If you were to ask me about my superpower, I’d say I’m really good at making money fast.
I’m a serial entrepreneur who started my first company when I was 17. I’ve had five ventures and two exits. Until this point, my life strategy has been to build a business, make the money I need, take a sabbatical, and believe that when I run out of money, I’ll be able to spin up another company to make some more.
I know it’s not the most financially responsible way of life, but it’s taught me a lot about how to bootstrap a revenue-driving venture quickly.
Ten months ago, I launched my sixth company, Robin House, which fractionalizes property investments into thousands of shares, empowering everyday individuals to invest in real estate with as little as $100.
We currently have three properties that will be renovated into short-term rentals to quickly start earning returns for our investors (“investors” in this article means customers who are buying shares of our properties). We’re on track to hit $1 million in sales in our first year, all completely bootstrapped.
This didn’t happen by accident, but thanks to some tactics that I’ve learned along the way, including growing a previous company to $1 million in a year. Read on to learn my playbook for rapid growth and how you can apply it to your own business.
1. Make it critical
Early on in growing Robin House, my team was stuck on the idea that the only way we could possibly grow was by investing in paid marketing. So, I brought them together and asked them to brainstorm ways they could get 100 leads in a week for $0. After about 15 minutes, I noticed nobody was coming up with anything.
I then remembered a brainstorming exercise I learned on a podcast: What if getting 100 leads by the end of the week was truly a matter of life or death for the business?
Suddenly, everyone had ideas. With that change in perspective, they were willing to do whatever it took to achieve the goal: walk around and knock on doors, print flyers to hand out everywhere you go, ask anyone and everyone you know for referrals.
Thanks to this exercise, we identified some simple, obvious strategies we hadn't thought about yet. We created a business on Google Maps at the address of the house we were purchasing with a title that made it clear this was an investing opportunity and got a sign printed in front of the house that explained how to get involved. This simple move led to at least 20 new inquiries and about $7,000 in new investments.
We also agreed that we’d never leave a conversation without asking for a referral because you never know who might be interested. This also led us to some of the strategic partnerships I’ll talk more about in a minute.
Yes, sometimes you have to spend money to make money. (For example, I wish I had made sales and marketing hires for this company sooner — I think we’d be even further along in our growth.) But there are also plenty of ways to grow for free that you can unlock if you push yourself to think creatively.
