Are Business Advisers Any Good?

The answer is...

... it depends on who the adviser is.

Tad Web Solutions is nearly two and a half years old. It started out as I switched from working as a sole trader/freelancer and decided to do the Web thing full time and seriously. Once I'd made that decision I needed some help as I was a pure techy and had never run a real business.

This was the days of Business Link and I secured 40% funding for business/marketing support and was furnished with a list of potential suppliers. This was quite enlightening as to the different approaches taken by those potential suppliers and also the differences in price.There were 3 broad approaches:

The first (relatively inexpensive) and very poor approach was to receive an email with an outline of what would be done without even having a conversation.

The second and most common (average price) was to pop in for a quick meeting, explain how they would help me increase conversions from leads to sales plus get more for each sale.

The third was an interview at some length over the telephone (most expensive) that asked me detailed questions about what I do, my plans, problems, etc. and then a fairly detailed plan for working together was sent to me.

So guess which approach worked? Yes, the expensive one. not because it was expensive but because it was thorough and bespoke. Even though I struggled at the time to pay for it, and the fee was double any other quote, I knew I would be working with someone who would make a difference. And it was the correct decision.

If you would like to know who we used, it was David Laud at i2i Business Solutions Llp and I thoroughly recommend him.

Since then we have had other business advisors supplied, for free I hasten to add, via Redcar and Cleveland Council with various levels of success including one who I told not to come back after a brief meeting (no names but he just talks jargon-filled bollocks). We've pretty much fulfilled the early years plan we drew up with David and that has got us to a level where we need to plan again, and move forward to the next level.

Then a few weeks ago there was a free workshop on Business Growth at The Palace Hub and I was very impressed by the person running it (and believe me I'm not easily impressed). At the end he said there is free support from him available if Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council agree. So off I went to ask for it based upon the fact that Peter has recently gone from apprentice to "proper job" and I intend to grow - and hey presto support available.

So before you ask, why not use David Laud? I would happily do so, David is worth every penny, but our new support was free to us (paid for by the council) and I am from Yorkshire after all! (Sorry David)

We have now had 3 meetings with Ross Golightly from Sphera Consulting with the aim of setting growth targets for the business, planning for them and implementing strategies that will ensure we meet those growth plans. Ross works with business who are looking to grow rapidly and in broad terms the plan is that in 3 years our turnover will increase 7-fold, so very ambitious but also very achievable. The final plan for long term and shorter term are not yet written and in place, though they will be shortly, but we have already introduced a couple of very simple strategies Ross has suggested.

What have those 2 simple strategies done:

1. Cash flow is much better (and Feb is always a bad month, but fine this year - annual insurance gets paid and Jan is a slow month for work completed and invoiced)
2. Got £500 of extra business this week that we normally would not have got (if that happens every week that's £26k a year)

There was no extra work to improve cash flow nor gain the extra business (though that will involve an extra day's work that is charged to our clients) and are very minor tweaks to how we operate not some major part of a strategic plan.

I'm really looking forward to doing the more strategic stuff as the changes so far come under the "bleeding obvious" heading even though I would never have made them without encouragement from Ross, who I've really enjoyed working with

The lessons:

• The right support can make a big difference to your business
• Cheap is not necessarily best, sometimes you get what you pay for but it is definitely worth the expense
• Free can be great - but it can also be garbage
• Don't be afraid to pull out of a support package where you feel it is of no use, even when it's free - your time is money
• Councils do offer some great business support but chose which you use, it's all about the person/company supplying that support

And watch this space and see us grow.