Wealthy & Wise: Top 3 Things That Entrepreneurs Need to Know.

About the Video

Cort Christie and Greg Martin share their top three things you need to know in this informative video. In addition, every entrepreneur should be well-versed in essential aspects to navigate the complex landscape of business successfully. Entrepreneurs need to have a profound understanding of their target market is crucial. Entrepreneurs must grasp the needs, preferences, and wants of their customers to create products or services that truly resonate. Also, financial literacy is non-negotiable.

Prefer to read? A full transcript is provided below.

Cort:

Hello, and welcome to another edition of Wealthy and Wise. I’m your host, Cort Christie, founder of NCH. Today we’re going to be talking about the top three things that every entrepreneur needs to know to be successful. These are the top three business success tips. And we got it here coming from Mr. Greg Martin, the president of NCH. Welcome to the program, Greg.

Greg:

Thanks, Cort. Great to be here.

Cort:

All right. Now we’re ready to be inspired. We’re talking the top three things that every entrepreneur needs to know about.

Greg:

All right. Well, let’s start with a, it’s simple and it’s basic, but it is, in my opinion, the most important. If you want to be successful as an entrepreneur, you need to solve pain. What do I mean by that? Maybe that doesn’t mean much to our viewers out there.

Cort:

Advil, Tylenol.

Greg:

Yeah, exactly. You know, people hear pain and they think a lot of different things. But in a business context, pain is either something that’s inconvenient, something that’s maybe overly expensive, something that’s maybe hard or difficult to understand. So, I’ll give you an example, because I just read about this last night. So, there’s a young lady went to business school, graduated, was living in San Francisco during COVID. And as most of our viewers know, San Francisco was locked down tight during COVID. So as a single individual, she decided to buy a dog to keep her company while she was working at home. Well, come to find out that her dog had some health challenges. And she realized through doing some research that much of the commercially available pet food was not really going to meet the needs of her dog. And so she started experimenting, doing research and figuring out, well, you know, I wonder if I have this pain point with my dog, meaning my dog is not able to get the proper nutrition to keep him healthy. They’re probably a lot of other pet owners out there like me who have that same pain point. Well, now that business has raised a lot of money, is a direct to consumer business, meaning that you find them online and you can buy this, it’s basically raw food for dogs. It improved the health of her dog dramatically. And now she’s built a nice business around this fundamental insight she had, which is that, I’ve got a pain point. I wonder if other people have that pain point. Now we know that pets, people treat pets like a member of the family. So not only are there millions and millions of households with pets, the people who have pets tend to spend a lot of money to keep their pets healthy and happy. So, she found a very large pain point. And the thought that went through my mind is really no one had thought of that yet. Like no one had thought of raw dog food to keep a pet healthy. Apparently not. So, you never know where an opportunity is going to come from. But again, the key insight is find a pain point. And most of those pain points can come, maybe should come from your own experience, something that you’ve dealt with yourself, that you have a compelling solution for, that you think other people could also benefit from. So that’s insight number one and how to how to build an entrepreneurial business.

Cort:

And I think it’s fantastic, right? It’s like, you know, you’re identifying something that you find to be a pain point for you and then you find out, you know it is for a lot of other people, too. And you don’t have to have a solution for everybody’s need, but find a niche. That’s her niche.

Greg:

Right.

Cort:

She’s in that space. She found out that these animals are going to be happier eating that food and helped out a whole community of people probably at the end of the day.

Greg:

Yeah, exactly. So that would be number one. Number two is if you’re going to be an entrepreneur, you need to be comfortable with risk because there, you’ve heard it said a thousand times, there are no guarantees in life. Maybe you’ve heard it said more than a thousand times. Maybe when you were growing up, you heard it a thousand times in your own household. There are no guarantees in life, and an entrepreneur has to be comfortable with shouldering a certain amount of risk. Risk that the business may not go exactly as you had planned. Risk that maybe someone that you had depended on either as an employee or as a key vendor. Maybe they don’t keep their promises. Lots and lots of things not just can go wrong, but do go wrong. You started NCH. I’m guessing everything didn’t go according, exactly to plan.

