This year I have been working with StartSpace and the State Library of Victoria to run a series of bootcamps, designed for international students who are designing and growing their own businesses.
The process was intense, each cohort going through a 12-day intensive full of guest speakers, workshops and mentoring sessions to refine and reinvent their companies.
Here are some of the gems that came up in our conversations…

Go fishing where the fish are
This sounds obvious but people get this wrong all the time.
It is tempting to go fishing where you like to sit, which may or may not be where the fish actually are.
What if your fish aren’t in your neighbourhood?
What if they’re on TikTok?
What if they have gatekeepers who block most advertising messages?

Where are your next 1,000 customers today?
How can you move yourself to be near them, rather than hoping they magically swim to where you would like to be?

Can Google Analytics help you to triple your traffic?
Google Analytics holds one of the biggest opportunities for new businesses – the benefit of tripling your online traffic.
The only thing standing in the way is that it’s a little tedious to learn.
That’s it.
Not a bad deal overall!
Learning where you’re making mistakes can be painful, but it allows you to correct them instantly.
You can also learn a tonne of best practices online, for free, which can help boost your site’s visibility and credibility – all of which affect how many people will see you appear in search results.
Would you have a go if you thought it could triple your traffic?

It takes seven interactions for people to trust your brand
This is a great reminder for new businesses – trust takes time, but you can speed up that time by creating more positive interactions with a new audience.
Seven is a good rule-of-thumb, and they don’t all have to look the same (e.g. ads, website copy, testimonials, content in news feeds, word of mouth recommendations, walking past your retail spaces, etc.).
What’s helpful about this idea is that those first six interactions don’t need to ask for a sale – they can just be about familiarising and explaining who you are and what you do.
You want to get these six interactions in before customers need to make a purchase decision, otherwise you have to start the sales process without them trusting your brand.

Find a mentor who is two steps ahead of you
I love this advice – people think that mentors need to be 20 years ahead of you, but there’s massive benefits in learning from someone who’s just done what you’re doing next.
They probably used the same tools that you’ll use, rather than what worked for a CEO back in 1993.
Two steps might translate to 12-18 months ahead of you, long enough to see what works, but recent enough that they made progress in the same circumstances as you.

How big is your actual market?
Whenever someone is presenting their idea and says “this is a $25 billion industry” I never know what to think.
What am I supposed to make of that?
$25 billion is reassuring I suppose, in that there’s room for several brands to co-exist, but this isn’t your true market.
This is what we call the TAM – Total Addressable Market, everyone who could want a solution.
What’s more interesting is the SAM – Serviceable Addressable Market, everyone in your area who could want a solution.
But what’s even better is the SOM – Serviceable Obtainable Market, the people in your area who you can actually serve.

For example, there might be 200,000 people in your country who need to see a physiotherapist (TAM).
There might be 7,000 of those people who live in your city (SAM).
Then there might be 1,000 of those people who are you can actually serve each month (SOM), based on their willingness to try somewhere new and your capacity.
Even though the market might be 200,000 your business can realisitically serve 1,000.
That’s still a good business, and people can get their heads around that number.

Can your audience summarise your pitch?
A slightly mean test I use at the end of a practice pitch is to ask the people in the room to summarise or repeat what the presenter just said.
It’s the perfect test of a pitch – it shows what messages stuck with people, which is the true purpose of a presentation.
If everyone thinks you spoke well but none of them can repeat back what you do, who it’s for or how they can engage with you, then you haven’t nailed the pitch.
You are responsible for the message your audience receives, and if they’re not getting the right impression, it’s up to you to change your approach until the message gets through.
Annoying as it is, I’ve never heard an argument against it.
There is no possible upside to being poorly understood.

You need two pitches
For a lot of industries, an entrepreneur needs two pitches – the sophisticated one and the plain language one.
The sophisticated pitch assumes the audience has a thorough understanding of the industry, and can use shorthand language or jargon as needed.
The plain language pitch avoids jargon and uses stories, analogies and comparisons to explain how the business works, how it fits in the industry and how it stacks up next to competitors.
It takes longer to get the same points across, but it brings people with you, rather than losing them with technical details.
Once you have these two pitches ready to go, you can start to check whether or not your audience has a sophisticated understanding of the industry before you launch into your talk.
A few quick questions will sort out if they want the fast version or the introductory version, and saves you from delivering the wrong one.

I’ve never seen Microsoft Clip Art used in a good presentation
Look, I know this sounds elitist, but I am convinced that it’s correct.
The temptation is to put several small images/pieces of clip art on a slide in order to convey several different points or emotions.
The catch is, it makes your slide look like a primary school assignment.
There is never a scenario when you need Microsoft clip art in your pitch.
You might like to use a high res image from Unsplash, Pexels or Pixabay – these are free to use and look great, but probably use one per slide.

“But Isaac, what about using their icons?”
Icons are great, but use a matching set.
The trouble with people who use clip art as icons is that they end up with 5 icons from 4 different sets, which gives the grade 4 collage effect.
There are heaps of good and free icon sets online, you don’t need the ones in PowerPoint.

Three tiers of business names
I believe there are three sorts of business names:
·      Good ones that enhance your image and make you more likeable
·      Neutral ones that you breathe life into with your work
·      Bad ones that make you seem confusing or unprofessional

What’s interesting is that a lot of new business owners aim for the first category, go for something overly convoluted or compromised and end up with something in the third category.
I’d suggest that a lot of your favourite brand names actually started in the second category – blank shells that became meaningful through good work and positive experiences.
Uber, Apple, Nike, Sephora, Samsung, Delta, etc.
Some people’s names work better than others, but generally speaking brands named after people work if their products are revered – Louis Vuitton, Tiffany, Ford, JP Morgan, etc.
Is it worth starting with a neutral name and giving it a good reputation?
At least it’s within your control?

Well done to all of the participants, you all presented well and made such impressive progress in 12 days!