Once upon a time I started a business. I honestly didn’t know that I’d still be doing this 10 years later, but here I am. At some point in those first few years, when I realized that “holy crap – am I actually doing this??”, I sat up a little straighter and decided I needed to get a little more organized to make this an EMPIRE.

Now I realize that an “empire” is not the same for everyone; for me it meant growing well beyond the solopreneur-show that I had been running. It meant hiring a team and broadening my services beyond 1:1 client work and evolving to the world of education and coaching.

But first, I needed my business to “grow up” a bit. I needed to move beyond the seat-of-my-pants business strategy and set some real foundations to get me to where I wanted to be. In retrospect, I’d likely be much further along today had I started with these foundations, so I wanted to share with you the things I put in place to get me on my empire path.

1. Create a Business Plan:

I know, this sounds a bit much, but hear me out. First off, a business plan does NOT need to be a 200-page document with appendices, graphs, and months’ worth of market research. It can be, but really…unless you’re building a fortune 500 (and if you are, what are you doing reading this!??!), you don’t need to be this extreme.

Think of a business plan as your roadmap. It’s a way to take all the hopes, dreams, plans, and goals that you’ve got in your mind and put it down on paper. When you follow a business plan outline, it will also force you to think about a lot of things that maybe you haven’t yet, and will help you realize some of the numbers you’ll need to reach (both marketing, finances, and production) to achieve your goals.

The other great thing about taking the time to write out your business plan, is that you’ll have something to share with others – whether it’s a bank – if you’re looking to get a loan - or taking pieces of it to share with a new team member (check out the ONBOARDING post we did a few weeks back!). You can also pull snippets from here to help with website and marketing content and it’s a great check point to go back to every once in a while, to see how your business has evolved or met the goals you’d laid out at the beginning.

2. Create SOP’s:

As your business grows, you can't do it all alone. I avoided this for the longest time! I integrated every piece of tech I could to avoid the responsibility of another human. I definitely waited too long. When I did finally take the plunge, it was great. Look for people who share your vision and can help take your business to the next level.

But here’s the kicker…my first hire was a success; many others were not. The KEY to doing your part to make a new employee successful is giving them clear expectations and instructions. For me, this meant documenting every single thing that I did in completing a task. These are called SOP’s – Standard Operating Procedures. Not only does it make us sound SUPER corporate, but it also eliminates a TON of work training and overseeing new employees. Instead of spending hours shadowing a new team member and answering questions every time the do the task, I now have a step-by-step “manual” that tells them every button to push, box to check, and data to enter.

Don’t get me wrong, creating SOP’s is a beast of a job. But it’s honestly been the best thing I did in my attempts to scale. I’ve created word documents for most of our processes and add new ones as I delegate more tasks. I’ve also started using Loom to provide video lessons on how to do things as well.

3. Money Made Easy:

[Don’t. Run. Away.] As a number’s nerd, this wasn’t something I neglected from the beginning (LOL it was my favorite part of running a business!), but I can’t write an article about how to grow without talking about the M word. Keeping tabs on your finances doesn't have to be a headache. My number one piece of advice is to set up a separate business bank account and don’t mix personal and business expenses. As someone who deals with a lot of tax-time clean ups, I can tell you that its always 1000x easier to create your year-end financials when you have (and USE) a separate business account.

The second thing with money management is to keep records of your income and expenses diligently. This means having “something” that tracks your sales – if you use a system like Square or Shopify, or any other online platform for that matter, this will have the reports you need; you’re golden.

When it comes to expenses, this is ALL on you. All those little pieces of paper – the bills and receipts – you receive from your purchasing are all important. Without these, anything you claim as a business expense can be ignored by the feds if they audit you. And anything ignored = more taxes that you need to pay. Avoid this ;)

There’s lots of tools and software that can simplify this for you. Check out my Tech Stack for the ones I love to use.

There you have it! Remember, small steps today can lead to big growth tomorrow. Your creativity and determination, combined with a solid foundation, will set you up for success.