Management Consulting – The BizzBee Solutions Story

18 Dec 2020

Dancho Dimkov shares the BizzBee Solutions story on the latest episode of “The Entrepreneur Speaks” podcast.

“Don’t find excuses, find solutions” is Dancho’s recommendation. There’ll always be obstacles and hurdles on your path to success.
The real question is how you perceive them.

As a Senior Business Consultant and a Serial Entrepreneur, Dancho and his team assist startups and businesses with critical tasks.
Such as market research, business plans, product sourcing, lead generation, and other services, so their clients can focus on growing their business and core proposition.

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Episode Transcript

[00:00:00.060] – Dancho – My recommendation is “Don’t find excuses, but find solutions.” There will be always problems, just how you actually look at them. And the second biggest recommendation is people wait for an opportunity to emerge. And you shouldn’t wait. You need to chase an opportunity, because if you just sit and wait for someone to call you, yes, someone will call you. But then you’re missing all the opportunities of connecting with other people. You know, business is a life matter. As you talk with people, you reshape your service, you upgrade your logic, you introduce new services. As you talk with people you understand new market needs, that you are not even aware before it. And then you think “Okay, but I can actually add a new service.” So if you start talking with people and if you start getting into the networking is very promising for entrepreneurs to succeed. And if they stop finding excuses and start finding solutions, then I can guarantee that there will be a very successful entrepreneurs.

[00:00:59.430] – Kofi – Welcome friends to “The Entrepreneur Speaks”. I’m your host, Kofi Anyemedu. Each week I host an amazing on their journey, successes and challenges. It is my hope that we will learn from the experiences as we all work towards living life of passion and purpose. I’m pleased to have my guests with us today. His name is Dancho Dimkov. He’s the founder and CEO of BizzBee Solutions. He’s passionate about helping small businesses define statistics of failure by bringing his many years of experience and expertise to the table. He joins me today to share his journey, as well as offer useful advice for businesses. Welcome to this episode of “The Entrepreneur Speaks”, Dancho.

[00:01:57.570] – Dancho – Hello. Hi, Kofi. Thank you very much for having me on “The Entrepreneur Speaks Podcast”. First, congratulations on spelling my name right, because I’ve seen a lot of variation in terms of “Danko”, “Dan”, “Danco”, so you got it right from the first time. So that is a positive mark.

[00:02:19.080] – Kofi – Thank you, Dancho, thank you. Let’s get to know you some more. Can you please tell us about yourself and how growing up was like.

[00:02:30.900] – Dancho – Sure, sure. I mean, there is a long story which could take four days telling you my whole history or there is a shorter story, as always. But honestly, if I need to summarize in few bits, it is actually I’m a serial entrepreneur, because I actually had started several companies in my lifetime. I’m currently proud founder of BizzBee Solutions, which is my core competence and my main business that I brought in. I’m a proud husband for like, probably six years. I’m not sure, but don’t tell about that. And at least I know I’m a proud father of a baby boy, which is a three years old. And for that, I’m certain. The longer story on how I was growing up is a bit longer one. I think that I’ve been an entrepreneur my whole life. I mean, my earliest recording in my memory about doing any kind of business is fourth grade. So I made my first sell, and my first business at fourth grade. Actually, at the time I was not aware it’s actually a business. I mean, you’re a fourth grader. You don’t really expect that you’re going to start thinking in that way. But here is the story. I was on a holiday and I actually bought a full bag and by bag, I think 10 kilos of candy, which was a big, big, big bag. You’ve seen those plastic bags with a lot of candy inside?

[00:03:59.070] – Kofi – Yes.

