Chapter 3Small Business Pitfalls

“There’s no other business like this!”

When I was flying home from a recent business trip, the woman in the seat next to me (I’ll call her Wanda) asked me what I did for a living. I told to her I was a CPA and small-business consultant. “Wanda” was in the financial services industry. She told me she was happy to know I was a CPA because she was eager to share her new business idea with me and ask for my thoughts. The sense of excitement I felt turned to disappointment when, after her pitch, she said, “There’s no other business like this and that’s why it will work!” My response to her was, “There’s usually a good reason why there’s no business like it already!”

“It’s generally a myth to think that nothing like ...

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