Business Planning for Entrepreneurs: Build the Business You Actually Want
Business planning for entrepreneurs is often presented as a roadmap for getting bigger, generating more revenue, hiring more people, and continually expanding.
But what if the better question isn’t simply, How big can this business become?
What if it’s, What kind of business do I actually want to own?
That idea was at the heart of our conversation with Jason Yormark, founder of Socialistics, on Business Owners Tell All: What It Takes.
Jason is a 30 plus year marketing veteran whose career has included work with Microsoft, the United States Air Force, Habitat for Humanity, and other major organizations. Today, he is the founder of Socialistics, a Seattle based social media agency, author of Anti Agency: A Realistic Path to a $1,000,000 Business, and founder of Late Founders, a community created for first time entrepreneurs over 40.
His path to entrepreneurship wasn’t an overnight leap.
It was planned.
And that distinction shaped much of our conversation about what effective business planning actually looks like.
Business Planning for Entrepreneurs Starts With a Runway
For years, Jason knew something wasn’t quite right about his traditional career path.
He described himself as feeling like a “square peg in a round hole.” He wanted to do his own thing, but like many aspiring entrepreneurs, he had convinced himself that owning a successful business wasn’t necessarily realistic.
There were paychecks to earn and a family to support.
Rather than ignoring those realities, Jason planned around them.
Around 2018, he began what he calls building a runway. Instead of quitting his job and hoping everything worked out, he started creating momentum before making the full transition into entrepreneurship.
When his final nine to five position eventually ended, he was ready to commit completely to Socialistics.
That decision eventually contributed to building a seven figure business and, perhaps more importantly to Jason, creating greater freedom in his life.
It’s an important distinction in business planning for entrepreneurs. Taking a calculated approach doesn’t mean you’re less committed to entrepreneurship. Sometimes planning the transition is exactly what makes taking the risk possible.
Internal link opportunity: Link “business planning” or “planning the transition” to a relevant Seeker Solution business assessment, strategic planning, or business growth page.
Don’t Chase Dollars. Chase the Right Relationships.
Jason entered a competitive social media agency market. He wasn’t trying to convince himself that he’d invented something no one else was doing.
Instead, he focused on how he wanted to do it differently.
One statement from our conversation captures that philosophy:
“I didn’t want to chase dollars, I wanted to chase relationships.”
That meant becoming increasingly selective about clients and opportunities.
In the beginning, Jason acknowledged that business owners sometimes have to accept work they might turn down later. Revenue matters, particularly when you’re trying to establish a company.
But that shouldn’t become the permanent strategy.
His goal was to reach a point where Socialistics could say yes to the right work instead of saying yes to everything.
That philosophy also changed how he thought about growth.
“Keeping clients, to me, is more important than winning new ones.”
Instead of building an agency around constantly replacing departing clients, Socialistics focused on developing relationships worth maintaining.
Business Planning Means Knowing When to Say No
Business planning isn’t only about deciding what your company will do.
It’s also about deciding what it won’t do.
Jason described learning to say no as one of the most powerful lessons of becoming a business owner.
“Ultimately, just learning to say no is one of the biggest things.”
That isn’t easy when revenue is attached to the opportunity.
When every dollar matters, turning down work can feel counterintuitive. But accepting every client and pursuing every opportunity can gradually create a company very different from the one the owner intended to build.
As Jason put it:
“When you’re chasing dollars, it just becomes a commoditized business, and it becomes just a grind.”
Effective business planning for entrepreneurs therefore requires more than identifying opportunities. It requires establishing criteria for deciding which opportunities actually belong in the plan.
Define Success Before You Plan for Growth
Freedom isn’t simply a benefit Jason hopes his business eventually provides.
It’s one of Socialistics’ core values.
“That’s my calling card, is freedom.”
Jason wants the ability to live life on his own terms, and he wants his team to experience that freedom as well.
That philosophy influences how Socialistics operates.
The company doesn’t use traditional time tracking. Jason isn’t interested in controlling where employees work or how every hour of their day is spent. What matters is whether clients receive great work, commitments are honored, and the team delivers.
“Just do awesome work, live life on your own terms.”
There are tradeoffs.
Jason acknowledged that not tracking time can make profitability more difficult to measure. But he believes the benefits to culture and employee retention outweigh those challenges.
Some team members have remained with him for more than five years, significant in an industry where turnover can be high.
Your values shouldn’t simply appear on a website. They should influence how the company actually operates.
Internal link opportunity: Link “plan for growth” to a Seeker Solution page or previous article about business growth, leadership, or scaling.
Business Planning for Entrepreneurs Includes Building the Right Team
One piece of advice Jason received early in his entrepreneurial journey was simple:
“Make sure that the business isn’t reliant on you.”
That advice fundamentally shaped how he built Socialistics.
Jason found an important leadership partner early in the company’s development, Joanna, who became Director of Operations and now runs much of the agency’s day to day operation.
Jason has intentionally removed himself from many daily responsibilities, although he has stepped back into certain areas as the agency has shifted its focus toward nonprofit organizations.
For many owners, this is one of the hardest transitions in business growth.
The skills required to start a company aren’t necessarily the same skills required to build a company capable of operating without the founder constantly being involved.
If every decision, relationship, approval, and problem continues to flow through the owner, the business may grow in revenue while becoming increasingly dependent on one person.
That’s not necessarily freedom. It can simply become a larger job.
Internal link opportunity: Link “business growth” or “operating without the founder” to your Fractional COO service page.
Hire for the Things You Can’t Teach
Building a company that can operate without its founder requires the right people.
Jason credits some of his approach to the hiring, recruiting, and mentoring training he received while working at Microsoft.
But his hiring philosophy isn’t primarily about finding candidates who already know every tool or platform.
