How to scale your favorite business into a business: a checklist of actions for a month

What to do in the first month

Hobbies often turn into businesses. It seems that there is only one step from baking cakes in the home kitchen to owning a profitable confectionery business. However, everything is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. But if you are determined, here is a monthly action plan that can help you.

Week 1 Decide on a goal

The first thing to think about is why do you need scaling? Set a goal and then move forward.

Making clothes for dogs, making cheesecakes or creating jewelry - now you do all this not just for yourself, but for clients. If you want your hobby to be produce a profit, your product should be interesting to the audience.

To do this, study what products your potential customers need and at what price, what formats are currently popular in this niche among buyers.

Let's say you manufacture scented candles. Go to aggregators like Wildberries or Ozon, explore the range competitors and their benefits, compare prices. This will help you figure out if monetization of your hobby is even possible. For example, if the cost of your candles is 500 rubles, and on the marketplace the prices for such products do not exceed 200–300 rubles, you should look for another niche or platform.

Another example: now in the restaurant industry, cheeses according to original recipes are in demand. Production does not require large investments, the mini-workshop will pay off quickly: the margin on some types of cheese can reach 200%, and in 2021–2022, the competition in the niche was very low. Such a business can definitely be developed and scaled.

Week 2 Write a business plan

We have decided on the goals - it's time to move on and create business plan. It should prescribe all the key indicators and the time for which you will come to them. After all, the main reason for low income and lack of payback is most often unrealistic planning. Here's what you need to do.

1. Study the market and the advantages of competitors

Look for potential competitors for related search queries on marketplaces and social networks. If you sell soap, search for “handmade soap at such and such a price.” Fix what seems to be winning in their visual and content presentation, what you pay attention to: packaging style, details logo, unusual author's images.

For example, a dress brand shows a dress model not in a photo, but in a video. The girl easily spins in it, showing all the advantages of the fabric and fit of the product. This distinguishes not only the brand, but also the model. The dress will look much better than the products shown in the photo only.

Don't forget to also read consumer reviews: they will help highlight the pros and cons of brands and their products, as well as the main pains of the target audience.

2. Consider technical aspects

An outsourced accountant can take over the payment of taxes and control of documentation so that you do not break firewood at the initial stage. Another option is a specialist from the bank with which you work. This is convenient, and you do not need to waste time looking for an employee.

The next option is private accounting companies in which specialists lead several business clients, completely covering the need for a permanent employee. Such a service, as a rule, costs 5-6 thousand rubles.

The second important issue is budgeting. A rough idea of ​​how much a company spends and earns has nothing to do with the real picture of what is happening. Therefore, so that the business does not sharply go into negative territory, it is important to start at least clearly keeping track of income and expenses.

You also need to control the company's turnover, net profit, in order to understand how much you really earn, and set further financial goals.

Maintaining a budget will allow you to avoid cash gaps, plan expenses, predict profits and go to high rates. If there is no financial manager, you can handle it yourself. One of the modern services will help you with this, for example "Plan fact”, or good old Excel. I would also advise taking the simplest financial literacy courses, or at least studying all the available materials.

But, as in the case of an accountant, to keep budget it can also be an outsourcing employee or a special company.

3. Decide which team you need

To do this, write down the structure of the project: what kind of employees are there, what kind of employees will be needed, how many of them should be and what skills they should have.

For example, you bake cakes and while you yourself communicate with customers and distribute finished products. But with an increase in requests, you will definitely need a second confectioner, and when the business scales, you can think about the manager who will take orders, and about the transport company or courier for the delivery of ready-made orders.

You can depict the structure of your future company in the mind map format. This mind map, in the center of which is the main idea, in this case, your company. Further, arrows are drawn from it: CEO, managing director, accountant, manager, marketer, SMM specialist, and so on.

Thanks to this, it will be easy to understand who reports to whom and what pool of specialists your company needs.

The program can also describe the duties of employees and further consolidate the mind map as a working form of interaction. To compile such a smart map, you can use, for example, the application Xmimd.

4. Write down the stages of development

You must imagine how much the business should bring in three months, six months, a year. It is necessary to calculate when he will be able to reach self-sufficiency and start making a profit. Do not forget to take into account the time for promotion. In the first months, the project may not work at full capacity, it will take some time for the flow of buyers to grow. All this will help to assess the realism and effectiveness of the plan.

If you are new to this matter, do not hesitate to contact a specialist. This will save you time and help you avoid annoying mistakes. There is also a rich selection of short-term business plan courses on the market.

Its development can be divided into four stages: market analysis, collection of initial data, formation of a financial model and writing an implementation plan.

A more detailed description may include many other items:

• description of the industry and company;
• sales and marketing;
• organizational plan;
• plan financial indicators;
• guarantees and risks of the company.