Cort:

Right.

Greg:

I started a business in 1989 that I ran up until I sold it many years later. Lots and bumps and bruises along the way. If I had been averse to risk. If you had been averse to risk, we likely would have pulled the plug far before we got to our success. And I think a lot of entrepreneurs, particularly first-time entrepreneurs, don’t understand the level of risk that they’re assuming by starting an entrepreneurial venture. The fact that not everything is going to go according to plan and that they need to be nimble and agile in responding to the market and to who knows what’s going to happen on a day-to-day basis. So, if your personality is risk averse, entrepreneurship is probably not the right career choice for you. But for those who are willing to take a risk, who are willing to get comfortable with the bumps and bruises that are going to come and they’re going to come and use those as learning. You know, I once heard a very wise saying, which is the only real failure is something that you don’t learn anything from. So, if you look at every situation, even a negative situation is an opportunity to learn and then apply that learning. You will be eventually successful at whatever you do, whether that’s entrepreneurship or something else. But that’s number two. And number three, not everybody can…

Cort:

Can I mention something now that we’re on number two?

Greg:

Yes, absolutely.

Cort:

You know risk in business. So, we’ve got, we formed over half a million business entities at NCH and we’ve seen it all. And you know, many entrepreneurs aren’t quite familiar with what you’re saying, but the ones that have gotten into business, the ones that have been around for a long time, are very familiar with what you’re saying because it becomes a place you have to get comfortable with.

Greg:

Yeah.

Cort:

And, you know, like you said, being comfortable, being uncomfortable. And what does that mean? It means you’re out there exposing yourself day in and day out to a level. You know, there’s a responsible way of handling risk. You can’t go too far out there and then you’ll crash and burn, you know? But I think of all the entrepreneurs I’ve known throughout the years, and you think of all the people that you’ve worked in business with and, you know, there’s a lot of risk taking, a lot of learning that goes on for a very long time. And really, in many cases, you come to your own after, come into your own after enough years behind you of finding out what’s acceptable risk and what isn’t.

Greg:

Right.

Cort:

Where those, you know, tolerances are, those bookends that you need to stay within as you develop your businesses. So yeah, that’s a great one. Getting comfortable with risk.

Greg:

Yeah, huge. Exactly. And then the last one, I kind of talked touched on it when I was talking about the last one I was talking about the only real failure is one you don’t learn from. If you’re going to be an entrepreneur, and particularly if you want to be a successful long-term entrepreneur, you need to commit yourself to being a lifelong learner. And what do I mean by that? What I mean by that is before you take the risk of launching the business that you’ve identified, because there is a pain point that you think you have a nice, tidy, compelling solution for, do some research. Ask your friends. Talk to your friends. Are your friends experiencing the same pain point? The internet is an unbelievably helpful innovation over the last 20-30 years. When I started my first business, there was no internet, so I had to go to the library to do research. Now, you sit in the comfort of your own home in your jammies with your hot drink by your side, and you can do amazing, an immense amount of research. But one of the mistakes that entrepreneurs make, they get, they fall so in love with their own ideas that they don’t take the time to figure out whether what they’re experiencing as a need in the market, other people are also experiencing as a need in the market. So, that’s just one facet of learning. Before you launch, do as much research as you can, but then after you’ve launched, you need to continue to be a lifelong learner. Read articles, read anything about your industry that is published. Again, the internet is such an amazing innovation. There is so much free content now that you can take advantage of and just learn, learn, learn, learn, commit to learning something new every single day, whether that’s about your industry, whether that’s just about general business or management. You need to have a commitment to continued learning. The other reason that’s so important is, when I started my first business over 30 years ago, again, the Internet didn’t exist. There was print publications, there was broadcast television, there was cable, but we just did not have the flood of information that we have today. As a result, things didn’t change quite as quickly as they do today. Today, things change on a dime from one second to the next. Things can change in your industry, in the general economic environment of the country. And so, if you’re not plugged in to learning and to being, to making yourself aware of as much information as possible, I mean, you can’t go overboard, obviously. We all have to live our lives. Our families are important. Our you know, our physical health is important, but you need to make sure that you are committed to spending a part of every day, just in active learning.

