12 Week Business Experiment: One Number, One Stop.
A 12 week business experiment starts with three things written tonight. First, a window with a start date and an end date. Then one number that only moves when a stranger pays, plus the values that mean continue and stop.
Three lines on one sheet tonight.
Your window is twelve weeks, evenings and weekends only, with both dates where you will see them. So it costs nothing you cannot afford. Next comes one number, not a dashboard: sales, deposits, signed orders or paying customers. Finally, write the threshold. This is how you set a stop threshold for a business before you care about the answer.
Why week eleven cannot be trusted.
In week eleven you will be tired, hopeful and holding three months of effort. As a result, you will find a reason why any number counts. That is not a character flaw, because everybody does it. Therefore, the only defence is a threshold written by an earlier you who did not yet care.
Picking the number for your 12 week business experiment.
If you sell hours, count signed engagements from people who did not already know you. If you sell a product, count units paid for. For recurring offers, count second payments, since they show whether the thing works. This is how you validate a business with sales. Also, write it as a sentence, like forty units, so nothing is left to interpret.
Start your 12 week business experiment tonight.
Write your start date, end date, number and both thresholds in ink.
Turn your number into one sentence, such as eleven signed engagements.
From the book.
The first is your window. Twelve weeks, with a start date and an end date, both written where you will see them. Evenings and weekends only, because the whole point is that it costs you nothing you can't afford and risks nothing you need.
I Want to Start a Business but I Can't Quit My Job, chapter 9: Do not leap. overlap.
Questions about 12 week business experiment.
What number should a 12 week business experiment track?
One number that only moves when a stranger hands over money, such as sales, deposits or paying customers.
What if my business fits none of the three shapes?
That usually means it has no customer yet, only an activity, and no length of trial will fix that.
Why write the threshold in advance?
Because a tired, invested you in week eleven will find a reason why any number counts.
Read the whole chapter.
This lesson covers one section of chapter 9, “Do not leap. overlap.”. The book goes further, with the full evidence, the stories and every exercise.
Lessons in this chapter.
- 01 How Many Hours for a Side Business: The 96 Hour Trial.
- 02 Hybrid Entrepreneurship Study: Overlap Lasts Longer.
- 03 12 Week Business Experiment: One Number, One Stop.
- 04 Selection Bias in Startup Research: Read It Honestly.
- 05 Downsides of a Part Time Business: The Salary Shield.
- 06 Quit Job After Product Launch: Order Your Decisions.
- 07 Quit Job to Launch a Startup: Two Routes Compared.
- 08 No Time for a Side Hustle: Fixing a Trial That Slips.