Nobody Panic - How to start a business

Episode Date: October 16, 2018

Got a hobby you want to earn sweet cash from? Stevie and Tessa find out that starting a business isn't as scary or adult as you might think, with the help of sponsors iZettle and advice from some kickass women who did it themselvesSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/nobodypanic. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Carriad. I'm Sarah. And we are the Weirdo's Book Club podcast. We are doing a very special live show as part of the London Podcast Festival. The date is Thursday, 11th of September. The time is 7pm and our special guest is the brilliant Alan Davies. Tickets from kingsplace.com. Single ladies, it's coming to London.

True on Saturday, the 13th of September. At the London Podcast Festival. The rumours are true, Saturday the 13th of September. At King's Place. Oh, that sounds like a date to me, Harriet. it's nobody panic with me and Stevie Martin and me Tessa Coe's

and this episode is special because it's brought to you by Izzettel and we're talking about how to start a business which sounds so grown up but we're here to tell you that actually it's, I mean it is grown up because you're all adults it's too easy from I am pretty good at making

brownies and I'd like to go to a market and sell them and maybe that'd be a nice thing to do on a Saturday right through to like I would like to open a library don't open a library because they are run by the government so that's pointless a book shop and this one is brought to you

by Isettle a la Sesame Street is brought to you by the letter S the number four and the company Isettel who I think are super cool

basically when you go to a market store and you're like oh no I don't have any cash and then they get out an Isatel contact reader you're like amazing and you can also do it on your phone as well so they basically champion

small businesses and people who are like I've got an idea to set up a business like I've got an idea but I don't know how to actually do it They really help their website, Iisethel.com, has got loads of really good advice on there. I don't know how to send an invoice. They will help you with that. You can take payments through your phone.

You can look at your sales on your phone. So, like, how much money have I made this year? You can just look at it on your phone. You can look at that. No problem. I'm going to use a lot of the rings metaphor, please. I mean, Frodo didn't, couldn't do it by himself. And I was like, I've never started a business before.

I don't know about sales. What are you talking about? We started this podcast. And also, like, I'm a freelance writer. That's obviously a business too. Exactly. These days, when we're all less likely to have one job until we die, it's good to look at the stuff, like the hobbies that you have, things and be like,

I wonder if I can maybe turn that in something a little bit more. We've talked about side hustles, but this is basically taking it a little bit more seriously. Just taking your side hustle one step further. With the side hustle episode, which I would recommend, we talked about like how to feel psychologically confident enough to start a side hustle, whereas this is like, okay, cool, if you don't know about numbers, get a friend who knows about numbers, because Frodo needed Sam. Exactly right, but he also needed somebody on, bows and arrows and all the other equipment.

Yes. Who's Boromir? He's just a man. He was bringing nothing to the table. Was he bringing nothing to the table? Because last night I went home and my boyfriend was watching the fellowship with the ring and crying. He does not get emotional. And I said, why are you crying? He went, Boromir said, I will go to the end of the earth for you, brother. I just thought it was really nice. I was like, wow.

You've got to get your emotion out. Clearly this is a real little port for it. I'm really happy for you. but Borrameer was helpful. He was helpful even though you can't remember. He may have done something helpful. When there are those arrows in him, he's still fighting off the orcs. There we go.

He keeps on, he keeps slashing. Get yourself of Boromare. Get yourself. Get yourself a whole fellowship. Get a gang around you. And realize, you know, what you're good at, like Frodo, just good at carrying. Oh, big time. The idea that we have in our heads about what a business is looks like, you know, owning a power block or wearing a grey suit, having your coffee brought to you, missing your kids

baseball day. Being 43, having kids. Being 43. Some would your secretary being like, it's your son's birthday. I bought him a present. The secretary is male, by the way. That's a male secretary. Yes. And that's on you, that's sexism. You know, just constantly be like, business, business, business. Yes. I own this massive. Calling Japan a lot. I'm called Japan. Yeah, constantly calling Japan. Whereas really, that's not what a business has to be. No. It doesn't have to be that. You can be just one person. So ages ago this amazing cool gal called Gabby got in touch

