DDeep Dive with Ali Abdaal
← All episodes
Robin Waite03 August 2023

How To Build A Business In 2023 (The Easy Way) - Robin Waite

5Frameworks
15Insights

Frameworks in this episode

Finance8 steps

Capacity-Based Pricing

Read →
Marketing6 steps

Marketing 101: The Four Steps Plus The Identity Layer

Read →
Sales7 steps

The Offer-First Workshop

Read →
Entrepreneurship6 steps

The Three F's Idea Filter (Freedom, Fulfilment, Finance)

Read →
Mindset5 steps

The Truths Exercise

Read →

Insights & moments

The myth-busts, hot takes, explainers, and tools worth keeping.

Myth Buster· 2

Myth Buster22:00

You do not need funding to start a business

Robin says the most common question on Simon Squibb's platform is about funding, and that people who have never run a business assume they need investment or a loan first — largely a Dragons' Den artefact. He calls it complete BS: every business has a version you can start from the ground up with no capital. Register a domain, set up a social account, write ideas on paper. His reframe is to take funding off the table entirely and ask what the smallest first step you could take today would be. Otherwise you are no better off, and people simply procrastinate.

“in any business there is a version which you can start from the ground up with no Capital you can just do something towards you…”

Robin Waite · 22:30

“well you're no better off if you take no literally no steps towards whatever you know your goal is so people just end up procrastinating”

Robin Waite · 23:00
Myth Buster1:20:30

Hourly rate charging is a broken model: the three web designers

Robin walks through three web designers quoting on the same job. The first is inexperienced, quotes ten hours at 100 pounds, delivers late and incomplete, and would have to charge more for the missing features — the fact that he could tells you the model is broken. The second is better and faster, so at the same hourly rate he earns less for a superior result: the incentives are inverted. The third quotes 10K flat, guarantees a 10x return within twelve months or a refund plus a thousand pounds for wasted time, and wins — because he has systems, one client type, and predictable remarkable results. Hourly rates do not exist in that transaction.

“the mere fact that you could tells me that hourly rate charging is a broken business model okay so there's our first clue that hourly…”

Robin Waite · 1:22:00

“surely the guy who can do it better and faster and deliver better results why does he get paid less than the guy who's less…”

Robin Waite · 1:22:30

Hot Take· 3

Hot Take1:05:30

"I'm not good with numbers" is a crutch, not a condition

Robin says this is one of the most common things he hears and it genuinely angers him, because everything in business is numbers: profit and loss, turnover, gross and net profit, overheads, conversion rates, leads, website visitors, likes and shares. He allows a caveat — you only need to understand enough to delegate responsibly. His distinction is that most people delegate responsibility rather than delegating responsibly, then act shocked when the accountant presents a tax bill. Ali's read is that most people saying it are not numerically dyslexic at all; they do drug dosing fine, they just told themselves a story after not taking A-level maths.

“one of the most common things I hear in businesses are not very good with numbers right and that really angers me I nearly swore…”

Robin Waite · 1:05:30

“however a slight caveat that said you only have to understand enough about numbers to then be able to delegate responsibility to somebody else”

Robin Waite · 1:06:00
Hot Take1:53:30

Comparisonitis is the death of most entrepreneurs

Asked for the biggest early-stage mistakes, Robin names hourly rates and comparisonitis. The moment you measure yourself against others, imposter syndrome and self-doubt creep in and you never start. His counter is uniqueness: there are hundreds of thousands of business books, and the reason to write another is that it is yours and only you convey your message that way. Earlier in the episode he makes the same point with Lewis Hamilton looking at Ayrton Senna — if Hamilton had decided he could never be that good, there would be no seven-time world champion. Look at what someone has done and conclude that you can too.

“so comparisonitis is like the death of most entrepreneurs”

Robin Waite · 1:54:00

“rather than looking at it and going oh I can never achieve that look at it and go well they've done it so can I”

Robin Waite · 19:00
Hot Take2:11:30

The provider trait, hustle culture, and using work to hide

Robin traces his own work compulsion to a childhood where everything was about working hard for money and every argument was about money, and says he has spent nineteen years unpacking it. He still gets work guilt sipping a beer over the Cotswold hills. His confession is sharper than the usual balance talk: sometimes he has used work as a reason to hide from problems and challenges in his life, and he calls that the toxic side of the provider trait. He argues men becoming aware of what they are avoiding would produce happier men, and dismisses hustle and grind culture as complete BS — this year he committed to easy and effortless and is the happiest he has been.