Week 3 Find an investor

Scaling is not cheap. And here there are two ways. The first is to develop yourself. For example, they opened one point, paid back the investment, raised money for the next one. If you have a small startup and there is no money for its development - it is worth finding an investor.

1. Create an investor profilewith whom you would ideally like to cooperate. Write down his field of activity, position, personal qualities. If your product, for example, is about sports, and the person has a fast food business, it is unlikely that your priorities will be the same.
2. Make a presentation and prepare investment and financial plans. In the documents, try to fully reveal the potential of your project, show the current state of the business and growth prospects.
3. Start your search. First of all, look among your inner circle. Write a post on social media. Call friends, acquaintances, former colleagues - just tell them about your idea. Perhaps someone will be interested in it and he will have a desire to invest in the project.

Attend meetings of entrepreneurs: meetups or business breakfasts. Meet, communicate, meet like-minded people, show your project. You can find these events at timepad or just social media.

To do this, you must have a minimum financial model and a clearly defined proposal for a future investor. Usually, the financial model is compiled for a year - they do it in Google Spreadsheets or Excel. You need to be able to work with formulas in a basic way in order to build dependencies between indicators. Examples of financial models can be found on the Internet.

Another option is to use the help of business accelerators. These are programs to support young projects.

Their goal is to train beginner businessmen and develop companies in the shortest possible time. According to research According to American analysts, startups that have used this opportunity are 26% more likely to survive the first few years and gain a foothold in the market compared to other companies.

But be prepared that for your support accelerators get a stake in your business. When choosing, study what areas they work with, what requirements they impose on potential partners, what investments they offer and what well-known projects came out with their help. Here are the most famous accelerator platforms in Russia: “Skolkovo», IIDF, SOBA, MSU business accelerator, «MTS Startup Hub».

Week 4 Gather a team

When the goals are set and the money is found, it is worth looking for a dream team that will help in the implementation of the plan. If all the processes are on you, it’s too early to think about scaling. You need to be able delegate tasks, and the team to perform them efficiently.

For example, you should not fill out voluminous tables on your own, respond to letters in general mail company or add new data to the presentation - the whole routine can and should be redirected to employees.

Start simple - hire a personal assistant. Slowly relieve yourself of responsibilities that do not affect the overall speed of your business. While the employee is doing operational work, you can switch your attention to team communication, customer service and project development prospects.

Delegation is, first of all, trust and acceptance that you are not the only one who is perfect (or just good) at responsibilities. It must be introduced gradually.

You should not hire 10 employees at once and give them all your responsibilities at once.

First, remove yourself from routine tasks, then delegate the management of the social networks of the project, then sales, and then communications. For greater process optimization, there should be a CEO - a manager, or, in other words, your ideal deputy.

Try not to hire beginners with no experience. Of course, you can pay them less, but they will have to be taught, and this takes time and resources. The price of any mistake is extremely high - for example, an intern can drain the entire advertising budget and not bring customers simply because they do not understand how everything works in marketing. It is better to hire those who are qualified in their field and know exactly what they are doing.

What to do next

The main tasks have been completed. Now you can do marketing - draw up a marketing plan. Define a social media strategy, think about what promotions and events you will hold, with what bloggers or media partners you plan to cooperate with.

It is also important to receive and analyze customer feedback. If the reviews are unsatisfactory, you need to adjust the product: change the cost, the form of packaging, the advertising strategy. And then, taking into account all the changes, make changes to the business plan.

Do not forget to check the business plan at each stage of scaling and evaluate the results: have you achieved the necessary revenue by 3 months of work, by 6 months, and so on.

You understand that something is going wrong - refine the idea or test another option.

For example, your confectionery For the sake of economy, I began to buy cheaper raw materials. As a result, the quality of products decreased, there were fewer customers, and sales fell. How can you get out of the situation? Order raw materials directly from the manufacturer. This will reduce costs and bring quality back to the previous level.

What mistakes should be avoided

Let's analyze the most common mistakes when scaling:

• False start. Your company may not be ready to expand. For example, if profit is unstable, internal processes are not established: sales and storage systems, logistics, quality control, and so on. Find weaknesses, put everything in order, because if there is chaos in the organization, that is what you will scale.
• Poorly written business plan. All expenses were not taken into account, and you were not ready for losses. Therefore, write down everything in the business plan specifically and briefly, backing up the words with facts and real figures. For example, if you are going to buy equipment, you don’t need specifications, but suitable models with accurate prices.
• Unprepared Team. The business is growing - but there are not enough employees, they are not ready for heavy loads or not enough motivated. As you start scaling, assess each member's strengths and experience, figure out what's missing, and find new hires to fill in the gaps.
• Wrong choice of investor. An investor is your partner, who, in addition to financial support, can help in development: share experience and connect with the right people. It is worth paying attention in advance to the experience, reputation and scope of each candidate. Some of them may not meet the needs and goals of your business, which will lead to problems in the future.