with those because when we were the debrief podcast there was how to do something that frightens you episode or how to overcome fear. It was like the second episode we ever did and she got in touch a couple of weeks later and was like, I listened to that episode I've always wanted to set up a vegan fried chicken food truck. It's like been a real dream

of mine because I'm really good, she's just great at making it. And I've now decided that I'm going to do it and I've put things in place to do it. That was like a year and a half ago and she messaged me the other day saying oh you're doing like a business thing like I actually started it and she's got

the trucks there it's Manchester base it's called Vegan Fried Chicken and you can follow her on Instagram eat dot vegan dot fried dot chicken and she's got some tips as well that we're going to talk about later because we asked a load of people who have basically set up on their own about how to go about it

in a bid to sort of inspire you all so if you've got something that even if it's just like so my sister is really great painting but sort of didn't fancy being an artist for a living so went into loads of other jobs and now she started doing taking like commissions from friends and stuff just being like oh you want that painted and um but she hasn't really monetized it or set up set up or anything but that's like such a simple thing if you've got a hobby and you're like I might start selling things on it like then you can you can monetize it and it can become a thing and who knows where it'll be in 10 years time if you

even if you start very casually exactly what I'd all thing have you done this week uh well mine is that I've taken some advice she's pointing at me but she can't make me it must be someone behind me it's barram it behind me it's you you're always banging on about your Instagram feed and I like about oh my Instagram feed's great

no about how you have to curate it blah blah blah oh I only have dogs and tortoises on my feed yes and I've thought I don't much like tortoises so I'll ignore that advice and I'll ignore that comment and ignore Stevie she means nothing to me but then I

started already taking on board what the impact Instagram can have on you. Yeah. And also, Twitter I can't go on because everything's a hellscape, a flaming trash can of horror. Yes. Hour to hour. It's just like, what fresh hell is this? What's he done now? And so what I have been doing is on Instagram following the Instagram stories of the entire

cast of Love Island. Okay. And it is the most pure and most beautiful experience that I have day to day. What are they up to? Oh, God. They're living their best life. live, Stevie. They are all appeared to be doing, you know, everyone's launched

their own clothing range. People are working for boohoo, misguided, pretty little things. Megan appears to be in L.A. on making milkshake or something. She's having the time. Wes is about to be on dancing on ice. And they all just look so happy and

I have no interest in any of the things they're doing. Like I don't... That's crucial, I think. That's crucial. It's like, here are some people who I genuinely like, who I genuinely wish all the best for, who I hope are so happy. I could not be less jealous of them doing and of any of the things they're doing. You've hit the Instagram jackpot. I have hit the Instagram jackpot. Danny Dyer, I just, I cannot tell you how much goodness I wish her and how disgusting her in style clothing range is.

I sure it is. Absolutely heenest. Of course. And I genuinely think I might buy some stuff just to help her out. Just to help her out. Yeah. And just to show that I really like her and I'm so glad for her. She got to go on her own bus. They've painted a bus. She got to go to her own bus. They've made one those, you know, when the buses look like the buses have got stuff on. Yeah, you know, you know a little bus. Yeah, customizable bus. Customizable taxis. Oh.

She's just having the time of her life. And I'm really glad for them. And they all look like they've got good people around them. Oh my God, they've got a good fellowship around them. I've got a good fellowship of the reins. Oh, heavens above. Well, mine's also a social media thing. Please.

