Excuse 2: “I tried that once, and it didn’t work.” According to Panaggio, those words are most often uttered by small business owners in reference to marketing. Perhaps you’ve been there: You allocated a large part of your budget to producing a television commercial, for instance, but barely noticed any increase in your business. Or maybe you offered an online deal to new customers, only to realize that the discount you advertised was a little too generous and wouldn’t allow you to make any profits. Your one-time marketing failure has convinced you not to try again.
“Yes, marketing is far from certain,” Panaggio acknowledges. “It can be expensive, and it’s hard to accurately predict what customers will respond to. But without proactive long-term and consistent marketing, businesses die. Avoiding investing in marketing—or even cutting back on it—because one campaign didn’t produce the desired results is a risk you can’t afford to take.”
Excuse 3: “If I just had XYZ gadget…” “If I just had faster computers, my team could respond to customer emails on a more timely basis.” “If I just had the latest supply chain management software, my company could fulfill orders more quickly.” When you’re an entrepreneur, there are a million “If I just had…”s, and often, they center around technology. Remember, though, you can spend forever waiting on the next best thing—and often, says Panaggio, that “next best thing” isn’t as necessary as you thought.
“On the infrequent occasions when the Internet in my office goes down, everyone has one concern: ‘What should we do now? Go to lunch?’” Panaggio recounts. “My answer is always this: ‘If you were on a deserted island with no supermarket, would you just let yourself starve, or would you figure out a way to survive? You may not be online, but your phone still works. Pretend the Internet hasn’t been invented yet and call a few customers. Survive.’
“My point is, by viewing technology as a necessity, we create our own prison,” he states. “We no longer use it as a tool. Instead, we are trapped by it. Remember, the road to success is through action, not accessories. Countless success stories have been written with nothing more than ink and paper, a rotary phone, and plain determination. While tools, technology, and accessories might be helpful, they do not guarantee success. Effort guarantees success—you have to keep your foot on the accelerator longer and more often than your competitor.”
Excuse 4: “I’m still working on the plan.” Let’s say that you want to move to the next level, whatever that happens to be for your business. So you begin planning, preparing for every possible scenario. You define contingencies with backup plans full of redundancies. You sometimes wonder how anyone could fail with a plan that covers all possibilities and that offers each a solution. But here’s what you’re not taking into account: While your perfect plan might prevent you from failing, it will also hold you back from succeeding if it’s never executed.
“To be absolutely clear, planning is a good thing,” Panaggio clarifies. “However, for many entrepreneurs, the solution to avoiding the risk of reality is to keep planning. After all, they tell themselves, you must have a plan to be successful; ‘winging it’ is a blueprint for failure. The fact is, with planning as a comfort zone, you can easily replace the reality of execution with theoretical forecasting and ‘what-if’ modeling. For that reason, many risk-averse entrepreneurs miss opportunities and fail to build actual businesses in the act of building virtual businesses. Don’t make that mistake.”
Excuse 5: “It’s a good idea, but circumstances have changed.” “I was ready to pull the trigger, but then the market changed and I had to reassess.” “I had to set back the original product launch date because I was just too busy to get everything ready.” “Preliminary research showed that this idea might not be as lucrative as we thought, so we scrapped it altogether and went back to the drawing board.” Sound familiar? If so, you may be moving the target.
Tom Panaggio has enjoyed a 30-year entrepreneurial career as cofounder of two successful direct marketing companies. For more information, visit www.TheRiskAdvantage.com.
