All I ever wanted was a job

My business makes money. I, as a seperate entity from my business, make money. My business makes more money than I do. That's how it should be.

When my partner and I started out in the 1970s we each had a function, did our jobs, then took home a pay check. His mom set it up that way so we wouldn't blow the money on stupid stuff. Then we set up a corporation with seperate acounts for material, and equipment. Lastly the corporation bought a location. There we were working the job, but the business was making all the money.

We didn't have pay roll other than ourselves. We had employess from time to time, but sub contractors, or consultants, made up our cash outlays. There again as we grew there was a seperate account for those cash outlays. My partner's mom was replaced with an accountant, we had a contract lawyer, and for me it was a job I went to every day. 

For right or wrong, my perception was that there was more in life. The company is still in exsistence today. It's a life of it's own and I ask from time to time if it makes money. It does. Both my partner and I are long gone, down the road, but the company still ebbs and flows, so for me I really was just a cog in a mechanism. This business I walked away from, but it taught me that structure is important.

Over the years I've started more than a couple of businesses and consulted on more.  Many of my projects still exsist. As I wander around it's great to see things I've been a part of. On the other hand, when I walk by a store front and see a friend who is working on a Saturday it comes back to me about being the cog that drives the mechanism. When people refer to business owners as sharks it's true, if you stop swimming you die.

My friend in the store front makes money, lots of it. He has a fun business and loves every minute of it. He and his partner invested heavily in internet sales. It's worked out very well. They contract with sub contractors they consult with then collect and manage the money. They tried franchising at one point; consulting is working better. In a way the internet presence is thier business today. The store front is a promotional item.

This is what it has to do with you. You are a person, couple, or group with a business. You set it up with all the bells and whistles. Some one asked me yesterday about being an LLC. What ever your structure your business should be it's own entity. It should be able to stand alone, or that should be your goal. A trained monkey should be able to come in, on any given day, and your business should be able to survive. That's the secret. 

OK, you're a consultant, graphic designer, radio personality, or trainer. Nobody can do what you do. Nobody's motivated to do what you do. You're the best! Then you have a broken leg, your mother dies, you find a friend in drugs, or you are networking a little too much at the cocktail lounge. Your business should be there when you sober up; if not why not?

The answer is the original premise: Your business is your job and your job is your business.

There are two ways people look at thier business. Number one they pay themselves first, number two they build the business before they take a pay check. In internet business models people refer to ebay or Amazon as money losers until they are profitable, blah, blah ,blah. The corporation makes money, the stock holders make money, and last the business loses money. It floats by venture capital which is also making money, so how is the business losing money? I'm going to let you MBAs answer that one.

Rather than tell you to buy the book or hire me these are the steps of having a business that makes money. Number one is to have a profitable product. Second is to get it in the hands of consumers as quickly as possible. Third have the delivery be effecient. Last, but not least, have the consumer have the ability to come back and do it again.

Even if the product is you, you need a delivery system that allows you to be in multiple places on a day to day basis. If you really think about it it's possible given the right variables. That's what makes the internet magic. You can be a thousand places at the same time in a variety of demographics. If you think about it you can offer a complete set of services surrounding you that directs people back to you. You can promote, sell or make available a variety of services related to your feild. You become the epicenter of what you do.

You can hire people. You can have a payroll or you can have other people help you help your customers as a stand alone business. You can start multiple businesses and have other people partner with you. Ten per cent of something is better than having a competitor you get nothing from. Being in business allows you to expand beyond who you are. 

These are just things for all us to keep in the back of our minds while our businesses grow. Will we be able to sustain what we do over the course of time? Are we cloning ourselves to build the business or are we carrying the business on our backs? How ever you build the business it should be profitable, it should be able to sustain itself without you, and it should make money long after your gone.