Basically, I've decided to go on Twitter and Instagram all the time. No, I decided to go on Twitter and Instagram still because I'm struggling a little bit with social media. exactly the same reasons you've just said. Twitter, because of just the constant terrible news and Instagram, because despite the constant curation of dogs and tortoises and memes, occasionally one will pop through and I'm like, something I'll get through the gate. Totally go through the gate. And then also, I've realized that it doesn't matter what's there. Just the fact that I keep just scrolling and scrolling and scrolling, it's like, what could I be doing with that time? Even if it is just sitting and doing nothing. I think your brain needs to

sit and do nothing occasionally. And every time I had a free moment I was scrolling. I was like, okay, I can't go off those social media platforms because I think it would actually harm some of the stuff I'm doing, for example, this podcast and promoting stuff. And your many, many businesses. My brand, my brand is so important to me. So I decided to curate my social media usage. And what I'm doing is I'm now just not scrolling.

I can look at the, if anyone messages me and asks me and says hello to me, I read that. I can post off, but I'm not allowed to scroll down on the timeline. So you only go on your notifications. Only go notifications. At best, I'll see like the top picture on Instagram or the top tweet when I actually log in. That's it. Because you can't get away.

You can't log in behind the tone line. It's a no-thumb experience. It's zero thumbs. I'm not going down. Okay. I just, there's a lot of tapping. Fantastic. Taping through and leaving.

Taping and writing and talking and then going. Going, crucially. And I think I'm going to keep doing it forever. we'll say how far lasts. May I seamlessly tie two things together? Oh my God. May I? Please go ahead. I think that she's really backed herself,

but I think exactly that, that we're all desperate trying to be on our phones less and sort of step away from things. And I truly believe there will be a renaissance away from screens and away from... Yeah, definitely. Because I read this article about how all the kids in Silicon Valley, the children of these, like, massive Silicon Valley tech lads.

Oh, yeah. go to schools with no computers. Great. So they go to these like really earthy. And so I think there will be this real shift. We will want to like go back to sort of pen and paper and the letters and, you know, a return to sort of old school ways. And I think similarly, exactly this idea of like starting a business by yourself, I think there is a real push away from Starbucks, for example, towards little coffee shops. We want to talk to the person that made the coffee.

Like we want to do that. And as people, we don't want to be lost. and these big businesses, we want to put our own stamp on the world. I had a friend who worked in the city who started up his own sock company. And the stock company, I was like, oh my God, what? You're doing these two things? And he's like, no, it's actually very simple. Like, he had a friend that knew how to do the business of, like, getting the socks.

But he had a design that he thought was really cool. Then he got someone else to help distribute it. Because he built up a fellowship, it wasn't actually that hard. And it just meant that he felt like he had some identity. An identity, exactly right. Exactly right, sadly. Exactly that. It's so easy to get into the, the rat race is the wrong word,

but it's so easy to get into like, this is where I eat, this is where I buy my coffee, this is where I shop from, it's everything is delivered to my door, it's so simple, whereas really you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, how much more alive do you feel? Who am I? Who am I? Yeah, and like crafting out and actually, it's exactly like creating your Instagram feed.

Oh my God. And also it's useful as well if you're listening and you maybe have just graduated or you're, you're not like, well, I'm bored of the rat race because you haven't been in it, Grosional. No idea. Is that you will have lots of skills

that you don't realize that you have and lots of fun things that are for fun that you can make some money on the side for. Because before I got a job as a journalist, I was a waitress and basically I would just either be a waitress in one cafe or I would just get more waitressing jobs and do more and more around it

rather than think, hey, what maybe could be fun that I could make money out of as well as this waitressing job? I just did more waitressing jobs, which I think was fine, but not maybe. may be as clever as I could have been, because while I'm getting a regular wage with one thing,

I could be doing something that is what my heart desires, with the other going to Mordor. We asked quite a few people about some advice, and one of the things that kept coming back and back again was get people to help you. Yes. Like we've mentioned about the fellowship, our friend Claudia Conway, who was a PR,

and then set up on her own, as Draper Conway with a friend Emma Draper, says have friends. Friends are so important, because even if you just set up something with one friend, that's still two people doing the job. You've now got someone to go, oh, God, this is hard,

or like, how do we do this? Or who should we find to get that to work or whatever? I think getting people to help you is one of the most important part of just trying to do anything. And then the second piece of advice that I thought was just really good to start off with was to not overthink it.

