Look up from your computer screen (ep 70)

Show notes from episode 70 of the podcast.

If people would just get out from behind their computer and look around them they would have no problem finding opportunities galore. I started my business hauling boxes up and down skinny stairwells during finals week. Sweating my butt off. I worked hard physically for a year or so then kept working hard from behind a computer. Now I don’t do much work at all and the business is larger and does better than it ever has ($3MM in revenue at a ~20% margin).

GET OUT FROM BEHIND YOUR COMPUTER AND LOOK AT THE PHYSICAL SERVICES PEOPLE PAY FOR EVERY DAY.

I am working to finish my basement right now. Can’t get anyone to come out and even give me a quote. The trades I understand but you name it – drywall, tile, flooring, framing, cleaning, landscaping. Anything that requires a little skill or labor is so massively undersupplied right now. I called 10 tile setters (to do my shower) and not a single one even returned my call. If one person would answer the phone they could charge me $300 per hour and I’d have no choice.

When I moved into my house the same thing. Cleaners and carpet shampooers were impossible to get on short notice. Lawn care companies didn’t return my calls. Pest control companies the same thing.

You are competing against people with no websites and no management training. They run businesses like its 1985. They don’t market. They don’t utilize software tools that could make them way more efficient. They don’t charge enough money.

But my background is in management and software and digital marketing. I’m a techy! I can hear the cries already. Thats GREAT! Even as a local service business owner you won’t be doing any of the work yourself beyond the first few months. You’ll be on your computer. You’ll be building systems. You’ll be implementing new tech and digital marketing and software. You will be competing with someone who doesn’t even know how to hire a freelancer or run a CPC campaign and sends bids by fax. I’m not joking. I got asked what my fax number was and my lawn care guy at my storage facility sends me invoices in .jpg format by taking a picture on his flip phone of the printed invoice he then mails to me.

You don’t have to look far for opportunities. All I’m asking is that you look up from your computer screen and give the physical world a second look through your entrepreneurial lens.

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About Me

I started the Sweaty Startup in December of 2018 because I believe the Shark Tank and Tech Crunch culture is ruining the real spirit of low-risk entrepreneurship.