Online Business

Distribution is the moat

Great products fail without distribution. Mediocre products with great distribution win. Solve distribution before you scale product.

Unit economics

If it costs you $200 to acquire a customer worth $150, growth makes you poorer. Fix the math before you spend on ads.

Founder replacement

Every process only you can do is a cap on the business. Document, delegate, or automate — that's the whole game past a certain size.

Getting started

1. 1
   Validate demand before building

   Pre-sell, run a landing page, or get 5 customers to pre-pay before you write any code or build any inventory.

2. 2
   Pick one acquisition channel

   SEO, paid ads, cold outreach, partnerships — pick one and get good at it. Attempting all four at once usually means all four fail.

3. 3
   Measure the numbers weekly

   Revenue, expenses, CAC, churn, and cash on hand. If you don't know them cold, you're not running a business — you're running an expensive hobby.

4. 4
   Build the ops before you need them

   Standard operating procedures, a simple CRM, and a customer support process should exist before growth breaks you.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Building for 6 months without ever showing the product to a paying customer.
• Raising prices too slowly — most online businesses under-price by 30–50%.
• Ignoring retention because acquiring new customers feels more exciting.
• Confusing revenue with profit. Revenue is vanity; margin is sanity.