So we spoke to a lovely woman called Nita Patel who set up this cool coffee shop called Kaya Club. It was a coffee shop designed for people who are freelance who need to kind of go and work and stuff. So they've got loads of plugs. You pay two pounds per hour and you get unlimited coffee and tea and just there's really great food. It's now really like thriving. But when she started, it was just like a, it was so overwhelming. We spoke to her the other day and here's a little bit from her about why maybe you shouldn't overthink it.

I think if Kate and I thought about it too hard, it would have never have gotten off the ground. Yeah. I think lots of people kind of say that they want to start a business, but I think if you really start drilling down into all the reasons why you shouldn't do it, you can absolutely talk yourself out of it. I think it's important to sort of find that balance between like, does anyone want my business, will anyone actually buy this thing, and freaking yourself out into believing that they won't or that it'll be too hard.

You can talk yourself out. You can just talk yourself out and I think you just need to like jump in. And when you're in there, be like, oh, bugger. Yeah, I got a lot of messages from people saying, I really want to start a blog, or I wouldn't want to get into writing, or the big one is I really want to start a podcast. I was just wondering if you had any advice.

It's like, I don't really, because the advice is just to do it. So when we were doing the podcast, we didn't have, like, loads of planning meetings and figure out how we were going to, what our, like, seven-year plan was, or whatever. It was just little steps. Yes. It was like, okay, we both thought

that there were lots of podcasts out there, obviously, because there were lots of chatty podcasts, but not what ones are like, how to do this, how to do this, how to do this. Now there are loads and I would have very easily talked myself out about had I done some market research and looked and seen like in America they definitely have loads of podcasts that are similar to ours, but different enough that if we'd have talked ourselves out of it, it would have been a real shame because now it's doing quite well and really happy with it. And your brain can just be your worst enemy with any kind of creative thing you ever want to do.

ask some people if they think it's a good idea, if they will help you, and then just have a go. Like, test it out. See if your cakes are good. I think people want one of your paintings. Do you want to do a podcast for five years? I'd have gone, no, thank you, Steve. No, thank you. Thank you, Stevie.

I want to go to Norway or something. I'm always harping on about Norway. I'm like, no, Stevie, I don't. But what we were going to do was do just six episodes. And I think the first ones were like, how to face the fear and do it anyway, how to, I don't remember what our first six were, but I remember thinking how interested I was in finding out the answers to all those questions. Yes. And so it came from

a genuine place of just being really excited to do the thing for no for no purpose other than because it felt nice. Yeah, it felt nice and also then people responded to it. Yeah. So if no one had responded to it, we would have stopped after six episodes and been like, that was fun. That was fun. And I think that you can, obviously this is, we're talking about a podcast

here and I've mentioned quite a love, like, creative things, but with any kind of business, you have to have a trial, just try it out before you talk yourself outside. Yeah, because honestly, as long as you're sort of, you know, haven't invested your life savings and the savings of everyone you've ever met. Tip two, don't do that.

Tip two, don't. And we will come back to money in a second. As long as that hasn't happened, then the worst thing that can possibly happen from your business, not succeeding is the wrong word, but coming to an end. Failing. No, coming to an end,

is that you learned something, you learned so many things that you didn't know before. You've come out the other side of that. Yeah. If that's the worst possible case, scenario, then definitely go for it. Do it. Do it. I think there's a big misconception that you have to be really wealthy independently to set up a business. And I don't, I mean, that's not obviously not true. There are so many people that I know who aren't incredibly wealthy and aren't cash rich

