Build a business with momentum

Does growing your business feel like an uphill battle? It did for me, until I learned how to harness gravity instead of fighting it. I've been an entrepreneur for five years, and most of that time I’ve been pushing a boulder uphill.

Instead, imagine standing at the top of the hill while your business gathers momentum and grows like a snowball on the way down.

Harnessing the laws of business, like the laws of gravity, can make the difference between whether your business snowballs or stays small, and whether it feels seamless or full of friction.

After five years of trial and error and getting my “podcast MBA”—seriously, I’ve listened to thousands of episodes—I’ve learned a few things. Including that the way I went about building my business was all wrong.

I want to share three of my biggest mistakes that left me forcefully pushing my business uphill instead of getting on a roll.

Mistake 1: all you need is a great product

Nope. Oh, and if anyone is still under the illusion that “If you build it, they will come,” sorry, no one’s coming!

Like many entrepreneurs, I started my business with a product rather than a customer base. It was a great product that solved a very real problem—loneliness.

I’m a mental health professional, and at that time I was working on a college campus where students were telling me that they were lonely and it was hard to make friends. So, I created a solution: a six-session small-group program that helped participants get to know each other and make friends.

Students loved it. We had an instant waiting list and 95% of participants said they’d recommend it to a friend. Assessments showed it successfully reduced loneliness. Staff and faculty demanded their own groups. I had a hit on my hands, so I left my secure, salaried job and launched ProjectConnect.

I soon discovered there were a couple core problems with my product. Including that it was difficult to market.

Your product not only has to be great, you need to be able to easily communicate its greatness. For example: can you run a short ad that makes people say, “I need that,” or, “I know someone who needs that.”

Can you answer, “What do you do?” in a simple sentence that people instantly grasp?

In the past I could say, “I’m a therapist” and people understood what I meant.

With ProjectConnect I was saying things like, “I work with colleges and businesses to help them build connection.” Or, “I train people to run groups that help participants get to know each other and make friends.”

I got lots of confused looks.

My product was new, hard to explain, and people were unfamiliar with the idea. I needed to educate customers. That was part of my uphill battle.My product was a six-session group curriculum to help participants make friends—but I wasn’t selling directly to the people who would be participating in these groups. I was selling to the schools and workplaces that wanted to implement the groups. In order to use it, they had to identify staff to attend a five-hour training to become certified as a ProjectConnect facilitator. Only then could they facilitate groups—which were an hour a week for six weeks. Rewarding and impactful? Yes—but also a big ask for busy customers.

You need to be able to describe your product/service—and its value—in a simple sentence that people instantly “get.” I’m playing around with this new description of what I do: “You know how a lot of people are struggling with loneliness? I help people develop five fulfilling friendships, because that’s the difference between feeling lonely or connected.

It took time and effort to implement. People want a quick, easy solution, but it's hard to change behavior.

Mistake 2: everyone will benefit from my product

Loneliness is everywhere you look. That makes my audience unlimited—and that’s a good thing, right?

Every time I talked to somebody about what I do, they would offer me a new niche. One person said, “This would be great for the elderly,” another told me, “people with autism could really use something like this,” and yet another offered, “Have you thought about working with military wives? They’re constantly moving, which makes it hard to make friends.”

Everyone had an idea for a new audience for me to work with.

But just because a potential audience has the problem you address doesn’t mean you should work with them.

Warren Buffet put it this way, “The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything,”—and everyone.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t bring myself to say no to all the suggestions, so I had to learn the hard way.

It’s hard to target multiple audiences. I tried to straddle two markets: colleges and workplaces. I even did a little work with schools. Working this way meant I couldn’t speak to the specific concerns of anyone unless I duplicated my marketing efforts with messages tailored to each. That’s challenging as a solopreneur. I also had to maintain separate web pages and materials. In other words, I increased my work and diffused my efforts—another fight against gravity was happening.

There are drawbacks to working with certain audiences. As you choose your ideal audience, keep in mind that they not only need to have the problem you solve, they also need to have something else important—money. In my work with colleges, many of my potential customers didn’t have their own budgets. They were sold on the idea but had to get creative about finding funding by pitching it to their boss, or their boss's boss, or even writing grants. When your customers aren’t the decision-makers, it extends the sales cycle and you're dependent on them to “sell” your product to others. Even if potential customers are passionate about your product, they’re rarely able to explain it to others as well as you can.

To quote John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneurs on Fire, “Niche down ‘til it hurts!” The short-term pain of cutting a potential audience loose will save you the long-term pain of being a generalist and not getting traction anywhere.

Mistake 3: my business model is flawless

Yes, I managed to replace my salary and have achieved some measure of “success.” I’ve worked with more than 100 organizations to build stronger connections—from Ivy League colleges to multinational law firms to local community centers. Thousands of people have participated in ProjectConnect groups and built positive relationships. But these outcomes were almost 100% based on my effort. There was no snowball effect going on here.

The biggest problem was that my business model was based on one-time sales. Once I provided facilitator certification training and the program materials, my customers no longer needed me. I had to climb back on the hamster wheel to find new customers. I had no recurring income, and the income I had was based on my time delivering live training. This limited momentum and snowball growth.

My goal is to create a more sustainable lifestyle that separates my time (input) from money (sales).

That's why developing a product that can create passive income is a good strategy. Think course, book or physical product.

I’m developing a membership community to help members make five fulfilling friendships, because that can make the difference between feeling lonely or connected.

Turning mistakes into momentum

Looking back, each of these mistakes slowed my momentum and made growth harder than it had to be. But every misstep taught me something valuable—and those lessons are shaping how I move forward.

These are lessons I wish I’d learned before I’d started my business. If you’re just starting out, maybe you’ll learn from my mistakes without having to make them yourself. But it’s never too late to pivot, and that’s what I’m doing right now.