The business moves that rarely fail are raising prices, focusing on one customer, building recurring revenue and distribution, productizing, systemizing, doubling down on what works, raising switching costs, adding a premium offer and making yourself replaceable. If you had one year to improve your business, where would you start? The answer given here is that history already shows it, because thousands of successful businesses eventually make the same moves.
Here are 10, counted down from number 10 to number 1.
Watch the full video here, or skip to the breakdown below.
The 10 business moves at a glance
- Raise your prices (0:15)
- Focus on one customer (1:49)
- Build a recurring revenue stream (3:49)
- Build distribution before building more features (5:18)
- Productize your service (6:27)
- Systemize before you hire (7:24)
- Double down on what already works (8:45)
- Increase switching costs (10:22)
- Create a premium offer (12:03)
- Build a business that does not need you (13:24)
10. Raise your prices
If your business needs more money, ask customers for more money. Anyone who has sold something knows raising prices feels uncomfortable, with fears of customers leaving, getting angry or competitors undercutting you. Yet your favorite pub, your favorite food order and every paid app you use probably cost more than last year.
Most small business owners set prices by adding a markup to their costs. Very few measure what customers are willing to pay, so they spend years delivering more value than they charge for. Businesses win because customers believe they are worth the price.
That does not mean randomly raising prices tomorrow morning. A higher price is a promise of better service, communication, reliability and experience, which forces the business to improve. Try an exercise: imagine you doubled the price of what you sell, and ask what would need to happen to justify it.
Once each customer is worth more, the next move is choosing which customers you want more of.
9. Focus on one customer
You cannot please everyone. More potential customers should mean more sales, but when a business tries to appeal to everyone it becomes memorable to no one. The restaurant known as the place for authentic Neapolitan pizza usually outperforms another serving pizza, burgers, sushi, tacos and pasta under one roof. A law firm specializing in startups often grows faster than one promising to handle every issue.
People buy products and they also buy confidence. Specialists create it because customers assume they have solved the same problem hundreds of times. Narrow focus also reveals patterns. You see the same ten problems repeatedly, and each customer teaches you something for the next. You learn what they buy before they find you, what they complain about after the sale and which adjacent services they already pay others for.
Marketing gets easier because every ad speaks to the same audience, sales gets easier because you hear the same objections daily and hiring gets easier because the team learns one customer type. Referrals improve too: a founder who knows another founder knows exactly who to recommend if you are the startup law firm.
Many successful companies begin by dominating a small corner of the market before expanding.
8. Build a recurring revenue stream
Predictability is one of the most valuable assets a business can own. Investors, banks and business buyers know it, and companies with recurring revenue sell for much higher valuations than those earning the same profit from one-time sales, because future cash flow is easier to estimate and the business is less risky to own.
Adobe moved from selling software every few years to Creative Cloud, and Microsoft did the same with Office 365. Car washes offer unlimited monthly plans, gyms sell memberships, HVAC companies sell annual maintenance contracts and accountants move clients to monthly retainers.
Almost any business can do it. A consultant can replace one-off projects with ongoing advisory packages, a retailer can create a membership with exclusive discounts and a cleaning company can offer weekly or monthly service rather than waiting for customers to call again.
Stop relying on the next customer and earn more from the ones who already trust you.
7. Build distribution before building more features
Products get easier to copy every year. Once someone launches something people want, competitors start their own version, which used to take years, then months and increasingly takes weeks. If you invent a clever kitchen gadget, phone accessory or beauty product, manufacturers around the world are probably working out how to make something similar for less.
Building something has become cheaper than ever, while building attention has not. That is why some of the most valuable businesses spend as much time building distribution as products. Nobody can duplicate ten thousand real customers who trust your brand overnight, instantly recreate an email list that actually gets opened, or manufacture years of reviews, word of mouth and a community that keeps coming back.
Distribution has to be earned, and it grows more valuable every year.
6. Productize your service
Every service business starts the same way: a customer calls, you ask questions, prepare a custom proposal, negotiate the price and then start working. After your fiftieth client you notice that you are solving the same handful of problems with the same process and a similar result.
That is when you move from we build websites to a 90-day website launch, or from marketing services to lead generation systems. The work behind the scenes can stay customized, but the buying experience does not. Sales gets easier because customers know exactly what they buy, marketing gets easier because every campaign promotes the same offer and hiring gets easier because employees follow an existing process.
Turn your repeated work into a named offer.
5. Systemize before you hire
If your business is disorganized with five employees, adding five more makes it worse. Successful businesses scale systems before they scale people. McDonald’s does not rely on brilliant employees but on a process that tells them exactly what to do, and Toyota became one of the world’s most efficient manufacturers by documenting every step of production. People enter the system, not the other way around.