who have tried it. So I think not putting all your eggs in one basket is a really clever thing to do. So don't quit your job before you've even tested whether selling socks is going to do anything. When we spoke to Anita, she had some good advice on that. Definitely do you. Definitely do. your numbers definitely think about how you're going to make money where that money is going to come from give yourself enough of the budget to get your business off the ground but then the mistake i think that we made was that we kind of poured all of our physical and financial energy into just getting the doors open and just didn't think about the runway that you would need before you really started making money because you'll always in the beginning not make as much money as you think you're going to make

it takes a lot longer than you think it's going to take. So like whatever your numbers are, just double them now if you want an easy life. No, obviously she's talking about a very specific thing, opening a coffee shop. But I think that is kind of the same sentiment as don't jump in before you've done any planning or before you know that you're not going to lose money or anything. When I went freelance, which is in an episode of a business, I didn't jump ship from 9 to 5 until I was earning more from a freelance than my salary every month, which wasn't hard because I was paid.

Shit, no. But still, like, it was like, well, as long as I know I could make my rent every month. And it seems like the last three months I've been able to, if I was freelance, it was like a hypothetical thing. Then I jumped. Obviously, you might be listening being like, oh, I've got so much money. I don't know what to do that. Start a business, mate.

Crack on. Invest, crack on. But I think it's harder if you don't. It requires just a little bit of planning. And also, even though your instinct, if you are a creative person, is to see a number and run for the hills and to sort of go like, ah, not for me. It's to like breathe through it, keep learning, like keep understanding what all those things mean. And to not get into your, and yeah, the idea of her saying double the expenditure.

Yeah. And be real about that. It's over because things will come out of you that you had no idea when you were coming. You know, if you sold your socks at the market and you got 10 pounds for them, I'd be like, I made 10 pounds. I didn't make 10 pounds. It cost me how much to make the socks. Yes.

I paid to be at the market. Yeah. I paid, and then somebody fined me because I didn't have my special market application. Like, here are all these things. I forgot my lanyard. I forgot my lanyard again. So I hear of all my things that would come to bite me that I wouldn't realize. Yeah.

And there will be those things. So being realistic about exactly how much money you actually need from this. Yeah, I think is so important. And on the subject of money, Guru advises to get an accountant immediately. If you're going to the market to sell some, read, don't get an accountant, I think you're fine, but make sure you've set up things like I settle, people can pay via your phone, so it's so easy. Yes, and then all your business expenses can be in one place, one place, so easy. Basically, if you get into any situation where you're like,

hmm, how do I track this money, then you need to get an accountant, and accountant sounds really scary and expensive. So they said that I didn't get one until last year, because I was like, cool, I'm not the queen, I'll get an accountant when I'm the queen. And my accountant does all my tax stuff for, I think at the moment it's like 180 quid. The amount that I cry over tax and the amount of time it takes me about how I'm so enumerate, it's terrifying.

She's so great and you can find people outside of London as well. It gets a lot cheaper and if you're listening and you're in London the internet exists so you can get an accountant from like hole or something and just make sure basically Claudia's advice is to not screw it up from the start because she

didn't do that and then had to do a lot of catching up. Suddenly you find yourself out of your depth really quickly and you're like oh now I don't know and then you have to scoop yourself out yes as well as set up a new way of tracking your money and making sure that you're totally covered for everything because basically anyone mentions the word tax to me and I both fall asleep and shit myself cross those T's and you dot the eyes right from the get-go even when you think this is so silly it's just me and boring and boring why am I doing this is because

somewhere down the line you'll be like thank God yes I had all this in place if I may oh my god Frodo didn't know they were going to have to take that path through the mountains. No. They didn't know they were going to get there. And so at the beginning of the journey, if they'd packed all their wet weather gear, everyone would be like, what's the point of this? It's dragging me down.

I don't have got space for this one, going through the mountains. And then lo and behold, lucky we brought this gear. Is the gear the accountant? Yes. Brilliant. My point is be ready from the beginning. Be ready. Be prep.

