Lessons From Building Businesses



 Idea to success, building a business map

I’m 2 years into multipreneurship.

I embarked on this journey because I loved the early days of building Morning Brew, and I wanted to recreate that feeling over and over and over again.

The plan was simple:

  • Incubate 1-2 new businesses per year

  • Spend most of my time in the 0-to-1 phase

  • Bring on a CEO as soon as a business’s cash flow can afford it

  • Fire myself from the business within 12 months

Table of Contents

  • Initial Doubts

  • Case Study: storyarb

  • Key Lessons

    1. Picking the Right CEO Is Everything

    2. Everything Takes Longer Than You Think

    3. Pivoting Is the Rule, Not the Exception

    4. You Need the Right Structure

    5. Think of Yourself as a Product

    6. Multipreneurship Isn’t for Everyone

  • Conclusion

Initial Doubts
I had doubts about this model from the jump:

  • Building something great requires maniacal focus. This model is unfocused by design.

  • I had an early win with Morning Brew, but I wasn’t sure if I was lucky or actually good.

  • It was unclear if I could find great talent that would subscribe to this model.

It’s only inning two and there’s a lot to be proven, but early signs are strong.

Case Study: storyarb
Business: storyarb
What we do: World-class content for high-growth B2B brands

I co-founded the business with Abby Murray 22 months ago, and since making a large pivot 6–8 months ago, it’s been on fire:

  • $3,000,000 in revenue annualized

  • Growing 20% per month

  • 25% profit margins

  • An absolutely savage team

  • And I could get hit by a bus tomorrow and the business would be totally fine.

Key Lessons
Here are some key lessons:

  1. Picking the Right CEO Is Everything
    You can only build a portfolio of businesses if you trust your partners to execute them autonomously and successfully.

  2. Everything Takes Longer Than You Think
    My original goal was to fire myself from storyarb within 12 months.

In reality, it took 18 months to get there.

  1. Pivoting Is the Rule, Not the Exception
    The odds that you nail the first product from the jump are almost 0%.

Your ability to absorb information, find signal, and know the right time to shift course is underrated.

  1. You Need the Right Structure
    In this next phase of multipreneurship, a huge to-do for myself is to answer the following questions:

  • How many ideas can I work on at any given time?

  • What is my process for qualifying ideas?

  • What milestones must I hit to turn qualified ideas into legit businesses?

  1. Think of Yourself as a Product
    The only way to command significant upside in the businesses I launch, while being able to step out of the day-to-day, is to offer so much value to my cofounder that it is worth their time.

For me, it’s three things:

  • Distribution: a trusted audience gives my businesses unfair access

  • Zone of genius: my three gifts (invention, storytelling, curiosity) increase the odds of getting through the 0-to-1

  • My network: my network of founders, investors, and operators gives my cofounder an edge

  1. Multipreneurship Isn’t for Everyone
    Multipreneurship shouldn’t be an empty goal. It should be the solution to a problem.

Conclusion
My problem: I love the 0-to-1 phase.
My solution: Being the co-founder, but not CEO, of many businesses.

Learn more about my approach to building multiple businesses at Alex Lieberman .

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