[00:04:00.210] – Dancho – Well, as a fourth graders, that sounds like a lot. So I actually went to school and started selling them. So I bought in bulk, I started selling them individually and, you know, I started selling to other fourth graders who, of course, don’t have money. So this is funny. We started bartending. We started compensating. So I’ll give you five candies, you give me a pen, I’ll give you six candy, you give me a pencil, I give you ten candies, you give me a notebook. And soon enough, I started getting a lot of stock of all the school materials that I did not really need. And the funny part is the teacher caught me and I was so scared because he was an old guy, you know, 40-50 something. And when he realised that I was selling, instead of screaming at me, he was like, okay, I want to buy some for my grandchild. He is going to actually pay about this. He gave me, I don’t know, a quarter of a dollar, very small amount, but that’s actually the first money I ever got from my business. And to keep it going, In the short version, of course, in high school, I started another venture, but it was in CDs. So you buy in bulk 300, 500 CDs. Then, I live in a small town where I could actually resell one by one and actually start making, earning the change. Then I moved to the capital, on college and during university, I actually started my first official company. It’s called AdvertSMS, and I was only 21 years old. I had no idea what I’m doing. I had no previous experience as an employee, so I had to catch up everything on the fly. To give you a quick background, AdvertSMS was a mobile marketing agency. So my point was that I would, I want to start sending SMSes. This is back in 2007, 2008, when there was no Facebook, there was no Twitter, Instagram and all the fancy tools that are now. So SMSes were quite efficient, at the time. And when I started, you know, we had the same problem. Where can we find users to start sending the SMSes? And that was the revolution I had at that period. I said, okay, what if I create a questioner and start sending it to people that they can feel your name, your surname, your age, your education, your interests. And then I can actually go to companies and say, okay, I have advanced targeting. I can actually filter out males only, from 25 to 30 years old that have interest in sports and I can put a specific SMS to them. I mean this is before even Facebook was invented and the advanced targeting was such a great concept that I actually got the Global Innovator for 2008, which was an international reward by the World Bank. So after that reward, I actually got a lot of open doors. I went as a guest speaker in Brazil on the Global Entrepreneurship and Innovation Forum, then another one in India, then another one in Finland. So it opened quite a lot of doors for me. Fast forward, after college at 28, I actually started BizzBee Solutions, which is my heart and soul at this point. And when I started BizzBee, I already had the experience. I mean, when I started AdvertSMS, I didn’t know how to sell. I didn’t know how to market. I didn’t know how to create a simple invoice. For me, it was weird because I had to take some of our suppliers and just recreate the invoice because I had zero experience at the time. But when I started BizzBee, I said, okay, now I know what I’m doing. So that’s the fast forward on how I actually grew up through several companies and failed several startups in between. But I’m sure I’ll tell you more about them at the later stage of this podcast.

[00:08:01.730] – Kofi – Thank you very much for this introduction. Now let’s talk about your business, BizzBee Solutions. Can you tell us about the business and what services do you offer?

[00:08:16.500] – Dancho – Sure, I mean, BizzBee Solutions actually started with more than five years ago, if I remember correct. I mean, time flies so fast. And when we started, we actually had several different services like market research, business planning, product sourcing, Lead Generation. Fast forward now we have more than 20 employees. We have a portfolio of more than 350 clients from around the world. I mean, you name a country. We have a client there. So if we’re looking at Canada, in USA, in Latin America, in Europe, in Asia. I mean, we even had several clients from Africa that we actually helped them a lot. Kofi, where are you from, actually, in Africa?

[00:09:07.110] – Kofi – From Ghana.

[00:09:09.120] – Dancho – Mm hmm. I will actually look this up if we actually worked with someone from Ghana. And I’ll tell you later, of course. But we had several clients from Africa, they were very strong entrepreneurs, and they just needed help. And I was there to actually help them in order to start a business and grow. The latest thing that we’re having in BizzBee Solutions is that from that entrepreneurial world, we now move to business and sell support services. So when it comes to cold Outreach and B2B sales, that’s something that we are really passionate about. It is the place, that unique angle that we found so good that now we are like the “go-to” guy. Whenever there is a company that says I need an Outreach, then they come to us. And I just checked as we were discussing, we actually had a home automation entrepreneur from Ghana that was interested in creating an IT solution that will automate the home. So, you know, sensors, lights on, lights off, curtains and things. And this is in June 2015. So we were working with a Ghana entrepreneur in order to help him, in order to create a business plan on how they can actually start that business. Then on another one from Ghana, there was an airline business plan where we were working with the entrepreneur in order to help him understand the feasibility of whether it’s doable to create an airline in Ghana. I don’t know if that entrepreneur actually started it. So you should check if you have any local airlines. But if they do, I would be so happy about it.