Be prepared. And Gabby of Vegan Chicken fame. Gabby for the vegan chicken. Her tip is to break each task. down and to not panic when you look at the big picture. Because obviously to go from like, hmm, I'm good at making vegan fried chicken chocolate. I've got a food truck business. It's like quite terrifying.

But she says day by day, she breaks down into little tiny steps. And I think as well, delegating and just making it manageable is just very, very important. So then you can make like a list of all the things that you know how to do, make a list of all the things that you're like, I actually don't know how, like I don't know how to do spreadsheets. So if I was, I was just thinking then that I said, you don't need an accountant if you're selling cakes at a market, I would because I would need to track my, I would need to track everything and I don't know how.

So you could, obviously you can go on Izzettled.com and do it all through there, which is amazing. That's basically like having a little invisible accountant. Can I just say if you are an accountant and you're listening, or if someone who isn't actually good at numbers, just so you know, the market is screaming for you. There is a niche here of people. Go freelance and just help people like me.

You will clean up. If numbers are your bag, there's people... Spread your bag around. Sure. Like, there are people desperate for you. Yeah, God, I'm desperate for you. If you were considering an accounting business, this is a thumbs up for me. Nice tip from Nita, which I really liked, was this kind of works for literally anything I've ever been like,

I'd quite like to do that. I'm like, well, seven other people have done it, and they've done it better and actually... It's just rubbish. So here's a tip from Nita about that. We haven't really done anything that's rocket science. Like, we are a coffee shop. We just put some extra. plugs in. Yeah. So like anyone that's like thinking about doing a business like you don't have to be

thinking oh I'm like need to be thinking like a Silicon Valley entrepreneur. Yeah I'm reinventing the wheel. Oh god like so many people like I need to come up with this brand new utterly amazing idea. You really don't just do something and do it well. Do it better than your competitors. Find like just one tiny little tweak that you're making that gives you a little bit of something different. That thing about you might be saying anything. Well loads of people make brownies. Loads of people paint things. Loads of people have a blog, but if you can just think of a tiny little twist, I think that's the crucial thing, a little USP, whether that is the branding of it, and it's just branded totally different. Like, just taking brownies as an example, because I'm really hungry, is that the difference

between those brownies that are essentially coming like Hessian sacks, and those brownies that look like they've literally just come out of the oven. It's like, hey, I'm two barrels of brownies. Like, people are drawn to one or other of those. And I think you have to figure out your audience and be like, right, what is the thing that I'm going to make? I want it to be for that person. How specific is that person? Sometimes it can be too specific, obviously. But a coffee shop, there are so many coffee shops. A coffee shop for a freelancer also isn't a groundbreaking thing.

But where it was in Brixton or where it is in Brixton, there aren't many of them. And also, just in general, there aren't many coffee shops that fully cater to a very particular freelancer who needs a plug. Only today I went to a coffee shop and I bought three pounds pepper mint tea. And I just left it. They didn't want it. I just needed a place to be. And there was like loads of people talking and there's a dog, which I did appreciate.

But then I was very distracted. It obviously wasn't, it was more of a coffee shop for like everyone in the community. You could just go and chat. And I was like, that's lovely, but I want to work. So there's a real niche there. But it doesn't have to be so, like an idea that no one has ever thought of, which I think will often put people back. It's a similar thing to the overthinking thing.

I concur 100%. And I have nothing more to add. I don't. I think you've made a very good and extremely eloquent point. because you're very talented. Very talented. I should start a business. I thought of a business idea the other day.

What was it? I don't know. Sue tortoises, so I always said. What was it? I've got to hibernate my tortoise and I've got to put her in a fridge. We're all living it. We're living every step of this tortoise journey.

