📈 Breaking My Own Rules Caused Designer Losses! TikTok's Business Secrets & More

Welcome to your Friday morning dose of everything that matters in the world of business, finance, entrepreneurship and my life! If you want ‘agenda free’ news, top tips, tried and tested strategies and a bit of my banter, then you’re in the right place!

This week you’ll find:

🤔 MATT’S CHAT’S: The CEO's Confession: Mistakes, Layoffs, and the Road to Recovery

📈 SEXY STAT: 44 million. Thats the number. But what does it mean and how does it help you?

🗞️ NEWS ROUND-UP: All the latest business news fresh from the Matt Haycox Daily website including Tips to get ahead in AI, Five private equity sectors to watch & Barbiemania!

🎙️PODCAST: This week on The Matt Haycox Show, Matt interviews the King Of ‘Bosh’ Tom Skinner!

🖇️ QUICK LINKS: You are just 1 click away from tips and tools to make you superhuman!

📸 BIG PICTURE: What did our poll last week reveal?

🤝 SHARING IS CARING: Tell your friends and get rewarded!

🧏‍♀️ THE LAST WORD: One last thing before we go…..

🤔MATT’S CHAT’S

It’s been a tough few weeks in our luxury fashion group. Crystallising losses, staff layoffs and uncomfortable conversations. 

The good news is that we are through the bulk of the pain now and it should only be ‘up’ from here. We have consolidated a couple of our brand fascias and closed down a division - but the outcome of this is that we have a better, more efficient, profitable, more stable business that is very capable of producing a 7 figure profit over the next 12 months. We have secured the future of the remaining staff members and will ultimately deliver strong returns to investors. 

But these positive changes are happening later than they should have done. Fortunately not too late, but definitely much later than they should have. 

Why? Well like anything that happens in any of my businesses it was my fault! I could have dealt with this at any point. But for various reasons, I chose not to. I ignored the warning signs. I denied common sense. I broke my own rules. 

As the CEO or owner of a business, you are responsible for everything that happens. Every decision taken, every mistake made, comes off the back of a plan that you put in place or a member of staff that you employed or allowed to remain in place. Passing the book is not permitted! (And it achieves nothing anyway). 

So for anyone reading this thinking, it is me slagging off other people - it couldn’t be any further from the truth. People working closely in this business will have heard me say multiple times, ‘It’s my fault for allowing it to go on. I could have changed this at any point’.  

So today’s lessons are more a case of do as I say, not as I do! Because you need to learn from this by doing the opposite of what I did!! 

So which of my rules did I break and what can you learn? I came up with 9 without having to think too hard!  🥲

1. A Business Is Only A Business If It Makes Money: I had a few notes written down to write this column with and I have struggled to put the ‘rules’ in an order.

But I think this one should be first. A BUSINESS IS ONLY A BUSINESS IF IT MAKES MONEY! Otherwise, it is just an expensive hobby or ego flex. Getting an office, buying a laptop, employing staff, posting on social media - that isn’t a business. A business means you are generating a profit. You are taking out more money than you put in. If you aren’t doing that or don’t have a clear plan to see where and when you will be, then you are just playing around - so don’t kid yourself. 

2. The Economics Of Selling A Commodity Are Never Good: A commodity is an item that is interchangeable with any other one. Something that lots of other people are selling.

We were selling very high-end luxury shoes and handbags like Balenciaga, YSL, Versace etc. It may sound fancy and expensive - but for a retailer of those products (not the brand owner) they are as much a commodity as yellow hi-vis jackets or white paint. We are selling the same product at the same price as any of our competitors - zero point of difference and zero control as the brands hold a gun to our heads telling us what we can and can’t do. To get strong economics you need to have a clear point of difference, a brand you control, and a customer base who is desperate to buy your product above any others. 

2. You Don’t Need A Top Accountant To Know If You Are Making Money: Every business owner or senior leader should be able to calculate their profitability within a 10% range of tolerance on the back of a napkin. 

You know your turnover. You know your margin. So you know your gross profit. You know your overheads. So you can deduct those to know your net profit. It’s that simple. If you don’t know any of those figures then you should be able to find/work them out in minutes. This particular business was devoid of any competent accountancy support - but that shouldn’t have been used as an excuse to not be aware of the basic financial metrics. 

