Mistakes Business Owners Make With Money by Lee Schneider
Lee Schneider, Founder of Red Cup Agency: They’re not thinking about what the world is going to think about that thing when it shows up in the world. Is there a following for it? Do people care about it?
You know, when people get that first round of funding, it’s very, very exciting. So, you want to spend that money. Most people make the mistake I think of spending on outward-facing things like a nice place to work. That’s good, it’s better than working on your couch, you know? If you have to see clients, you have to have a nice place to work, no doubt about it.
But you’re going to have to have legal help, you’re going to have to have accounting help. And marketing and cohort building usually come in later.
There is this thing that happens especially with coding where people get very head down. They get very focused on the app “This app has to be perfect! We’re going to ship this on December 15th. It’s got to be perfect and we’re going to work on that all the time.” And then they ship the app and nothing happens because they didn’t build an audience for that app. They didn’t connect with people before.
Most people don’t think about they’re spending money on coding or getting the back end of things put together, but they’re not thinking about what the world is going to think about that thing when it shows up in the world. Is there a following for it? Do people care about it? Do you have salespeople there and that’s a very hard balance to meet. Because if you bring on the sales people (I’ve seen this), you bring on sales people and there’s no real product to sell. Those sales people don’t have anything to do. Versus you could build a great thing and have no one to sell it and then you’re going very slowly because there is no one pushing it.
So it’s another balance issue.
Question What mistakes with money did you make early on in business?
