u/maistahhh

Wrote and posted about my experience starting for a laborer to graduating to a business owner.

Due to me being a prolific writer it was taken down but I don't give up easily.

Anyway

I've found my footing here on EntrepreneurRideAlong subreddit and it changed my life. Partly due to circumstances and partly due to luck and lot of work.

If you're looking to get into a sweaty startup with hopes of getting out of the manual labor - I'd be happy to answer any questions. Decade plus of experience running a business.

Straight from my soul hoping to inspire someone and answer any questions:

Service businesses are awesome. You get to help someone with something they can't or don't want to do themselves. America is built on this - about 75% of GDP comes from a service sector.

So what is the timeline of someone that starts a service business?

If you're into something that has a low barrier of entry - competition is high.
If you're trying to start something that requires a lot of capital - competition is lower but getting those funds is a challenge.

If you're going the first route you simply get drowned out by competitors. I think it's inherently good to be able to compete but it presents some challenges.

So you're ready to work and get the money. 1st problem you encounter is - how do I get steady work?

Usual move is to join local facebook groups, nextdoor and maybe post on social media. That itself is very hard to sustain when you have to do the work yourself.

You do more research and get your website going and maybe a google business profile - but those are invisible so not much results there. It's also another plate to spin.

From there you start to do research into more advanced tactics to rank yourself. You are bootstrapping so first try do so something yourself. Then some company reaches out to you and promises results for $200/400 a month. That fails. Maybe you turn to someone local but that is costly and you can't justify the costs.

Ultimately you give up on the idea of organic leads and maybe go towards hiring a business coach for your niche. Maybe getting a course thinking the foundation of what you built is wrong. This often isn't likely to produce much results.

I've ran my service business for 10 years now and passed all those milestones myself (never hired a coach or paid for a course) and the most important thing is you don't quit.

If you're in a populated area, you can build your business and eventually stop doing the sweaty part yourself.

You either have a lot of hustle and grit to learn, implement and stay consistent when things don't show results.

or

You have capital to hire people or run ads to speed up the early slog.

I have the utmost respect for people that do physical labor sweaty startups. You're slowly destroying your body or putting yourself at risk to provide a service to your fellow human.

If your goal is to eventually move up the ranks, stop doing the labor part yourself, manage people and focus on sales/marketing - this is achievable if that is your goal.

Focus on your craft, spread the word, make some money, leverage it to grow your business, surround yourself with good people, create systems, get help, start working on your business, treat your coworkers and customers well, stay curious, keep learning and NEVER GIVE UP!

Service businesses are awesome. You get to help someone with something they can't or don't want to do themselves. America is built on this - about 75% of GDP comes from a service sector.

So what is the timeline of someone that starts a service business?

If you're into something that has a low barrier of entry - competition is high.
If you're trying to start something that requires a lot of capital - competition is lower but getting those funds is a challenge.

If you're going the first route you simply get drowned out by competitors. I think it's inherently good to be able to compete but it presents some challenges.

So you're ready to work and get the money. 1st problem you encounter is - how do I get steady work?

Usual move is to join local facebook groups, nextdoor and maybe post on social media. That itself is very hard to sustain when you have to do the work yourself.

You do more research and get your website going and maybe a google business profile - but those are invisible so not much results there. It's also another plate to spin.

From there you start to do research into more advanced tactics to rank yourself. You are bootstrapping so first try do so something yourself. Then some company reaches out to you and promises results for $200/400 a month. That fails. Maybe you turn to someone local but that is costly and you can't justify the costs.

Ultimately you give up on the idea of organic leads and maybe go towards hiring a business coach for your niche. Maybe getting a course thinking the foundation of what you built is wrong. This often isn't likely to produce much results.

I've ran my service business for 10 years now and passed all those milestones myself (never hired a coach or paid for a course) and the most important thing is you don't quit.

If you're in a populated area, you can build your business and eventually stop doing the sweaty part yourself.

You either have a lot of hustle and grit to learn, implement and stay consistent when things don't show results.

or

You have capital to hire people or run ads to speed up the early slog.

I have the utmost respect for people that do physical labor sweaty startups. You're slowly destroying your body or putting yourself at risk to provide a service to your fellow human.

If your goal is to eventually move up the ranks, stop doing the labor part yourself, manage people and focus on sales/marketing - this is achievable if that is your goal.

Focus on your craft, spread the word, make some money, leverage it to grow your business, surround yourself with good people, create systems, get help, start working on your business, treat your coworkers and customers well, stay curious, keep learning and NEVER GIVE UP!

Talked to a pest control business owner recently and it opened up some old wounds. He paid someone a nice chunk of change to help grow his business and the end results left him in worse shape than before. Lost time, money and it hobbled his biz. Story very similar to mine as I was just getting started.

Almost every business owner has at least one story like this. A vendor, a contractor, a piece of software, an "expert" who took the money and did nothing or dripped just enough to keep you paying.

What's something that screwed you over running your business that you wish someone had warned you about first? Could be a bad lease, a bad hire, a bad supplier, whatever cost you.