3. The Only Thing That Matters Is ROI: I would never be considered frugal, but I rarely overpay for something without good reason or buy something that doesn’t add tangible value.

Because this was a fashion business, the utter shite I allowed us to waste money on was off the charts. Paying 5 times over the odds for a rebrand just because the designer once got his balls tickled by Gianni Versace in a Parisian toilet. Entering awards to rub shoulders with our equally unprofitable peers. The list goes on and I am cringing inside writing it, so let’s stop there! But the point is made. What is the ROI that your spend is generating? If it isn’t tangible and it isn’t clearly positive then don’t spend it. 

Read the rest of my top 9 rules, including “Once Off The Payroll Nobody Gives A Fuck About You!”

Writing that was either depressing or cathartic, but it was an essential exercise to remind myself not to make the same mistakes again!

Over the last 20 plus years, I've lost millions to gain the knowledge I share for free. Fortunately, I've made millions more than I've lost, and you can benefit from my lessons to avoid those mistakes.

Enjoy this week's newsletter! We've made some format changes to focus more on entrepreneurial content and less on vanilla news. Your feedback matters, so PLEASE fill in the short survey attached so that we can tailor future content to you and your preferences. 😊

Update your preferences now >

READ MORE ON MATT HAYCOX DAILY  >

📈 SEXY STAT:

44 million
The number of blue ticks (verification badges) Instagram sold in 1 day

Making them $660 million in a single day!

People will find the money to play to their vanity and buy ‘status’. (Despite the fact that now they are for sale they have been totally devalued as a status symbol!)

How can you appeal to your customer’s vanity to grow your sales or increase your margins?
 

🗞️ NEWS ROUND-UP:

LATEST NEWS: FROM A WIMPY BAR CHEF TO A LORD

BUSINESS: FIVE TIPS TO GET AHEAD IN AI

MONEY: SIGH OF SUMMER RELIEF AS INFLATION COOLS

BUSINESS: TIKTOK FOR BUSINESS (THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO DRIVE BUSINESS AND SALES)

RETAIL: SHOULD YOU LAUNCH A FASHION START-UP IN TODAY’S MARKET?

MONEY: WATCHDOG CRACKS DOWN ON FINANCIAL INFLUENCERS

LIFESTYLE: BARBIEMANIA

LIFESTYLE: BEAT BURNOUT: A GUIDE FOR ENTREPRENEURS

MONEY: TOP FIVE PRIVATE EQUITY SECTORS TO WATCH

READ ALL THE NEWS ON MATT HAYCOX DAILY  >

🎙️PODCAST:

LISTEN NOW >

🖇️ QUICK LINKS:

• ⛏️Move over Grammarly: Discover the latest AI copy tool. Natural Reader is a professional text-to-speech program that converts any written text into spoken words.

• ⛏️Learn to code for free: FreeCodeCamp offers verified certifications in Javascript, HTML and CSS!

• ⛏️Disposable camera app: POV is the latest, fun smartphone app, this clever app enables you to use your smartphone as a digital disposable camera. It helps you capture the point of view of everyone at your event and reveal them to all involved the next day.

 📸BIG PICTURE:

Last week we ran a poll for the most popular social media platform for businesses today.

32% of readers answered that they find TikTok the most beneficial social media platform for business. So we decided to create the ultimate guide on how to use TikTok effectively for business.

READ THE FULL GUIDE ON MATT HAYCOX DAILY  >

 🤝SHARING IS CARING:

TELL YOUR FRIENDS AND GET REWARDED! 💰 🛥

When I love something I always share it with my friends! And if you do too then this newsletter has got you covered! Share it with your mates and wider connections and get access to exciting rewards. Even though our full reward programme is still in the works, any referrals you make now count towards it. Plus, one of the rewards is a weekend in Dubai with me for an incredible business immersion experience and yacht dinner. Spread the word and join us in Dubai!

(PS my current biggest refer is Elena, can you beat her?! She does have 108 cousins though so plenty of people to go at!)

 🧏‍♀️THE LAST WORD: