Some learnings as SHIPMAX reaches six months

In this picture my youngest daughter is six months, she turns ten this year. This decade has gone by in a flash.

As SHIPMAX reaches six months it feels like an opportune moment to reflect on the journey. And, as is the general theme of these posts I want share some insights to hopefully help someone embarking on a similar journey.

In the short time since founding SHIPMAX I have had some successes, some luck and done a few things well. I have also fallen foul of pitfalls and made plenty of mistakes.

Starting any type of company is daunting, hard work and risky. Sensible people will try to talk you out of it. We’ve all heard the stats about how many start-ups don’t make it.

This post is for those who are going to do it anyway.

Getting started

This probably goes without saying but to have credibility as a freelance consultant you need to have a good amount of time served, and thus a high level of expertise in your specialised sector. I was fortunate in this regard as I have spent almost twenty years within the fields of supply-chain and logistics.

Being old helps!

Another thing that is essential is having a buffer of cash in reserve.

There will almost certainly be times, particularly in the early days when you will need to supplement your income. No regular salary and working on a self-employed basis is a little less scary if you have a bit of money set aside for the early days.

Having a strong professional network and a small handful of trusted mentors who have been there seen it and done it has also been hugely beneficial to me.

At this point I have to give a shout-out to Chris Tayler, Paul Todd, Karl Harwood and Tesh Jadev in particular.

These four awesome humans have shared their time and experiences with me freely and openly throughout my baby-steps in consulting and have each been instrumental in helping me understand some of the key principles and pitfalls of working in this way.

LinkedIn is a great tool for business, and I focus my effort and energy here, and here only when it comes to social media. I am operating entirely in the B2B space where I believe there is limited value from the other social platforms.

I am fortunate that I was an early adopter of LinkedIn, joining the platform as an individual in 2009. I have consistently worked to expand and develop my network and following with just short of 9000 1st degree connections and SHIPMAX has benefited because of this.

SHIPMAX has gained over 650 followers in its first six months. I think part of the fast growth in followers I have managed is due to me not being distracted by Facebook, X or TikTok etc.

When I set myself on this path there was a good degree of imposter syndrome at play as I didn’t have a clear idea of where I was heading. It felt at times like I was making it up as I was going along, because I was!

That said, I think it is probably quite normal for doubts to creep in when you take such a leap.

Am I good enough? Will people be interested? What if I screw up?

All these negative questions and a whole lot more must be fought off, particularly when setbacks occur, or challenges arise.

Navigating challenges, learning new skills, having nobody to delegate anything to, but also embracing opportunities and forming strong partnerships mean it has been a whirlwind of learning and growth for me as an individual.

Above all else the thing I am most grateful for is the flexibility and time at home my family that SHIPMAX has afforded me.

My old life meant constant travel and I was spending up to 120 nights a year in hotels, saying goodnight to my kids on the phone rather than in person two or three nights every week.

I don’t ever want to go back to that life, and this is the “juice” that makes me keep rowing when things get tough, or don’t go as I had hoped or planned.

Here are some key insights from these first six months that I hope can benefit some aspiring entrepreneurs looking to venture into the consultancy field. Even if your business is not consultancy, I hope there is still some value in these learnings for you.

Partnerships: The Foundation

B2B selling is something I have done consistently and with some success throughout my career so I was confident that this was an area where I could add value to potential partners.

Having spent much of my adult life working in supply chain I also had a good understanding of the types of solutions and service providers that were blazing a trail or shaking things up in their sectors.

As opposed to those that were more just going through the motions with run-of-the mill, or race to the bottom type propositions.

There are plenty of amazing companies with exceptional products and services doing amazing things in the world of e-commerce, logistics and supply chain in 2024 and I am proud to say that in six months SHIPMAX has partnered with around a dozen of them to-date.

It was, and still is highly important to me to establish affiliations with partners that I know I can get excited about and, more importantly get other people excited about.

People and personalities within these supply-side businesses are also a huge factor in how I select the partners I want to work with.

I pride myself on two decades of always doing business with the highest level of integrity.

It is a shameful reality that this is often a trait that is lacking in the supply-chain and logistics environment, but I think I have been able to buck this trend and my LinkedIn recommendations provide some social proof of this.

So, from the outset it was of the highest importance to me to align SHIPMAX with partners that shared this “do the right thing, not the easy thing” ethos.

I am always on the lookout for new potential partners but above all they must have a collaborative mindset and have the needs and ROI of the clients I introduce at the front and centre of everything they do.

Brand Identity: Leveraging LinkedIn and Industry Networks

Whilst I have no aspirations to be a large employer of people, operate warehouses, sell products or run a fleet of vehicles I did want to establish a brand identity for SHIPMAX.

Building a brand identity seemed important to positioning SHIPMAX as a thought leader and significant player in the supply-chain consultancy space.

This was, and still is one of my biggest “blind spots” as I am from a Sales, rather than a Marketing background and it can be a minefield. I have also wasted a fair chunk of change chasing shiny things in this area through my lack of a deep understanding of the “dark arts”.

Brand building is very much a journey and something where both patience and consistent effort and focus are required. I went down a rabbit-hole on SEO for a few weeks, wasted a ton of time and realised that this was an area that needed to be out-sourced to a specialist when SHIPMAX finances permitted.

I have recently outsourced my SEO and I hope this won’t be another expensive “learning experience”, so I am eager and keen to see how the traffic flow to the website benefits from the suppliers efforts.

Thankfully the stats and analytics speak for themselves so it will be quickly evident if this has been worthwhile, the jury is still out on that as I write this.

Building the website was easy and quick and I was able to do it myself. It is built using a Squarespace template, a few stock images, and some text I wrote in a few evenings and weekends.

You don’t need to be technically gifted to get a decent looking website up and running cheaply and easily these days.

For a few of the more techy things I wanted, where my basic skills were not enough I enlisted the help of some web developers and graphic designers to assist me.

Growing my professional network and establishing new contacts by being present at industry events has also proved to be an invaluable source of opportunities.

Authentic in-person engagements and discussions with industry peers has been a fruitful source of new partnerships and projects with retailer and supply-side contacts. Most things of tangible value to SHIPMAX have come about in this way.

Adding Massive Value: The Key to Client Acquisition

Acquiring the first few retail and brand clients involved demonstrating a strong commitment to integrity and having open and value-driven discussions. SHIPMAX will always offer some initial dialogue and advice without any charge to retailers that seek it.

I have had to be flexible on how small retailers renumerate SHIPMAX where the conversation develops.

The small start-up brands that approach me often have very limited budgets, so where there is a good personality fit and shared vision on how some of the challenges, they face can be overcome I have offered assistance without the prospect of any immediate compensation.

In several cases I have picked up interesting projects with interesting start-ups by being willing to defer any immediate renumeration and offer a “payment based on results” type of approach.

This ultimately de-risks the conversation from the start-up retailers perspective as they know they won’t have any front-loaded costs in our engagement where SHIPMAX payments are aligned to tangible results.

Where appropriate this ensures a fair and mutually beneficial partnership framework to begin the relationship upon.

Obstacles: Overcoming Perceptions and Challenges

No doubt through negative or painful experiences, some people are very much put off by the “C” word.

By that I mean “Consultant” so shame on you in your mind went elsewhere, ha.

Some people perceive a consultant to be an unnecessary “middleman” sitting between the client and supplier, charging a disproportionate rate for their time and adding little or no value to a procurement process. And I have no doubt this may be true for some.

On a few occasions I have been at the sharp end of this where someone has attempted to cut SHIPMAX out and go-direct to the solution provider, my partners.

But in several cases my partners have alerted me to this and brought me back into the conversation. This solidifies my belief that I have chosen great partners to work with.

When SHIPMAX signs affiliate or commission agreements with suppliers these agreements are structured so that the commission is at the same level as that which would be paid to an employed salesperson working directly for the supplier.

This means there is never a conflict of interest. As a good sales professional would, SHIPMAX engages in commercial discussions with the client’s best interest at heart. This in-turn ensures the client gets the best possible deal and outcome available from the supplier.

It must always be a win-win arrangement.

Transparency, honesty, and maintaining open communication channels with clients and supplier partners is essential in overcoming these negative perceptions. Establishing trust and demonstrating the value of consultancy is what it is all about.

Staying Afloat: Short-Term Income and Long-Term Growth

This is a balancing act and must be considered carefully. For short-term stability SHIPMAX has to have retained project work to bill each month while working on large commission based deals.

When selling big-ticket items and large contracts the deals can easily take months, or even years to come together. Prioritising immediate and retained projects, while nurturing a pipeline of future opportunities is crucial.

I am excited to continue this journey and extremely grateful to all my clients, partners, mentors and friends, and of course my family for allowing me the opportunity to follow this dream.

If you have got this far and you are looking at the picture of me and my daughter thinking if that was taken a decade ago how the hell is he wearing a t-shirt with a SHIPMAX logo on it, head over to Modred and speak to Scott.

I hope to still be here and growing stronger and wiser by the day a decade from now, just like my daughter is.