I had a really great meeting with my accountant the other day. It was about planning for the future of YourPCM and how to formalise the business as I move it forward. Some very interesting stuff came out of it ...
Roger has been blogging with me for longer than I can remember, and I do consider him a friend. I know he wants me to succeed with YourPCM as he's seen it grow and develop over the past few years.
My original thinking was to spin YourPCM out of my existing company SLO Media Limited, into a limited company of its own. This would enable investors to claim tax relief on any money they put into the new business, but Roger thought otherwise.
He told me that as I already have a limited company, it would be better to just rename that and move all my legacy blogging stuff over to my self-employment. Why add to my administrative load (and costs) when I don't really need to?
He knows a lot of investors and he said that the right one would simply take a punt and reap the dividends over time. He knows his stuff, so that's the plan now. Find an investor with experience in SaaS businesses (or at least software companies) and work with them. Whether they want to be an advisor or just be a shareholder is a matter for future discussions.
We talked about lots of different things during our coffee time, but the biggest one was writing a business plan. I've normally shied away from doing these because they are a lot of work to put together, and most businesses don't follow the plan anyway ... it's just something for the bank to read from time to time when you need a loan or an overdraft increase.
Roger advised me that I'm not going to get any investment without a solid plan, so now I'm writing a business plan. Most of the stuff I'm putting into it is in my head already, and ChatGPT4 is helping me crystalise my thinking and write it coherently. However, the financial projections are going to be challenging.
I want to create a small team to get us to the next stage. A salesperson, a marketing person (both make up the Growth Team), then there's support and training (that's another couple of peeps for the Subscriber Team), someone to do the financials (Billing and Suppliers Teams) and eventually, a young developer to learn from me (Dev Team), grow their own knowledge and move what I've created onto a modern tech stack on something like AWS.
So, at what point do I add different parts of those teams? How many subscribers do I need? How much do I pay them? What kit are they going to be working with? Where are they going to be working? And before I even think about adding to my team, how am I going to get my funnel full of enough new subscribers to support me in adding even one new team member?
So, that's my challenge over the next few months. I've been invited to join an Accelerator in September (still mulling that over) so I need to have all this sorted before then. What was my plan for 2024 is rapidly becoming my plan for the second half of 2023 instead. Things are just going to get busier from now on, but I'm up for the challenge.
I want to be able to step back a little when I hit 60, so a 5-year financial projection will be perfect. Thankfully I have the awesome Roger at my side to throw questions at while I'm creating my business plan. I know he'll give me the best possible advice and help me create something that will find me an investor to get through the initial stages.
So, yet again ... watch this space folks. It's going to be a busy few months.
If anything I've mentioned here resonates with you, do call me on 0333 335 0420 and let's see how I can help.