Cort:

Absolutely. And I think that’s so critical. We both have MBAs.

Greg:

Yeah.

Cort:

Right. And you are continuing to grow and learn from the community at Harvard where you got your MBA. And I think for the listeners here, it’s not about getting the latest business book.

Greg:

No.

Cort:

You know, because if that’s me, I’ve got a library full of business books that have never been opened because I don’t enjoy sitting down reading a book about business strategy and business success. I’d rather read some fiction that I can relax in, and that’s how I use my reading. But I go to YouTube and watch videos of whatever the subject matter is. I go to conferences and, you know, you watch, you go to Zoom meetings, you go to conferences online or in person. There’s just so many areas that if you’re not like a textbook learner, which a lot of people don’t have a lot of fun doing that. I do know people that read a lot of books, but yeah, you do. But for me I learn differently.

Greg:

Yeah, exactly.

Cort:

I’m more experiential and I’ve got to be in front of a group or other people. And so there’s, but there’s a lot of ways of getting the learning that you need to stay relevant to stay current.\

Greg:

Yes.

Cort:

You know, in any area that matters for your business, what you’re trying to do. So, I think that is critical. Well, those are three great things that you brought to the table for our listeners here today so that they can understand, you know, some of the really fundamentals of what makes a successful entrepreneur. And even if you are in business already, you know, these things apply and you should be applying this day in and day out to your business life. And if you’re thinking about going into business, these things are essential to the success that you’re going to have in business. So, thank you, Greg, for educating us today.

Greg:

My pleasure. And can I just say, as someone who’s lived the entrepreneur’s lifestyle, there is nothing that compares to it. In spite of all the hiccups and heartburn and heartache that you’re going to experience as an entrepreneur, and you will. The rewards are unparalleled. It is amazing. It is truly amazing to live in a country where we have the freedom to create something from thin air that can turn into a business. Whether that’s NCH, which you’ve now over 30 years, developed and grown this business, which I know has been very rewarding for you personally and professionally. Myself, who started and grew a business to a pretty large scale there. It is such a worthwhile and rewarding endeavor to be an entrepreneur in spite of all of the horror stories and sleepless nights. At the end of the day, creating something is so satisfying and so rewarding. And in the case of NCH, where we’re helping other businesses get started, so meaningful. And I hope that for everybody who starts on their entrepreneurial journey as well.

Cort:

Yeah, no, absolutely. It’s incredibly rewarding, I think, for those people that even if you’ve had a business before or know somebody that got into business and failed in that business, as you mentioned, it’s the learning that you got from that failure. What did you do and how did you apply it? And then come back to do it again and come back to do it again. And oftentimes you might have picked the wrong industry, or wrong product or wrong service. It just wasn’t working.

Greg:

Wrong timing.

Cort:

Wrong timing and the economy. I know people that started businesses in 2007. Oh, what a horrible time.

Greg:

Right.

Cort:

To Just be trying to develop a company and then have it go bankrupt a few years later or shut down because we had the worst frickin recession that we’ve ever had in the history of this country since the Great Depression. So, you never know. But you come back, and you do it again. So, if you’ve tried it to be in business yourself before and failed or know somebody, don’t let that stop you from doing it again. That’s the most important thing. Get back up on that horse. Get back up on that bike and ride it.

Greg:

Absolutely. Great advice.

Cort:

All right, Greg, well, thank you for being with us.

Greg:

My pleasure. Always. Thank you.

Cort:

And all of you listening today, thanks for tuning in to another edition of Wealthy and Wise. For any of you that are looking for support in getting your business launched and started, or if you’re a real estate investor and you’re looking for the right type of business entity to hold your real estate in, call us at NCH. Schedule an appointment, a free complimentary appointment with our consultants that’ll help you set the foundation properly for the future success of your business idea. So, thanks again for tuning in. Have a great day!

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