Today's business post was about scaling a business versus growing one, and why the systems have to come before the next hire. Before writing it I read the fifteen suggestions Google gave for the phrase. One of them was "how to build a unicorn". Another was "scaling a business too fast".
I laughed at the first one and then sat with the second for a while, because it described a decision I made three weeks ago.
The decision
On 25 September I narrowed what NexBDM talks about in public to two things: NexBrand, the platform that puts every customer conversation in one place, and the Business Operating System, which gives a business one source of truth instead of a pile of disconnected apps.
Before that, I wrote about whatever seemed useful that week. Compliance, tax deadlines, tools, AI news. A lot of it was decent. Very little of it pointed at anything I actually build for people.
Since that day, every post on both of my blogs has been about one of those two products. Today's is the Business OS. Tomorrow's is NexBrand.
Why it is slower
Narrowing cost me reach, and I knew it would.
When I planned this month's topics, I went through the search terms people actually type and threw away the ones that looked promising but led somewhere else. "Too many apps" turned out to be people clearing space on their phones. "Single source of truth" was mostly people wanting a definition. Ten terms went in the bin like that before a single post was written.
Every one of those would have brought visitors. Almost none of those visitors would have been a business owner looking for a better way to run their business. So I write for fewer people now, on purpose.
What I can and cannot tell you yet
Three weeks is not long enough to say this worked in any number I would put my name to. I am not going to pretend otherwise.
What I can say is what changed in the work. Writing about two products every day means I have to explain them properly, every day, in plain words. That has found gaps. Where a claim was vague, I had to check it. Where a feature was described loosely, I had to describe what it actually does. The products are better explained in October than they were in September.
Why it fits what I tell clients
The advice in today's business post is the same thing I did to myself. Do not add another person, another app or another topic until the system underneath can carry it. Growing by adding more is easy to start and hard to run. Fixing the system first is slower, and it is the only version I have seen hold up.
That is what the Business Operating System is for: one record where the work actually moves, so the next client, the next hire or the next idea lands on something solid.
I would rather grow slower and know exactly what I am building than grow fast on topics that were never mine to sell.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why market only two products?
Because most of what I wrote before pointed at nothing I build. Focusing on NexBrand and the Business OS means every post explains a real way to fix a real business problem, instead of general information people can find anywhere.
Does narrowing your topics mean less traffic?
Probably, at first. Several popular search terms led to people with different needs, so I dropped them. Fewer visitors who actually need a better system are worth more than many visitors who do not.
What is the difference between growing and scaling?
Growing adds revenue by adding people and tools at the same pace. Scaling adds revenue faster than cost and effort, which only happens when the work runs on one clear system rather than more manual effort.