[00:11:00.230] – Kofi – Wow, that’s interesting. It would be good to get to know who the person is and I’ll check if the person is still in operation or whether the person started at all.

[00:11:10.610] – Dancho – Yeah, I just think that there is just one more entrepreneur that I helped from Ghana. That’s why I said Kofi, when we’re talking international, I really think international. So there was another business entrepreneur that wanted to start gold refinement. Wow, that’s really exciting. So we actually did some market research in order to understand the industry, the market, even the regulations in the gold refining. And we actually were looking at the competitors. So I had three entrepreneurs, all from Ghana that we actually worked with over the years. This one is from 2020. So that’s the latest project we were working in Ghana.

[00:11:49.730] – Kofi – Wow, that’s very interesting. So what’s the story behind the set-up of BizzBee Solutions? What’s the story behind the setup?

[00:11:59.270] – Dancho – Of, that’s a tough one. Hmm, well, you know what I mean, not to put two very long stories. I was working for an IT company and it was a software and hardware development company, and they had their own solution. So I spent like two or three years working as a Head of R&D as a full time. But the difference is that while I was doing that in my free time, I was actually doing freelancing because I’m not an IT guy. I’m a really good at economics, at business, at marketing, at sales, at entrepreneurship, but not at IT. So I found it really, really hard to work with I.T. people. You know, they have like a different parallel universe where they are in their own world and in order to reach to them and to properly communicate was a headache. So in my free time, I was actually joining this freelance platform. It’s like UpWork. It was oDesk, I think at that time, PeoplePerHour, freelancer.com, you name a freelance platform, I was there. And the difference was that I had a full time job of eight hours, but after work I was actually keeping on my freelance work. The funny part was that I actually enjoy it more after work because I was talking with entrepreneurs, with people that are so excited to have an idea or a vision that they can actually want to change the world rather than going on work, with the administration, with logistics. I was the head of a department, I had to take care of everything. So the inspiration came here that I actually enjoy more working with entrepreneurs rather than having a full time corporate job. And at one point I actually started earning more money as a freelancer than the full-time job. It was a weird thing because, you know, I get up early, I go to work. I spent eight hours there. After work, I go home and I spent another eight hours as a freelancer. So that was a tough time. In between, I was doing my education. I mean, I managed to get one master on entrepreneurship, which is what I love. So I actually signed up for a master on entrepreneurship. And in between, I also did one executive MBA on management. So I was doing the education. I had a full-time job and I had another freelance full-time job after that. That was really tough period. I mean, it is hard to manage two masters and two jobs at the same time. Anyway, the point was that when I started earning more as a freelancer, I realized that I had to live the permanent job. It was a risky and bold move because, you know, you have a stable job full time with a big salary. I mean, the IT world, they always have big salaries. And you need to go to the unknown, where you are as a freelancer. You know, now you have projects that you might not have it in three months from now. But I made that leap of faith and I actually did it. I just quit my job and I said, okay, I’m just going to start working as a freelancer. Now, that was a very interesting part of my life because I realized that as a freelancer, I don’t need to be physical in one place. I convinced my just married wife at that point that she can also be a freelancer so we can travel around the world. I mean, not around the world. You need a budget for that. But around Europe was pretty close for us. I mean, I’m from Macedonia. I jump in a car, started going, went to Serbia, went to Hungary, went to Germany, went to The Netherlands, went to Belgium, went to France. It’s like forty-five days euro trip, where you wake up, you work a bit, you go sightseeing, you go to a restaurant or a coffee shop, you keep on working, you keep on sightseeing at night, you keep working a bit, then you keep on travelling. So it was a very exciting and discovery experience for me because with a car you just drive. So that was very interesting and I said, okay, this is life, I can live like this forever. Make some money, spend some money, enjoy life. But then at one point I got sick somewhere in France or it was in the Netherlands that, nothing serious, honestly. But on the other hand, it made us rethink how we currently work, because when I was sick for a few days, my wife couldn’t work either. I couldn’t work either, which is a big point and a big problem if you’re working as a freelancer located in a hotel somewhere in the middle of France. So that got me thinking. It’s like, okay, if I want to make this sustainable, I really need to have a company. And on the other hand, you know, a newlywed wife, we were also started thinking about raising a family, having a kid. And I was aware that if my wife gets pregnant, there is no way I can actually keep up with the work or she could keep up with the work. So the only logical solution was to start a company. I mean, at this point we said, you know what, let’s start a company, let’s invest some time, bring some people in-house. So when my wife gets into the labour and leave, then we could have people still generating revenue for us even if we take a step back. So that’s why we said, okay, with high risk, with not a lot of money. I mean, we are really bootstrapped, so no money, to be clear. We said, let’s start BizzBee, let’s buy some computers on a credit card and let’s get four interns. So nothing fancy, nothing exciting. You just getting four interns, people to start helping and start building them along the way. So that’s how we actually got to starting BizzBee, Kofi.