“sometimes I've used workers as a reason to hide from problems challenges in my life whatever shape or form those take um and I that's…”

Robin Waite · 2:12:30

“so easy and effortless goes against the grain of most the hustle and grind culture is”

Robin Waite · 2:17:00

Explainer· 4

Explainer04:30

Coach vs mentor vs consultant, and why accountability is the real product

Robin distinguishes the roles: a mentor has been there, got the T-shirt and tells you what to do; a coach asks well-formed questions and guides. His own practice mixes both, because leading a horse to water via questions sometimes fails and people need to be shown. He then argues the tennis-coach analogy misses the crucial piece — the coach also drags you out of bed on the lethargic days, watches your nutrition and self-care, and nudges you just outside the comfort zone. Not too far, because prolonged discomfort demotivates. Just far enough to build muscle memory.

“a mentor typically has been there and done it got the T-shirt maybe they're 10 years ahead of where you want to be”

Robin Waite · 04:30

“a coach in my view tends to sort of ask well-formed questions they're not necessarily there to tell you what to do they're kind of…”

Robin Waite · 05:00
Explainer1:43:30

The rule of three red flags on a qualification call

Robin treats the free thirty-minute chat as a two-way interview and applies a rule of three: if three things make him uneasy during the conversation, it is not a fit. Examples he gives include a prospect who has already worked with three coaches in the same field without success — statistically unlikely to be three bad coaches — and a prospect who asks about price repeatedly throughout. He advises giving the price but positioning it: you will hear it now, we will still go through the process, and at the end you tell me whether it is fair value. He also flags people wanting to compress a six-month process into a week.

“I have a rule of three for those those chats um three red flags if I spot three things during that conversation where I think…”

Robin Waite · 1:43:30

“we don't want to take their money if there's going to be no chance of them meeting the love of their life at the end…”

Robin Waite · 1:44:00
Explainer1:51:00

Build the MVP, build the audience, and let feedback loops improve the product

Robin admits he sold 24 places on his first group programme before building anything, then locked himself in a room for five days over Christmas to make it — and two or three modules were rejected outright by the first cohort when he asked for honest feedback. His conclusion is that a structure you can add to and remove from beats perfection. He cites Eric Ries and The Lean Startup: build 80% of the product in the shortest possible time, launch to early adopters, and run twelve feedback loops in the time others spend on one design cycle. Crucially, you are growing an audience during those loops, so the product launches into a warm crowd rather than crickets.

“Eric Eric Reese wrote a great book The Lean Startup where he talks about creating a minimum viable version of it so if you could…”

Robin Waite · 1:51:30

“I see so many business owners who yeah the product's great like don't get me wrong products brilliant but they've put no time into building…”

Robin Waite · 1:52:30
Explainer1:25:00

A "no" is aimed at the offer, not at you

Robin explains why sales calls produce sweaty palms and retreat at the price question: the seller has made the whole thing about themselves rather than the client, who is the most important person in the relationship. On rejection, he separates the person from the business — we are pack animals who read no as exclusion, but what is actually being refused is the offer, which is attached to the business. He describes keeping you and your business as distinct entities, with the business built on solid foundations, clear roles, systems, SOPs and income as its oxygen, so your personal wobbles do not become the business's wobbles.

“so if we hear the word no we take it as a massive rejection right but what what are they actually saying no to they're…”

Robin Waite · 1:26:00

“so when somebody says no they just don't get the value that your business offers it's it's not personal”

Robin Waite · 1:27:30

Story· 2

Story1:32:30

Frank Kern, The Richest Man in Babylon, and the twenty people who moved

Robin recounts marketer Frank Kern telling an audience of several thousand he would give them the secret to becoming millionaires: buy this book, read it ten times, follow every step. The book was The Richest Man in Babylon. He then instructed them to get their phones out and buy it immediately, and the camera panned across the room — you could count the people actually buying on your hands and toes. Around twenty out of thousands. Robin's point is the natural resistance you are marketing against: most people cannot summon the energy for the first step, let alone execute the whole method. Ali adds the parallel of streamer Ludwig calling out viewers who refused to pause his video.

