Part 1 was a pretty cryptic post around what SH is, and how it’s “the big thing” - the real brand.
Part 2 is going to be a bit more in-depth around different “stages” of the business itself.
Having built 6 other 6 figure businesses, I have a strong framework of the first 6 months of a business, but there’s a few missing links in my knowledge and experience.
On the “set-up” side, from a purely company set-up and integration point of view, this was a massive checklist from everything built over the years as well as adding multiple points specifically for this project, here’s what it looks like below;
Name
Domain/Availability of variations
Working environment set-up (work desk + laptop)
Daily work structure - 1pm+ for me daily, working on other businesses before this.
Personal brand alignment areas
Create initial logo + branding
Trademarks
Create Google drive structure/folders etc
Create a V1 website - simplified but live.
SSL set-ups
Set-up LTD company + ensure share structures correct
Read top 10 branding books (main knowledge gap)
Set-up business banking + confirmations
Set-up accountant + VAT
Set-up G Suite / emails
Set-up Paypal
Set-up + brand all social media channels
Speak to co-founders of other business + explain situation
Create plan itself (its massive)
Decision into whether another individual involved.
All this stuff is a lot of “work” but actually just means you can start properly.
If it’s your first company I don’t even recommend doing most of this, instead I’d just say start, but as this is going to be a large business in the future, spending a bit of time to get all of these ticked off is worth it.
Knowledge + Experience Gaps
The biggest knowledge/experience gap I had (still have properly) is around branding.
The past 15 years of business have been focused on marketing, specifically digital marketing and digital business.
As a result the clarity and systems around this are well developed, but anything on the design and specifically the branding side are very weak.
Understanding brand is something I think all good digital marketers could do with learning properly.
The power of brand with effective marketing is a powerful business, have just powerful marketing makes everything feel more difficult, you are essentially pushing everything uphill, all the time.
Alongside all this admin and deep diving into brand, I’ve also been developing the product itself, as well as the packaging. These are steps 2A / 2B / 2C. Progress is roughly;
Product formulation: 70% completed.
How to take + packaging: 20% completed.
Creating product itself: 5% completed.
Completion + inventory: 0% completed.
Part 3A/B/C/D is around building the ecommerce vehicle, finishing the copywriting and branding and soft-launching.
Part 4A/B/C is around launching on Amazon UK, building out processes and seeing where cash flow, financials and initial traction is.
Part 5 is marketAng and the re-birth of trust leveraging.
There’s other details but for the sake of this post, this is a good place to leave it.
Date: 20th July 2024.