Garrett Goldman of State Creative.
Tell us about yourself?
Garrett thrives in the process and loves watching an idea become an asset. As a natural strategist, he likes creating plans and checking the boxes.
He joined the team in 2010 and he focuses on operations and works directly with clients. When not working, he sips bourbon and dabbles in the bitcoin world.
What do you think is the single biggest misconception people have when it comes to startups?
That there are too many obstacles and it will be too hard to start something new.
When people tell me that they don’t have time or don’t know where to start, I like to call them out on it, challenge them to give me reasons.
With so many free tools and research available combined with the low costs of entry, there are no reasons not to start a business if you have the passion.
If you could go back in time to any moment from your journey, and give yourself one tip, what would it be?
I would tell myself to read more books from the very beginning.
Rather than waiting around until something goes wrong or not fast enough, I’d suggest to proactively prepare to scale by reading as much as possible every day.
What makes you stand out as an entrepreneur?
I’m working on my third business so I bring experience with me. I’m completely committed to scaling my business and I am constantly trying to learn and grow.
What are some of the best working habits you’ve gained over the past couple of years?
I’m a great planner and goal setter. I leverage tools to improve things like task or project management and I follow through on everything. I’ve worked on improving communication and organization.
Give us a bit of an insight into the influences behind the company?
Our influence comes from a combination of art, design, and well run businesses from all sectors.
Our products need to look great, so our creative team immerses themselves in art, music and culture.
Our desire to sustainably scale inspires our operations team to consume business books and ongoing education. Combining design with management leads us to seek inspiration from everyone and everything, including our customers.
Where do you see your business in five years?
We have been growing 25%-30% per year for the last four years and we plan on keeping that pace up. In five years, State Creative will double its revenue and have twice as many customers as we do today.
Our website maintenance business (MRR) will likely be larger than our design and development business (project based) by then as well, marking a big and concerted transition.
What do you think the biggest challenge will be for you in getting there?
It’s harder for us to find customers that need website support than it is finding customers that need a new website.
As we are focused on growing our subscription business (website support), the biggest challenge is finding prospects and getting in front of them.
Talk to us about your biggest success story so far?
Limiting the services we provide was the best decision we made as a company. As a young start up, it was easy to say yes to every request, but as the company matured, that turned out to be dangerous.
The decision we made to focus exclusively on two products we do very well has helped us focus, grow revenue and increase profits. Focusing on what we do well has helped us grow steadily and sustainably each year.
How do clients and customers find you? Are you much of a salesperson for yourself?
About half of our clients start with an internet search, usually Google or an industry directory.
The other half come from referrals of past clients or supportive industries (companies that offer complimentary services to ours like SEO or Marketing). Our small team doesn’t do outside sales, so we rely on SEO and word of mouth.
What one tip would you give to fellow startup founders?
Document everything. Data helps you spot trends and historical changes.
I suggest using documents, spreadsheets and SaaS tools to stay organized and track things like leads, proposals and all of your KPI’s.
And finally, what do you hope the future brings both you personally, and your business?
I would like to see our business continue to scale.
We would like to see the subscription side of our business overtake our project side to help us hit our revenue/profit goals in a more sustainable fashion.
Should we stay on that path, I’d love to spend more time learning and working with other entrepreneurs in the bitcoin space.
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