, I'm going to um the uh the the uh the the person who QuickBooks, uh Quicken, TurboTax, among other things. Name is Scott Cook, the CEO of that founder of that company. Pretty bright guy.

[51:15] Said something once uh that I was I was privy to. He said, "I'm not worried about Microsoft putting a accounting software on their 365. I always worry about the little guy." And remember, you're starting a you're the little guy. The little guy is The little guy will do what it takes to be successful. The little guy will take risks. The real little guy will be creative. The little guy is a little So, watch out. You're the little guy. if you have that mindset and you and you are scrappy, that big automotive guy down the street, Firestone with all its locations and attitude, and you're all the scrappy guy who over serves and over delivers for people and washes cars and delivers them to the to the the person in their you're all the scrappy guy. You're all the one who's going to get that business. You're all the one who's going to be able to grow your business. So, there is an upside to being the little — Competitive advantage. — It is a competitive advantage and don't don't overlook it. So, when you go into this, cuz you've done your homework, you know what you're going to do, you like what you're doing and you're good at it, be scrappy.

[52:26] Because it's it's a very good opportunity for you to be successful and stay at it. It did with all the issues that come up and all the curveballs, just stay at it. You're all the scrappy guy. You can be successful. — Yeah, I think that I think that's great advice, right? Starting where they are. I mean, I think some of the stuff we've talked about can be a little overwhelming. You have to learn this and you got to learn this and you got to do this and you got to have a pre-nup and you got to blah blah blah blah blah. sometimes it's okay to start where you are and then build those skills one at a time. You don't have to, you know, and and realize you're going to make some mistakes along the way. It's going to be okay. — Yeah, it's going to be a fight. — Yeah, on on the positive note, I I think that I think that's a good a good thing. when I think of a business a lot of I read this in Success Magazine over 30 years ago. Arthur Blank, when he start He was talking about Arthur Blank starting Home Depot. And it started he got unexpectedly fired from his corporate job. And he talked about how he was devastated and he didn't know how he was going to pay his mortgage and how he was going to, you know, feed his kids and everything else.

[53:34] And he said, "It was the greatest day of my life." And cuz that was he would have Basically, he he have never quit that corporate job. It was too com- too cushy and he would have never but I would have that forced him to start Home Depot. And he would have never taken that jump, — Well, there's something else, too. Like, I feel like in my role at this point in my career, like I love getting up and going to work every day. Like, I I truly like it it um there have been very very very few Mondays where I've been like, "Oh my god, I've got to go to work today." Happens occasionally after a long vacation or something, but like I really love what I do. — Yeah. And running a business there's a lot of people that love it. So, well, we we've on it a lot and said all the reasons not to do it. The fact is all three of us kind of have to do it at this point. I mean, you maybe didn't your whole life, Anthony, but there's not really another choice for the three of us. And I think some of the listeners that that's true as well. — Yeah, I mean, you can be fulfilled in a in a number of ways. You can be fulfilled in that cushy corporate job.

[54:38] I shouldn't say cushy cuz there's no such thing as a cushy corporate corporate job anymore. There's no more executive dining rooms and all that stuff that I grew up with. So, I don't want to do that, but you we had a we had an episode on happiness. You know, pursue your happiness. Pursue your happy place. Whatever that is. And running your own business can be that. If we're just trying to be honest with you. I mean, as three men who have done this and we know hundreds of men and women that have done this. So, we know the pitfalls. We're we're here to help you. And that's one of the reason that is why Tales of Abundance exist. We have a website that is full of articles and blogs and to help you be better at creating abundance in your life. And if creating abundance around building a business, we can help you do that. It's it's there for you. And um that's why we exist. And we're happy to do that, but we want to give it, you know, we talk give it to you straight. If you want us to sugarcoat it, wrong wrong podcast.

