One of the most important questions we’re often asked is why we charge for our business support, and whether clients can have an endorsement and maybe some monitoring without the associated support services. Here’s your answer – in detail. 

The support provided through Innovator International has been built upon decades of experience, with solid and factual backing. So, let’s start by looking at some of the statistics

The Statistics 

Many of our entrepreneurs are establishing a business in for the first time. Others have experience in other countries, but no vast experience in the UK. So let’s look at some of the statistics for UK businesses.

According to The Telegraph, 660,000 new businesses are registered in the UK every year. 20% – 1 in 5 – of these businesses fail in their first year, while an astounding 60% – 3 in 5 – go bust within their first three years.

The main reasons for these failures included:

• No business plan
• Cashflow problems
• Low business acumen
• Not understanding key data (primarily business performance metrics)
• Not understanding their marketplace
• Not having a “disaster plan”

The statistics for eCommerce businesses are even more damning. Sources including Forbes suggest that the vast majority fail within the first 4 months, with the top reasons including:

• Poor marketing and lack of online visibility
• Being “too small to compete”
• No market for their products / services
• Cashflow challenges (again)
• Pricing and competition

So, how do we address these challenges? Simple – good planning, coupled with great support.

Not just an endorsing body

Most of our clients initially come to us because they want an endorsement document to support their visa application. That’s the plain, simple truth. But, if we just gave out Endorsement documents, we’d be doing our clients a mis-service, and signposting many of them directly to the pot of 60% who fail in their first few years. For our clients, this is about more than ‘just’ having a failing business – the consequences are much greater. In their case, they will subsequently lose their endorsement, their Visa will most likely be cancelled, and they will have to return to their former country of residence.

That’s not what any of us want – which is why we care about much more than your endorsement. That’s just the start of your journey.

Our purpose is to:

endorse your business,

support your growth,

and secure your settlement.

We offer a bespoke programme which gives you the support you need, when you need it. Here’s how we do that.

Breaking down the challenges

Let’s look at the reasons new businesses fail in a little more detail. This way, we can capture them in a few categories:

1. Business Planning
2. Business Experience
3. Operations Management
4. Financial Management
5. Risk Management
6. Marketing Strategy

Now, here’s how we address each of these to ensure it’s not a major challenge for you:

1. Business Planning

We assess every business plan we receive in great detail to ensure it’s appropriate. Where necessary, we liaise with the clients to improve the parts which need improving. Often, if any of the other 5 areas are lacking a little, we will focus on these through the life of our support. It’s this level of assessment which helps us select the companies which are most likely to survive and thrive – which is why only 14% of our applicants progress on to one of our programmes.

2. Business Experience

If you’ve got it, you’ve got it – that’s great. But, the likelihood is that at some point you’ll need expert support in one subject or another. With our vast network of expert associates, we find the person who’s best suited to help you when you need them. This way, you’re covered in every area.

3. Operations Management

The first thing we do with you is establish a plan for the duration of your support. We achieve this through the fabulous Success GPS course, which aligns your personal and business goals, resulting in an operations plan. We then monitor this with you periodically (quarterly for start-ups, monthly for innovators) to make sure you’re on track. If you start to veer off track, we’re there to help with the required corrective action.

4. Financial Management

Everyone, yes everyone, over-estimates their revenue for the first few months and years. That’s why we often recommend that you have the support of our financial associate, who will help you question your assumptions and develop a more accurate sales and cashflow forecast. This allows you to plan your finances better, and ensures that the lack of cash (as opposed to the lack of sales) isn’t an issue which will burden you.

5. Risk Management

Approximately 2% of our clients include a risk register in their plans. Not everything is going to go right. It never does. Sometime, something will happen which will cause you challenges – so how are you going respond, and more importantly, how quickly can you respond? Could this have been avoided with pre-emptive action? That’s who risk planning is a key thing for us. We help you look at what might go wrong, and develop plan to either avoid it, or to be able to instantly respond if the unavoidable happens.

6. Marketing Strategy

If there’s one thing that rules the others, it’s the route to market. Businesses are nothing without cash, but cash comes from clients. If you’re thinking “it’s OK, I’m going to network, have a website and a social media campaign” then you’re in the most-at-risk category here. Who are your clients? How are you going to engage with them? How effective are your sales skills? That’s why we work with one of the top sales organisations to provide you with the sales skills you need to achieve the sales and revenue you’ve predicted. This is the engine behind your business.

So, that’s what we do. We help you build a business where we’ve addressed the risks with you to maximise your chance of success – and we start with you all the way.

What topics can our specialists cover?

With a vast team of specialist associates, we cover any and every business sector. We’ve just engaged with one of the UK and EU’s cryptocurrency specialists too, to add additional expertise in this field. So, we cover capabilities in planning, marketing, sales, innovation, creativity, finance, risk management, digital marketing, intellectual property, import / export, and the list goes on. In fact, whatever support you need, the likelihood is, we have an expert to help you. If we don’t, we’ll go out and find one, and bring them in to our support circle.

… and that’s why we insist that you have business support in our programme.

If you’ve got any further questions about Innovator International, please don’t hesitate to ask!