[00:17:59.100] – Kofi – Wow, that’s very interesting. What has been some of the challenges you faced while running BizzBee?

[00:18:05.550] – Dancho – That is a tough question. There are a lot of challenges. I mean, we had a lot of ups and downs. And my biggest problem was that when I started BizzBee, as I told you, I was a freelancer. I didn’t need marketing. I didn’t need sales. I would just go to UpWork and I’ll just scroll through the gigs. You know, someone needs a business plan. Can I do it? I apply. I cannot do it, just skip it. But at some point, we grow to 20 plus people in-house and the freelancing was no longer an option. We needed a more stable project. And then I realized that I need to start the Outreach process because you cannot really have a client without any marketing budget. You cannot say, okay, I’ll just wait for the phone to ring and someone would probably show up and ask for a service. I need to, you know, put my gear on and start proactively looking for clients. So that was the biggest challenge that we were facing. Freelancing was not enough. We had to figure out a way how we can start proactively looking for clients. And honestly, I was so excited with that and so interested that after we figured that out, we actually started offering our Outreach service, which is based on our points. And the second challenge that I actually had was that it’s very hard to train employees and keep them loyal. I mean, as I told you, we started with just four interns and me and my wife, which then grew to four employees, then to ten, then to 12, then to 15, then to 20. And being just on top of it, it is really a headache. I wasn’t ready for that. Now we have a team, a sales team, with a sales manager. We have a marketing team, with a marketing manager, and we have two or three project managers that are currently handling the execution of the project. Now, with this structure, I can actually take a step back and just let my team do the job and I can actually focus on growing the business even further.

[00:20:17.880] – Kofi – Just as you talked about challenges, I believe there’s also been a lot of lessons you’ve picked up along the line. Can you share some of these lessons with us?

[00:20:29.000] – Dancho – Well, with every challenges there’re mistakes and after every mistake, you need to upgrade your logic and try to do things differently. My first lesson is that you really cannot wait for the clients to come knocking. I’ve said it many times. It’s like build it and they will come. Well, nobody comes, especially if you’re entrepreneur. If you’re just starting your business, you need to be very agile and proactive. You need to get your phone up, start calling people, start reaching out to prospects. I mean, it doesn’t need to be phone if you’re not comfortable in talking, if you’re not comfortable discussing in real time. Their written communication and Outreach capabilities, you can start sending emails in terms of “Hi, my name is Kofi, I would really believe that I can help you.” Or here is LinkedIn, which is a very good B2B platform that you can just start reaching out to people, connecting with them and start seeing if there is an opportunity. So the lesson one, is that, you cannot really wait for clients to come, because if you wait, if they don’t come, then you have a really big problem. The second one is that you really need to start taking your chances. BizzBee, although is now a bit more mature company, we still take some high-risk chances. I mean, there was a project back when we started, when we were just seven people as a company, and the project required 10 people, full time for two months. And that was a very risky move. But what I did is actually I just hired 10 new people, because I had existing commitments with the existing clients. And then within seven days, we find offices. We bought computers, we bought desks, we bought chairs. We interviewed people, we recruited the people, all within seven days. And instead of that should be my biggest success. Then the biggest problem was that now, okay, now I have two months to find work for those people, because the project was only for two months. And after that I would either need to leave them or, the challenge I accepted – I have two months to actually find enough work to keep them all. And we did it within two months we found enough work for ten more people, which was, you know, we were seven people. That is really exponential growth. And the third lesson that I saw is that people are capable of great things. You just need to put some time and effort in them. I realized from the mistakes, you need to see what people are happy doing it, what inspires them, and just give them that work. I mean, we’ve made mistakes. We found a person that is not really good in sales, and we said, okay you know what? You’re going to be in sales. They were doing great job. But since it’s not their core, it’s not their inspiration, it never went to the next level. On the other hand, now when we recruit people, we think, okay, start doing some general things. Let’s see what you enjoy doing, what inspires you and put you in that position. Because I know that if you’re interested, it’s no longer a boring job. Time stop being counted. You start doing learning after work, during work, because that’s really exciting for you and that’s your passion. And if you know your passion, then our job is just to give you direction. And then we see some very great results, Kofi.