“you could count the number of people who had their phones out buying this book on like your hands and your toes”

Robin Waite · 1:33:30
Story1:12:00

The nine grand Facebook ads mistake: burning through your circle of influence

Robin's cautionary tale about ad spend. His Facebook ads worked well until everyone in his circle of influence who was ready to buy had already bought. Conversions then dropped off a cliff while the ads kept running at three grand a month. Despite trying to analyse the numbers he could not identify the problem with the audience for three months, losing nine grand in total. The lesson he draws is broader: marketing channels have a half-life, especially technology-dependent ones, so find two to four things that work, rinse and repeat, and stay conscientious about where the money goes.

“I've used Facebook ads for my business in the past and um uh I lost nine grand as a result of a mistake I made…”

Robin Waite · 1:12:00

“all of a sudden our conversions dropped off a cliff so we weren't signing up as many clients yep my ads are still running and…”

Robin Waite · 1:13:00

Tool· 1

Tool1:06:30

Profit First: siphon the money the moment it lands

Robin references Mike Michalowicz's Profit First and describes running it through modern UK banking. Instead of five separate bank accounts, apps like Starling and Monzo let you use spaces within one account. He splits incoming money immediately into VAT, corporation tax, PAYE and National Insurance if you have employees, a fun pot (camera gear, in his case), a rainy day fund sized to survive six months with no income, and a main float for day-to-day expenses. If 10K comes in, it is divvied up on arrival, so year-end tax is already covered and anything left over is genuine surplus to spend or reinvest.

“so online banking apps now have made this so much easier because I have these little things called spacers so you have one bank account…”

Robin Waite · 1:07:00

“so you divvy it up the moment the money comes in so by the end of the year when you do your returns you've got…”

Robin Waite · 1:08:00

Takeaway· 3

Takeaway1:37:00

Sell something for money and you learn 90% of business

Robin's answer to the mystery people project onto business: go out and sell something, anything, whether it is twenty pounds to mow a lawn or a six-month transformation programme, and see how you feel afterwards. Doing it forces you through the entire chain — you had to market to make someone aware, you had to have the awkward price conversation, you had to onboard them, fulfil the work, handle feedback mid-delivery, and find out at the end whether they pay happily or leave a bad review. Each of those is a lesson you cannot get by planning.

“ninety percent of everything you need to learn about business you will get from just getting out there and selling something”

Robin Waite · 1:37:00

“get out there and sell something for some money and see how you feel about it afterwards it's as simple as that”

Robin Waite · 1:37:30
Takeaway58:30

Only two things can go wrong in business: lose money or lose face

Ali describes carrying school and university perfectionism into business, where an assignment cannot be improved after submission. Robin's counter is that medicine genuinely has that jeopardy — lives depend on it — but almost nothing else does. He compares the imagined risk to walking ten miles to an African river past hippos and lions: things that can actually eat you. In business the entire downside is that you lose a bit of money or you look a bit stupid, and then you are back where you started and you go again with another idea, another Google Doc, another ad. Neither outcome is that bad in the grand scheme.

“there's only two things that can possibly go wrong you lose a bit of money or you lose a bit of face it's a little…”

Robin Waite · 59:00
Takeaway2:04:00

The regret: build recurring revenue years earlier

Asked what advice he would give a 29-year-old, Robin says he would have built sustainable recurring revenue faster. In his web design agency the valuation was based on the hosting revenue, not the design work, and he wishes he had started building that stream four years earlier — with the cash flow that would have produced, he says he would not have sold the business at all. He calls it a massive lesson he now front-loads with clients: accelerate recurring revenue and do it fast. His second piece of advice is to get fit before kids arrive, because maintaining fitness is far easier than rebuilding it.

“I think I probably would have built um a business that had more sustainable recurring Revenue coming in Faster I left it probably not not…”

Robin Waite · 2:04:30