In my consulting practice, I have a client who has a family-ran business. It has been established several generations back. He is doing well. Yet, one of his sons wants to be an entrepreneur of his own stature. He wants a complete independence - something I very much admire. The young man has a pretty fascinating idea worthy of at least trying to attract venture capital. Of course, he wants to do everything himself. I know the boy for a really long time - when he embarked on figuring things out, I told him he could always count on my advice if he had any questions.
He came to me a few days ago, his model clearly formulated and ready to be formalized in a business plan. But he was all out of sorts about the business plan. His original intent was to buy a PaloAlto's Business Plan Pro (still a #1 business plan software on the market) for $199.99 and work within its framework. But then somebody told him that he can go cheaper and "easier" with a Growthink's Business Plan Template - only $97 for a pre-written, fill-in-the-blanks, Word document/Excel spreadsheets. Excited, he went to look at the company's website and ended up having a panic attack.
I went to see for myself what could possibly spook him like that. Let me tell you right away that I have nothing against Growthink, a 10-year-old consulting company, specializing in business planning and investment brokerage. They appear to be quite successful in their core business of charging high-rate fees to moneyed clients looking for more funds, expansion or exit strategies.
The thing is, though, that in their daze of success they also decided to "reach out" to the general public. According to their Special Announcement, they
"regularly receive requests from entrepreneurs who want to hire Growthink but cannot afford our consulting fees. For this reason, we have developed a business plan template that allows entrepreneurs to quickly and cost-effectively develop professional plans."
How about that? They charge their conventional clients tens of thousands of dollars for their services, but here it is - for $97 you can have exactly the same thing. Well, that's nothing new. Consumer beware!
What caused the young entrepreneur to go into a frenzied mode was something else - it was the brutal, fear-fueling tactics that Growthink uses to market their side products. I don't know how they talk to their conventional clients, but their online lingo is nearly unethical.
You take a vulnerable group of people setting off on a scary quest of entrepreneurship and you tell them, "You don't know anything. We are the only ones who know all the secrets. Here, we tell you 4 out of 10 things you must know and then you will have to buy more products to know the rest. If you don't do it you are doomed. Here is another set of products with secrets from Venture Capitalists that were revealed only to us. Everybody else do it wrong and so will you, if you don't buy this," etc, etc. And it all enhanced with a rapid-speed audio.
By the time they are finished talking, the poor young entrepreneur feels he MUST SPEND $1,200, or there is no hope for him. And all he wanted to do is to spend two hundred bucks on the best business plan software on the market.
The funny thing is that the template has only three reviews. Do you think that the $1 billion of venture capital, Growthink claims their clients raised, was attracted by a ready-made generic template? I don't think so. Plus, if you are a creative person, capable of original brilliant idea, would you really want fill in the blanks and have somebody else's words expressing your aspirations?