[00:23:39.760] – Kofi – You’ve talked about inspiration for people. What inspires you to do what you’re doing?

[00:23:44.730] – Dancho – Well, first and foremost, my family, that’s like no one in any prioritization that I do, because as much I have to work when I go home, I have a wife that is waiting for me and a three-year-old baby boy. And I don’t know how your listeners can connect, but when we’re talking about the three-year baby boy, he’s so full of energy, he’s just waiting for me to come home and like, Daddy, Daddy, let’s play. So regardless how exhausted I am, regardless how hard day I have when I come home, you just need to restart, forget about work and just be with the family. The next thing that actually inspires me is the employees that I have. I mean, they do magic by magic. I don’t mean something weird. But in terms of, you know, they’re young people, they’re eager to learn, they’re eager to experiment, they’re eager to grow in their career. So just by giving them directions and give them thoughts and talking to them on how they can further grow, it’s really inspiring to teach that people on how they can become better. And finally, I’m really passionate about what I do. Maybe that’s why I stopped counting time. I don’t know how many hours I’m working, how many I’m resting, because there is always something new. There is always something interesting. And when you are passionate about your job, it’s no longer a job. I mean, I’ve talked with many entrepreneurs and you see the difference between a successful entrepreneur and unsuccessful one is that the unsuccessful one is motivated by “I need to make some money”, while the successful one is just like looking at what are their hobbies and try to make money out of them. So if you’re an artist and you love painting, just figure out how to make that into a profitable business. If you’re really interested in doing a podcast, for example, and you just love doing that, then you should start considering how to make it as a business, because if you love that, you can talk for five hours, for 10 hours straight, and you wouldn’t be exhausted at the end of the day. But on the opposite side, you’ll be so inspired by that.

[00:25:45.320] – Kofi – Thank you very much for sharing this with us. We find ourselves in this new era where we are confronted with the Covid-19 pandemic. Have you hindered or boosted your presence in any way?