[55:49] let's say we got listeners, we haven't completely scared them off, right? They they they're like, "Okay, even though you guys tried to scare me, you couldn't scare me. I want to start a Where the hell do I start? — Go to our website. — Yeah, we we have we have a great article we've written on on things to consider. It's a one of our longer articles. It's got a lot of lists inside the list. It's a list of lists and it'll give you a you know, a series of places to start and then I think you can drop that into AI and have some really interesting conversations. You know what? Reach out to us. Like I think you know, we're we're actually going to take an email and and set up a phone call and talk to you about it if you want to. Like that's maybe a little different than some, but — We're happy to talk about it. This is fun stuff. — You can always reach us is is the email address. — You know, take the first step, whatever that first step is for you. If it's go to AI to ask questions about what the best business for someone with my Put your resume in. Ask it to tell you what might be a business that that works. You start there and then do it again, prompt it again, prompt it again. I'm I'm a little late to AI, but I've in the last year I've learned about prompting and talking to it as if it's a mentor.

[56:59] Actually, it actually works that way. It You the more you prompt it, the better your answers get. So, you can say please and thank you to it. Although, they don't they don't like you to do that cuz it eats up, you know, compute time, I guess, I heard. But nonetheless, take the first step. And then the second step and the third step. And if you decide to go on, then move on. If you decide not to, that's okay. Nothing to be embarrassed about. — And and we've mentioned a couple of books earlier. You know, the E-Myth or E-Myth Revisited. John, I know one time you told me to read Simple Numbers. I did. That was fantastic. tree, and Yeah, I would I would definitely recommend I I would say that business owners, those are a good place to start. Start with simple numbers to understand the money and the — E-Myth Mastery is better than the E-Myth Revisited in my opinion. So, E-Myth Mastery, Simple Numbers, Traction. Like, if you're going to read — Traction's a little more advanced. — That not I don't know. I I think Traction's better than I've read them both and love them both. So, if you're going to read three books, those are a great place to start. — I enjoyed Traction more than the other two, but I would think people need those first two as a foundation and then Traction would be the third one. Any other books?

[58:05] — No, I wasn't wasn't going to mention a book. I was going to mention one other thing. You probably know somebody that is either in the middle of starting a business or recently started a business. Go have lunch with them. — Oh, great advice. — get a coffee or dinner or — Great advice. — golf, whatever. And talk to them. Tell them what you're thinking. And, you you can listen to us all day long, but if if you — And you should. — And you should, because we are just so special. No. The but talking to friends and you know, friends of friends about how what it was like to start a business, what kind of business, what were their steps. you know, you're not the first one to start a business. I can guarantee you that. So, learn learn from others, both their successes and their failures. And you'll either develop confidence or you'll recognize that it's not the right thing for you and that's a good that it's good to know one way or the other. — And and consider the source, by the way. Like, if that person wasn't successful, why weren't they successful? One of the things I will also promise you is once you start a business, you are going to get a lot of unsolicited advice.

[59:10] it's a little tricky, cuz a lot of it are people that are very well-meaning and they want to help, but they don't know anything about running a business, right? And they don't have know anything they're not considering you and your values. And I've gotten a lot of horrific advice from very well-intentioned people. But, then some of those people have little there's little nuggets, right? The person that might tell you five things that are completely wrong and stupid might be the same person that gives you a great idea. — Right? So, just but be a little careful with it. — Yeah. Beware of people trying to sell you something. — Yeah, that, too. — There is There are, you know, cuz they're they're small business, and they want to sell it whether it's some sort of advertising or whatever the case might be. As the carpenters would say, you know, measure twice, cut once before you write a check um based on, you know, a sales pitch. So, trust me, your customers are doing that. So, you should you should you should act like a customer as well. — All right, let's let's wrap this thing up. Go check out the website, visit the list of things, talk to people, ask them and call us.

[1:00:15] — All right, listeners, thank you as always. Download, subscribe, tell your friends, go to the website, and uh I hope I hope that this gives you some insight onto whether or not you want to start a business. Even if the answer's no, and you don't want to start it, then I would say this was a great use of your time. So, thank you for listening, and everybody have a fantastic day. wherever you get your podcast. Click follow for more content like this, or go to talesofabundance.com to join our community and get free tools.