I'm trying to keep it out of the public eye. The public are absolutely clamouring for more information. They're not really. But it's tricky because it's over Christmas. And so me and Gina want to go home. And also, Gina's in Australia. Can you take the fridge? Yeah, you can't unplug it because then the temperature can't

hook up and then they come out. And this is the kind of stuff that happens. Yes. You don't expect this stuff. Okay. So why am I using, why am I buying drinks fridges? Why isn't there a hibernation box that is for tortoises that you can put them in that control the temperature? Because one of the things I went to this tortoise lecture talk and they were like, it has to be at five, five degrees C or whatever, which is most drinks fridges.

But they were like, don't rely on it because fridges are really very in temperature. So I was like, well, hang on. Surely the vets would know if there was a. specific box you can put fucking tortoise in but there isn't so what we're looking at is that well basically we just have to like change a lot of our Christmas plans and Virginia's found a tortoise

hotel that her tortoise is going to go into and they're going to do hibernation services but it's in Hertfordshire be like this is this is like so ridiculous why doesn't someone just come up with essentially a drinks fridge but it's just it's tailored to a tortoise or a travel hibernation box that I can

take her my boyfriend was like oh my god just do it and I was like I don't have time for that. So if everyone listening, wants an idea and it cares about tortoises, I mean, take it up. I think you do. I think that,

don't let that stand in your way. You've got a fantastic idea. Got a lot on, though. I know you do, but how much of that is actually fear holding you back? Oh my God, maybe it's fear holding me back. I think it's you being like, oh, I can't, I won't be any good at it.

It's true, and I do know somebody. Is those a thought, Stevie just... The shit idea. You're a shitty girl. I do know someone. I do know an engineer who'd be able to make it. Like, I do know people. Yes, you know loads of people.

I'll come in your team. I don't think you don't like tortoises and you can't make things. No. You're very good at knocking up logos. I'll make a logo for you. You love to knock up a logo. It's very sort of vintagey antique looking. It's for powerful women who need to travel with their hibernating tortoise.

Yes, that's true. So vintage isn't very powerful. No, it's not powerful. Let's talk about it's off air. The point is... I think now is the time. Okay, I'm going to send you a mood board. Thank you.

I'll get in touch with my engineer and you'll be... And I'll come with a name. Any names, please let us know. I think it's very... SEO trotbox. Yeah, that's sure. That's it. There we go, done.

One of the things that's really important is to give yourself milestones. Well, like with the podcast, I was very much like, okay, I'm just going to quietly see how much this grows in the next year. I wasn't paying any attention. I don't know why you're telling me that because I know. But anyway, and I still am. I'm just letting you know that some members of this business team are weak. Sure, but you came up with SEO.

trot box, so I'll forgive you. I was looking at being like, okay, our listenership grew enough for me to be like, okay, this could be a thing. And then when we jumped off and became independent, it was even more of a stake on it because it was like, well, now we're not being paid by a company. Now we have to make them money ourselves. And it's really put a cracker up my jacksy. No, a fire. No, a firecracker. Oh, what did you say? Firecracker? It's put a Jacob's cream cracker up my ass because I think I'm looking month to month is this working. And the milestones, looking at the download rates every month kind of gives you a bit of a boost

and IZAT will have that so you can look at the sales and you can compare month to month and be like, oh, great, it's going better or oh, it's going worse, why? It's just on your phone. You don't have to like do anything really complicated or... We talk about that so often, don't you?

It's when you see something that you can't do, your instinct is to panic. Yeah. Not yours but once. Mine as well. But yours as well. And to be like, I don't know, run away, run away. Yeah.