[00:25:57.860] – Dancho – Well, Corona is here, like it or not, we have to adjust to it. For us, first hindered but then boosted our business. I mean, when I say hindered, we had several projects that were put on hold or even completely stoped, because they were dependent on physical events. We had a client from Norway, that we were doing Lead Generation and we were actually screening for B2B exhibitions and events. And when the Corona hit, all the B2B events halted. So we had to put the project on hold or we had another client from Ireland, which was an English learning school, which was inviting corporations to actually come to Ireland and learn the language. So, you know, when Corona hit, they had to put the project on hold. On the other hand, when we had upcoming projects with some companies, that they were ready to actually sign up and start working with us. Entrepreneurs, companies, investments, businesses, they all put their investment decisions on hold. I mean, during Corona, you don’t want to spend half a million or a lot of money on a project and since there is uncertainty, you think, okay, let Corona pass and then I’ll see if I continue. So this project were also on hold for us. However, on the other hand, we are in the B2B world and people are used to going to conferences, webinars, B2B events, physical stuff and talk with people and matchmaking. With the Corona that was taken away from them. So they don’t really had alternatives because as you see when the Corona hit, they need to figure out a different way and different channels on how they can start finding leads and prospects and new clients. So for us, that actually brought us a lot of clients. We are here. We have the knowledge and expertize to do email and LinkedIn lead generation and not just lead generation, lead nurturing, appointment settings, even helping them in the closing part. So all these businesses that were previously doing the physical way of lead generation, now they were pushed. They had to find a way fast of generating leads online and we were here. So that brings us a lot of clients that were struggling and we were here to help them. On the other hand, now with the Covid-19, it also helped us rediscover I mean, you know, it started with work from home. It has effect on our operation. We had to start disbanding the team, working from home. Luckily our service is digital, so people could just continue working from home. But on the other hand, it pushed us to shift from generalist to specialist. I mean, on our website one month ago, you could come and see that we do market research, business planning, product sourcing, lead generation and plenty of other services. But now during this Corona, we use the time to specialize. So now we have one service, one solution, and we want to be considered as experts in that field. So if you imagine a doctor, you have a doctor, a generalist when you go just to check you out and you actually have a doctor, which is a surgeon, heart surgeon, for example. So we actually moved from a general doctor that we can do anything that you need. We said, no, we’re now specialists in heart surgery. And if you need that particular field, we are the expert. And it’s interesting Kofi, because then we become the “go-to” guy. You know, if you have 20 services, it’s like it’s a consulting company doing various services. When we said, no, we are B2B Growth, then we become the “go-to” guy. If you have a B2B business and you want to grow, we are the guy that shifted our business significantly. It was thank to Covid-19 because that’s the thing that actually pushed us to reevaluate where we are and where we want to go.

[00:29:38.610] – Kofi – I want to spend my time now talking about issues that you deal with on a daily basis. You spend your time helping businesses and companies. So I want you to advise people and businesses. So let’s start off with the advice for someone who is desirous of starting a business.

[00:29:58.370] – Dancho – Yeah, honestly, I’ve talked with so many entrepreneurs that I started finding patterns. There are a lot of people that, like I’m an entrepreneur, you know, they get together, have a few drinks, I have an idea, let’s do a business on this. And they come to us and say, I have an idea, I’ll become a millionaire in six months or less. And for me, it’s like, good luck. That’s not going to work. On the other hand, I have people that actually spent some time as an employees working that particular thing, and they become expert in that field. And then they’re saying, you know what, I have the expertize I think I want to start my own business, and those entrepreneurs are highly more likely to succeed than the people that just got an idea. And on the other hand, as I said previously, is the passion. If the goal of the business is to make money, It will fade away. You’re going to lose the ambition. You’re going to lose the desire. However, if you’re driven by passion and you actually want to do what you really love to do, then things change. Then time stops being counted and you lose yourself in the thing that you want to do. So we have a saying here in BizzBee and I really enforce it with every employee and with everybody. And there is a quote. I really don’t know who said it, but I live by it every day. And it is saying, “If you want to do something, you’ll find a way to do it. If you don’t, you will find an excuse why not to do it.” And that really resonated with me. I mean, so many times it’s like, oh, but I cannot do that because of this, this, this, this, this. And that’s a lot of excuses on why you shouldn’t do something. On the other hand, I know people with far less opportunities and they’re like, okay, this problem came in. I found a way to go over it. Then another problem came in. I found another way overcoming it. And I think that the business is just overcoming problems. I don’t know a company that doesn’t have a problem. As an entrepreneur, you have one complexity. As a startup, you have different complexity and different problems. As a corporation, with the billions in revenues, you still have problems. It’s just different level. So if you start with excuses, why not to do something, you will never be able to grow. And this is also on a personal level. It’s not just for a company. You need to start running to lose weight. Yeah, but I don’t have sneakers, I don’t have music, the weather, it’s cold, it’s hot. It’s too many excuse. On the other hand, if you really want to do it, you just do it. It will be harder because of the problems, but you overcome them. So it’s a really nice quote. I don’t know who said it, I’ll actually Google it to see, but it’s stuck in my head and it’s always like if you really want to do something, you find a way. But if you don’t, you just start finding excuses.

