A nice little guide to some of the dos and don't of starting your own small scale business

Chapter 1: in this age the ability to test, launch and scale is fast and cheap
Chapter 1: only need 3 things to start, product or service, a group of peaopl willing to pay and a way to get paid, everything else is optional
Chapter 1: convergence / overlapp between what you like doing and what people are willing to pay for
Chapter 1: typically projects can happen via adjacent skill knowledge
Chapter 1: Merge Passion and skill with something that useful to others
Chapter 1: Not about being the best - Diller comic. Minor Art, minor wrighting, minor humor, minor business experience
Chapter 2: Value means helping people
Chapter 2: give people what they really want, not what they think they want
Chapter 2: Notice market inefficiency and when you want something that doesn't exisf
Chapter 2: New Market or opportunity with a change in tech or economy
Chapter 2: Market a core benefit not a list of features (think emotional needs)
Chapter 2: Focus on adding (money, love, attention) or subtracting (stress, anxiety, debt)
Chapter 3: Businesses provide good solutions to problems
Chapter 3: Consider business models related to your current passion or hobbies
Chapter 3: You can establish a specialized consulting business in a day, the mroe specific the better
Chapter 3: Lots of people are interested in something but have a hard time implementing in daily lives (paleo diet planning)
Chapter 4: You can roam as a business owner nowadays (Make sure its what you want)
Chapter 5: Whoare you people (not necessarily age or race but posisbly shared beliefs and values)
Chapter 5: Invitation marketing over persuasion marketing
Chapter 5: You can often follow a fad, craze or trend by being an authority and simplifying something about a process that others hope to benefit from
Chapter 5: Use short surveys to understand cutsomer prospects, the more specific the better ( ask what is the number one thing I can do for you, whats your biggest problem with x, whats the number one question you have about x, what can I do to help you with x)
Chapter 5: Decision making matrix (88 pg. Impact, Effort, Profitablity, vision,)
Chapter 6: Bias towards action, first sale as soon as possible
Chapter 6: 7 steps to instant market testing (pg. 96)
Chapter 6: One page business plan (pg. 102)
Chapter 6: Missions statement in 140 characters (pg. 105)
Chapter 7: Connect your offer to direct beneifts customers will receive, clear value proposition, (What they want and what they say they wwant aren't always the same thing)
Chapter 7: Think about their potential objections in advance
Chapter 7: You can make a business model around market inefficiencies (Priceline.com for a third party hotel booking) or lack of transparency (levels.fyi)
Chapter 7: Urgency, why should people act now
Chapter 7: pg 121, list of FAQ stuff
Chapter 7: Offer reassurance and acknowledgement immediately after someone buys something or hires you. Find a small but meaningful way to go above and beyond expectations
Chapter 8: A good launch features at least a few announcements before hand (built through regular communication with customers, pg 131/132)
Chapter 8: Has both strategy (the why, story, offer, long term plan) and tactics (the how, timing, price, pitch)
Chapter 8: Admitting to flaws makes you seem less scammy
Chapter 8: Ask for everything from everyone (news paper, blogs, TV spots, donnations, endorsements) and you'll be suprised what you get
Chapter 8: Tell a good story and make sure the why now part is answered
Chapter 8: 39 step launch checklist model
Chapter 9: Default 50% creating 50% connecting for business time
Chapter 9: If you build it they might come, but you probably need to let them know what you built and how to get there
Chapter 9: When you get started, say yes to ever reasonable request. Become more selective (consider the hell yes test) as you become more established
Chapter 9: After making someting worth talking about, make a list of 50 people (friends, former colleagues, aquaintances), send a quick note on the thing you're doing (pg. 151) then ask for a few minor action points if they'd like to help and if they'd be interested to sign up for a mailing list or to let others know about the project
Chapter 9: Strategic Giving marketing, upgrade peoples shipping randomly or add an extra serving of the order or include a bonus etc to suprise people for the better. Conact bloggers and influencers and give them free stuff of yours
Chapter 9: One page promotion plan, to regulalry connect with customers (pg. 159)
Chapter 10: Primary Goal is to get money, think about cashflow
Chapter 10: Spend money on things that increase customer relationships or increase sales,
Chapter 10: debt is optional
Chapter 10: Price your product based on its value relative to the problem not your cost of production, offer a limited range of product (3 - 5), Get paid more than once for the same thing (Continuity, membership, subscription, free of low cost trial, make it easy to cancel and advertise this)
Chapter 10: Get creative about getting what you need (Money, access to help, etc)
Chapter 11: Increase conversions, use prospects list and A/B testing for conversions
Chapter 11: Upsell, would you like fries with that, cross sell, customers who purchase your x also purchased y, sale after sale, special offer only for customer who bought today
Chapter 11: Increasing existing income is usually easier than starting a new business
Chapter 11: Encourage Refferals
Chapter 11: Product to service or service to product, if product make a teaching version or consulting version. If service make a lowerend productized or do it yourself guide kind of thing or theme or template
Chapter 11: By being careful you can grow without dramatically increasing workload to scale without hiring
Chapter 11: Easy growth, adding a service to a product based business or vice versa, deplyying a creative series of upsells and cross sells or making a few key tweaks
Chapter 11: Horizontal expansion - serve more customers with different but related interests. Vertical expansion - go deeper by serving the same customers with different levels of need
Chapter 12: By leveraging skills and contacts, you can do more. Affiliate recruitment (make it a good affiliate program like 51% of cost back to them), partnerships, outsourcing
Chapter 12: hub and spoke model to maintain one online home base and other outposts to diversify
Chapter 12: outsourcing should be based on you preferences and the business you're building. Do whats best for you, feel free not outsource
Chapter 12: Carefully chosen partnerships can be good. Just make sure its what you want to do. One page partnership agreement (pg. 211)
Chapter 13: The road of freedom has variety (multiple businesses, selling businesses, working part time at traditional, part time on your own thing)
Chapter 13: You can try to scale or stay small or something in between all is good just depends on what you want
Chapter 13: Going really long (ie selling the company), you need to have a system that can operate without your specific unique set of skills as a linchpin. Needs to be Teachable and Valuble. CPA ia valuble but not quickly teachable, bussing tables is teachable but not very valuble
Chapter 13: Regulalry monitor one or two key metrics that are important (sales, cash flow, incoming leads, average order price). Check up on others monthly or bimonthly
Chapter 13: Work on your business every day (improvements, business developement to grow, offer development, fixing long standing problems, pricing review, customer communication initiating via newsletters and updates), not just maintenence of the day to day
Chapter 14: Advice is hepful but don't be afraid to take leap, Don't wait for someone to give you permission
Chapter 14: More than competition or external factors, the biggest battle is against your own fear and inertia. Thankfully you can controll and manage this
Chapter 14: When you have a success or moment you knew story, hold onto it, the experience is powerful and can help in hard times
Chapter 14: Don't waste your time living someone elses life

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The $100 Startup

Chris Guillebeau