He looks for what he calls “the untrainable traits.”
Those include strong communication skills, emotional intelligence, authenticity, and a genuine capacity to care about other people.
Technology can be taught.
Processes can be learned.
Certain foundational characteristics are much harder to develop.
Jason’s goal is to surround himself with people who align with the company’s values and feel invested in what they’re collectively creating.
“I want them to feel like they’re building this business together with me.”
That sense of ownership becomes part of the company’s culture and, ultimately, part of its business strategy.
Internal link opportunity: Link “building the right team” or “company’s culture” to your Fractional CHRO service page or a relevant leadership article.
Eliminate Friction From Your Business Plan
Another idea Jason emphasized was eliminating friction.
“To me, it’s about eliminating as much friction in business as possible.”
What makes it unnecessarily difficult for a great client to work with you?
What makes it difficult for talented employees to stay?
What policies exist simply because that’s how businesses in your industry traditionally operate?
Jason applies those questions to everything from contracts and compensation to workload and employee autonomy.
One particularly interesting example is capacity.
Socialistics intentionally avoids overloading its team.
Why?
Because Jason wants employees to have enough room to think creatively.
If someone has worked with a client for two years, Jason wants that person to have the capacity to stop on a Thursday afternoon and ask, What could we do for this client that’s fresh and interesting?
When employees are operating at maximum capacity every minute of every day, that kind of thinking becomes difficult.
The result may be greater short term utilization, but potentially weaker long term client relationships.
Bigger Isn’t Automatically Better Business Planning
One of the strongest business planning lessons from Jason’s story is his willingness to put a ceiling on growth.
Socialistics could potentially pursue a more aggressive agency model, continually acquiring new clients and maximizing revenue.
Jason doesn’t want that company.
He estimates Socialistics may ultimately remain within roughly the $3 million to $5 million range, and he’s comfortable with that.
Why?
Because that size supports the kind of company and life he wants to create.
There’s an important lesson here for business planning for entrepreneurs.
Growth should serve the owner’s definition of success.
If growing from $5 million to $10 million requires multiple additional layers of management, a different culture, higher employee workloads, or a completely different lifestyle for the owner, then that growth deserves to be evaluated against more than revenue.
The question becomes:
Does the next stage of growth move you closer to the business you wanted, or further away from it?
Business Planning for Entrepreneurs Requires a Clear Niche
When asked about one of the biggest mistakes he sees businesses making today, Jason pointed to a familiar problem:
Trying to be everything to everybody.
His recommendation is to niche down, particularly for service based businesses trying to establish themselves in crowded markets.
“Better to be a big fish in a small pond.”
Socialistics eventually chose nonprofits as a primary area of focus.
Jason went even further during our conversation, explaining that some businesses may benefit from sub niching, narrowing their specialization beyond a broad industry.
“Sub-niching is the way to go.”
For example, rather than simply serving nonprofits, an agency could initially establish authority serving a particular type of nonprofit.
That doesn’t mean the company must remain confined to that market forever.
It creates a starting point.
Once authority, reputation, and momentum have been established within one specialized market, the company can expand into adjacent areas.
For entrepreneurs without millions of dollars to spend getting attention, specialization can be one of the most effective ways to cut through the noise.
A Good Business Plan Still Requires Patience
Creating the plan is one thing.
Following it when results aren’t immediate is another.
Jason emphasized that once business owners make strategic decisions such as choosing a niche, they need to give those decisions an opportunity to work.
Constantly changing direction makes it difficult to build meaningful momentum.
That brought our conversation naturally to the question we ask every guest on Business Owners Tell All: What It Takes:
What does it take to be a business owner?
Jason’s answer?
Patience.
He also described needing the appetite and stamina to see things through.
Entrepreneurship occasionally produces a quick home run, but Jason believes that’s the exception.
For most owners, meaningful results take time.
“Great things take time to build.”
Patience doesn’t mean moving slowly for the sake of moving slowly. Jason specifically cautioned against allowing patience to turn into analysis paralysis.
It means understanding that if you believe a goal will take six months, it may take longer.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the plan was wrong.
Sometimes it simply means you’re still building.
Business Planning for Entrepreneurs: 8 Questions to Ask
Jason’s approach offers a different framework for business planning for entrepreneurs.
A successful plan isn’t simply a document filled with revenue projections and growth targets. It’s a series of intentional choices about the company you’re trying to create.
Ask yourself:
- What kind of life should this business allow me to live?
- Which clients and opportunities actually align with what we’re building?
- What should we deliberately say no to?
- Where can we specialize enough to become an authority?
- What people and leadership structure will make the company less dependent on me?
- What unnecessary friction can we remove for our employees and clients?
- How much growth actually supports our definition of success?
- Are we willing to stay with the plan long enough to see whether it works?
Business planning isn’t about predicting every challenge that will arise.
It’s about establishing enough alignment that when opportunities, challenges, and decisions appear, you know how to evaluate them.
Jason’s story demonstrates that sometimes the smartest growth decision isn’t to get bigger.
It’s to become more intentional about what you’re building in the first place.
Listen to Business Owners Tell All: What It Takes
Hear the full conversation with Jason Yormark on Business Owners Tell All: What It Takes, where business owners share the decisions, lessons, challenges, and experiences behind building companies that work.
In this episode, Jason shares the journey behind Socialistics, the philosophy behind Anti Agency, why he believes relationships should come before revenue, how specialization can accelerate growth, and why patience remains one of the most important qualities a business owner can develop.
Because ultimately, business planning for entrepreneurs isn’t only about how quickly you can grow.
It’s about knowing what you’re building, why you’re building it, and whether the business you’re creating supports the life you actually want to live.