[00:32:42.280] – Kofi – Thank you very much. Now, how about for someone who is already in business, what would be your words of advice?

[00:32:48.580] – Dancho – Well, that is a fellow, because he’s already started and I can just tell him the mistakes that I did because those are critical. If you have a business, start thinking about marketing. I didn’t do it because I was a freelancer. And it took me three years to realize that I actually need marketing in order to have a successful business. And on the other hand, you need to start building a relationship with people. Networking is something that only few people talk about it. And it’s really like a cloudy sentence. Well, you need to network and everybody think, yeah, yeah, yeah, you need to network, because it’s important to be in a network and it’s important to be part of a network. But I don’t think that everybody understands the importance of network. When it comes to more expensive services or solution, nobody is just screening on UpWork or just Googling. People want to ask for referrals and I’ll come to you and say “Kofi, do you know anyone that is good in working with entrepreneurs?” And then you need to have a “go-to” guy for that service. And in order to be that, you really need to specialize. And it’s not just the specialization, people need to know about you. So I also learned that a bit later. But the moment I did, I actually said, okay, what are the Chambers Associations organization that I can join in? I’m not going to get a lot of clients from them, that’s for sure, because it will be filled with alike people. So I’m currently a member of the Macedonian Associations of Management Consultants, and there are like-minded people. I can even see they’re competitors to me. But when you stop looking them as a competitors, magic happens. I mean Kofi, I had more than ten projects, where I didn’t got it from them, but they’re saying, you know what Dancho, your Outreach, I’m a financial guy. Let’s apply together to a project opportunity that came up. And then I realized that we’re not really that competitors. We are actually complementary to each other in order to together reach new markets. So with the networking, we realize that you’re aligning yourself to other companies, another solution. And together you can actually make much better result than you just fighting yourself on the market only.

[00:34:58.450] – Kofi – Thank you very much. We are just about ending our conversation for today. Do you have any last words or advice for my listeners?

[00:35:05.740] – Dancho – Yeah, sure. Kofi, I really hope that your entrepreneurs will be inspired and take the courage and say, okay, I’m going to start that business. And yeah, if I wanted to have excuses, then I wouldn’t be here. But since they’re actually listening to your podcast, they’re making the effort. They are trying to find a way to do something. And if that’s the case, my recommendation is don’t find excuses, but find solutions. There will be always problems, just how you actually look at them. And the second biggest recommendation is people wait for an opportunity to emerge. And you shouldn’t wait. You need to chase an opportunity, because if you just sit and waiting for someone to call you, yes, someone will call you. But then you’re missing all the opportunities of connecting with other people. You know, business is a life matter. As you talk with people, you reshape your service, you upgrade your logic, you introduce new services. As you talk with people, you understand new market needs, that you are not even aware before it. And then you think, okay, but I can actually add a new service. So if you start talking with people and if you start getting into the networking is very promising for entrepreneurs to succeed. And if they stop finding excuses and start finding solutions, then I can guarantee that they will be a very successful entrepreneurs.

[00:36:26.260] – Kofi – Thank you very much Dancho Dimkov for sharing with us.

[00:36:32.530] – Dancho – This is second time you got my name and surname right. So that is really good Kofi.

[00:36:36.850] – Kofi – Thank you very much. I wish you the very best.

[00:36:38.480] – Dancho – I am very grateful for having me on this podcast. I’m sure that all the entrepreneurs would love to hear all your podcast because I understand the value that people can do mistakes. Entrepreneurs have a lot of obstacles and don’t know how to proceed. And this kind of podcast Kofi, is actually a way that you can help entrepreneurs get insights from different entrepreneurs, from entrepreneur to entrepreneur. So if I manage to help at least one entrepreneur from preventing them from making a mistake, I’m really grateful.

[00:37:11.080] – Kofi – Thank you very much for your words of advice and encouragement. This has been another exciting episode of The Entrepreneur Speaks podcast. Expect another amazing episode next time. I’m your host, Kofi Anyemedu. Stay safe and let’s keep our hope alive. Cheers.

[00:37:29.950] – Dancho – Bye bye, everybody.