Almost every repetitive task should become a checklist, a document or a process, so the next employee learns it from the business instead of from you. The biggest mistake is believing growth comes from hiring more people. Growth comes from building a business where ordinary people can consistently produce extraordinary results, since hiring does not fix broken businesses, it usually scales them.
Hiring does not fix a broken business. It scales it.
4. Double down on what already works
One of the hardest decisions in business is accepting that your customers may have a better business plan than you do. Picture opening a bakery to make artisan bread and pastries. You buy a decent espresso machine almost as an afterthought, and then a line forms every morning for coffee. The pastries sell okay, but coffee brings in about 80% of revenue.
Do you fix the bakery with new recipes and a bigger menu, or accept that you are now a coffee shop? Giving up the original vision feels off, but from a business perspective, following demand rather than ego is usually right. History is full of companies famous for something they never meant to be. Nintendo began as a playing card company, YouTube was designed as a dating site where people uploaded intro videos, Slack began as an internal tool built while the founders were trying to make an online game and Twitter came out of a podcasting company.
Customers vote with their wallets, and every sale is information. If one product consistently grows faster, has happier customers and better margins, getting the others to the same level is usually a waste of time.
Follow the demand, not the ego.
3. Increase switching costs
To keep a growing base of customers, a business can either spend money replacing those who leave or make leaving less attractive. The second is usually easier. Switching costs are what a customer gives up by choosing someone else, whether money, time or convenience.
The script shares its own example. When it tried to cancel an unused Adobe subscription it was told there would be a near $1,000 fee, which support agreed to waive after a call, a reminder that almost everything is negotiable if you ask. Yet it is still an Adobe customer after more than a decade, because every project, template, font, preset and workflow is built around the ecosystem, and relearning software, migrating files and rebuilding workflows would cost more than staying.
Every customer who leaves must be replaced, which gets pricier as advertising costs and competition rise. Every customer who stays is easier to serve, more likely to buy again and far more likely to recommend you.
Make staying easier than leaving.
2. Create a premium offer
Apple sells the iPhone, then the Pro, then the Pro Max. Airlines sell economy, premium economy, business and first. A car starts at one price while the fully loaded version costs almost double. The premium option exists because a small share of customers will spend much more for a better experience, and they often generate a disproportionate share of profit.
First class might be only 6 to 14 seats on a long-haul plane while economy holds hundreds, yet the premium cabin can bring in revenue close to economy because each seat sells for several times more. Same aircraft, same pilots, same route, but a tiny section at the front changes the economics of the flight.
A premium tier is not meant to convince everyone to spend more. It lets your best customers spend what they already wanted to spend. If 100 customers buy your standard offer and just 10 buy a premium version worth ten times as much, those 10 can generate as much revenue as the other hundred combined.
Almost every successful business eventually builds a premium tier.
1. Build a business that does not need you
At the start, doing everything yourself is an advantage. Nobody knows the product better, cares as much or sells with the same conviction, so you become the best salesperson, support rep and product owner. Then the business starts working, which is good for the business and bad for you personally. More customers, orders, emails and decisions arrive, and since it is faster if you do it, you keep doing everything.
Soon every important decision flows through one person. Refunds go to the founder, discounts go to the founder, approvals, complaints, hiring and marketing too. The company is no longer limited by demand but by the founder’s calendar. The founder has become the scarcest resource, and the business can grow only if the founder works more hours.
That is why many experienced entrepreneurs say their goal is to become replaceable.
Every successful life is built on a handful of decisions that keep paying you back.
From the first move to the last
The ten moves connect. Higher prices and a narrow customer give you better margins, recurring revenue and distribution make them predictable, productizing and systems make them repeatable, and switching costs, a premium tier and a replaceable founder make them last.
The video ends by noting it covered business this week, after money the week before, and asks viewers what to cover next.
FAQ
What business moves never fail?
The list covers raising prices, focusing on one customer, recurring revenue, distribution before features, productizing services, systemizing before hiring, doubling down on what works, switching costs, a premium offer and a business that does not need you.
Should I raise my prices?
The script says to ask customers for more, because most owners price by cost plus markup instead of what customers will pay. A higher price is a promise of better service, so the business has to improve with it.
What is recurring revenue?
Revenue that repeats, like memberships, retainers, maintenance contracts or subscriptions. Businesses with it sell for higher valuations because future cash flow is easier to predict.
What does productize your service mean?
Turn custom work into a defined offer, such as moving from we build websites to a 90-day website launch. The work stays customized but the buying experience becomes clear.
What are switching costs?
What a customer gives up by choosing another provider, in money, time or convenience. The script’s example is a decade of projects, templates and workflows built around one software ecosystem.
Why does a premium offer work?
A small share of customers will pay much more for a better experience. If 10 buy a version worth ten times as much, they can generate as much revenue as 100 standard customers.
