Essential Steps to Follow When Starting Your Own Business (Part 2)

Lesson Number 3:

You do not need a fancy website, logo, or launch party to get going. What you do need is a solid idea, a willingness to test and fail, and some good connections.

If I had appreciated this much earlier in my career I would have saved myself a lot of time and quite a lot of money. But when I first launched myself into the world as a fearless entrepreneur, I thought that nobody would take me seriously unless I had the fanciest logo, the shiniest website, and a swanky launch party in London’s trendy Shoreditch. So these are the things I focused on.

The first serious business I launched was a voiceover agency. One of the things I had enjoyed most working in advertising was writing and directing TV and radio spots so it felt like a good niche for me to pivot into when I left full-time agency work and decided to go it alone.

I started recruiting a wonderful stable of talent. I paid a brand designer to design me a natty logo. I paid a web designer to build me a natty website. I found office space in a trendy part of East London. And I scouted around and eventually found an awesome spot for the swanky launch party.

DJs were booked, food was ordered, invites were sent out to everyone I knew in the industry (plus quite a few I didn’t know) and I treated myself to a new dress for the occasion. Peacock blue silk from a boutique just off Oxford Street.

The night of the launch party rolled around and my partner and I were ready to get glammed up and head out for a night of schmoozing and networking and, hopefully, booking some business.

I came out of the shower, went through to the bedroom to get dressed and there was my beloved mog doing that kneading thing that cats love to do on my brand new peacock blue dress. Needless to say, cat claws and delicate silk are not a good combination and the peacock blue dress had to be hastily abandoned in favour of my old reliable LBD. Not a great start to the night!

I’m happy to report, however, that things did pick up after that. The venue was packed, nearly everyone I invited showed up and it was a fantastically fun night. Two glasses of wine in, I had upped the limit on the free bar tab and the dance floor was packed with lots of agency owners and media people enjoying my hospitality.

From that perspective, the launch party was a great success. Word got around that Jude Schweppe knew how to throw a party and I got plenty of thank-you emails and text messages the following Monday – mostly from my talent. Did I get lots of business from it? The honest answer is probably no. I was a new kid on the block with no track record and just because I had plied people with free drinks and nibbles did not mean they would immediately be jumping ship from their current supplier and booking all their voice talent through me.

I could probably have launched a robust email campaign and tried to book calls with people on the back of it, rather than spending money I didn’t really have on a fancy event and a peacock blue silk dress that I never got to wear!

Lesson Number 4:

Relationships are everything and they take time to build!

This is one of the biggest lessons I have learned over the years. Growing your network and building genuine connections with people is one of the best ways of growing your business. People do business with other people. It’s a concept that has been around for decades and it’s not going to change any time soon. 

When I launched my business there were lots of voice agencies in London. Some of them had been around for donkey’s years and all the successful ones had spent years nurturing their relationships. When I was casting voice talent for campaigns we would always use the same agency; it was just easier to deal with people you knew would make the process quick and easy. Creatives are always battling deadlines. The client takes ages to sign off on a script, a further age to sign off on the talent, and then when everyone and his dog has had their say you suddenly find yourself having to deliver the mastered files TOMORROW. I wanted to know that the agency would make the process as smooth as possible for me and that the talent would nail it in the hour we had booked with them.

This was the kind of service I set out to provide when I launched my own agency. I was very picky about the talent I took on and I made sure that the service I provided did my marketing for me. I became known as the ‘no problem’ agent and I genuinely went out of my way to make the process as smooth as I could for every client I worked with.

I nurtured the relationships via email. I was energised and engaged when I spoke to people on the phone. I learned how each client operated and what made their lives easier. I learned that there were clients who were ALWAYS on a tight turnaround so when I saw a brief landing in my inbox from them I took extra care to call the talent I was going to put forward and make sure they would definitely be available.

I earned a reputation for being great to work with and for always going the extra mile on every brief. And this stood out to me over the ten years that I ran the business.

You can have the fanciest website on the Internet, you can spend £10K and the rest with a fancy branding agency, and you can max your credit card out on an awesome launch party, but when it comes to actually building and scaling your business, the time and effort you put into developing and nurturing your relationships will be one of the best investments you will ever make.

Be good at what you do and be good at how you do it, and success won’t be too far away.