But actually, the internet is the greatest tool will ever be given. And you can Google anything and 10 minutes later become an expert on that subject. And the feeling when you're like, now I know. You feel like that bit in the matrix where he's like, I know Kung Fu. You're just like, oh my God, I know how this software works now. I've looked it up. It is amazing. Like even things like, I know how to grout a tile, for example. How to bleed a radiator. How to bleed a radiator. So then suddenly the thing of like literally starting a business suddenly doesn't become so, it's no longer scary because you're like, you can read about people who've done it. You can read about people who've failed. You can ask questions. You can get

answers from people that you don't feel judged by. If you're like, I feel like an idiot asking this question. Like you can just, you can ask anyone on the internet. No one cares. Yeah. The only businesses that truly fail are the ones that like came out the gates way too hard, too fast. Yeah. At the beginning with like a million pound investment and off we go. The ones that like quietly grew are able just to sort of come to their end. It's not a failure. It's not a financial crisis. It's not like. No, of course. I think that that's the thing of starting small, breaking it down and taking a little baby steps. And then you can't fail because then you can just pull out at any point that you need to.

When it stops being fun, get out of the game. Get out of the car. I've got two more things to see us to the end. Oh my God. One is for you, for your George's box. One is a practical one. Oh yes. One's practical, one psychological, as always.

As always. To have a workspace and be like, this is where I go to do my business. That's very important. So, and even if you're like, I can't afford that thing. That is an investment in you, have a good place. Yes. you go that is yours. Even it was just a cafe

because I went to a coffee shop today and I did so much more work than I've been doing at home. I've kind of convinced myself that no I like working at home in my pyjamas I do nothing so it's so much better. You just find other things to fix in the house. I've got a fringe.

Yeah, maybe I'll make a fringe. And the other thing is if you are currently started in a middle of a business or you have just started one or if you are thinking about it that it will be scary and there will be moments

where you feel very sort of alone and no one really talks about that because it's supposed to be this what a cool thing you're starting a business like how cool but really it can be very very scary and you can have these moments of like oh no

what have I done what have I done and you can also feel so out of your depth especially when like real proper grownups are depending on you and you've got you know a supplier involved or somebody who's you know people start depending on you

and you start to get like bigger than you feel you should be and you're like I'm just a kid everybody feels like that don't panic right through it you're so strong you're going to get through it and don't feel afraid of talking about that fear or asking for help or reaching out to people. It's such a thing that happens all the time. I remember when I went freelance

I was like, I don't actually know how to send an invoice. Like I don't know what an invoice is. Yeah. People keep asking me to send my invoice through and I'm like, okay. So I just like got a friend who had an invoice and be like, can you just send me an invoice and I just copied hers. And I did that same thing with my sister. So this like template is just going through. Yeah. To remember it's going around the world. Exactly. Like nobody knows. Don't feel like a tiny baby. You're doing really great because I've never thought about that about someone else. So hopefully

if you had an idea for a top vibey business and you were like I don't know what to do, hopefully that's helped you a little bit. Also just if you ever need to take payment for anything, I was just thinking as well like my friend who's a comedian who does pay what you want shows and he's realised that people don't have cash for the book at the end. He's got an eyesethle. Oh that's amazing.

So I think that anything that you need to take money from just bloody get one and check out the website if you need any further tips to have a look at all their tools and advice and to sell stuff through them. Oh God, if you've started a business. Got a business idea. You've got a business idea. Tweet us at Nobody PanicPod.

I'm at StevieM, the SSA 5. I'm at Tesico. It's just letters because numbers scare me. Numbers scare me and I don't know what I've done. Every time I look at my Twitter handle, I break into a sweat. And yet, email us, Nobodyopanickpodcast at gmail.com. And yet, we would love to hear your business ideas. Oh my God, it'd be so inspiring.

We will retweet all of them from like blogs, right through to food staffs to literally anything. And Nita at Kaya Club says if anyone has any questions, get in touch with her. She would love to answer them for you. You can find them on social media at Kaya, which is C-A-Y-A-U-A-U-Sklob. And Gabby is eat vegan-fried chicken. Eat.com. E dot vegan.

fried. Chicken. The company is Vegan Fried Chicken. V-F-C. Manchester-based. Go and find her. Have a great, great week. And big thanks to I Zettle to check them out.

And have an amazing week. And see you soon. Bye!