Friday, November 13, 2026
Losing quotes to price feels like a pricing problem. It's usually a sameness problem. An OODA-loop exercise and a real client story show SME owners how to find the one line a competitor can't copy.
Last updated 14 November 2026. Published by Simple-Growth (Motherbase Limited). Market: United States.
This is a story about an owner who wants to believe they're built for this — but who lay awake last night genuinely wondering if they can keep doing it. You haven't said that out loud to anyone. Not your partner, not your accountant, definitely not your team. You've just kept showing up, looking steady, while quietly doing the maths on how much longer you can carry this feeling before something has to change. You're not weak for wondering. You're paying attention.
40% of US small business owners have considered giving up their business altogether, and owners lose an average of 33 working days a year to tax and financial stress, according to Xero's 2026 Emotional Tax Return research (Xero, US, 2026). If four in ten owners have genuinely thought about walking away, "not sure I can keep this up" isn't a rare, shameful thought. It's closer to the median experience of actually running a business — just one almost nobody says out loud, because the story we tell about successful owners has no room in it for doubt.
Kevin is open with every client about this, because he's lived it: across nine companies founded or co-founded, some have been genuine wins and some have been genuine failures. He doesn't frame the failures as a prelude to the wins, or a story that only makes sense in hindsight. "Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn" is how he actually talks about it — not as motivational framing, but as the honest shape of what thirty-plus years in business has actually looked like, including the parts that cost him money and sleep at the time.
That reframe matters because the alternative — treating every hard month as evidence you're failing at something other owners have figured out — is what actually drains people, not the hard month itself. The owners Kevin's coached who come back from a genuinely brutal stretch tend to do one specific thing differently: they stop asking "what's wrong with me" and start asking "what is this one thing teaching me, and who can I say that out loud to." That second question is the entire job of a good coach — not to remove the hard months, but to make sure you're not carrying them in silence, telling yourself a story no outsider would actually agree with if they saw the whole picture.
"Keeping me sane and focused during uncertain times."
Rachel Williams
Icehouse Coaching Programme
Saying it out loud feels like admitting the business — or you — have failed, so most owners manage the doubt privately, which is exactly the condition that makes it heaviest. This isn't for you if you've already got someone you tell the truth to every week, no performance, no spin — some owners genuinely have that, and it shows in how they carry hard months. It's for the owner who's been performing "fine" for months, to their team, their family, and themselves, because nobody's ever made it safe to say otherwise.
Yes — 40% of US small business owners surveyed in 2026 said they'd considered giving up their business altogether. The feeling is common; it's rarely discussed, which is what makes it feel unusual.
Saying it honestly to someone outside the day-to-day — a coach, a mentor, a trusted peer — rather than carrying it silently while performing "fine" for your team and family.
Regularly. Kevin is open that across nine companies founded or co-founded, some were genuine wins and some were genuine failures — doubt and real achievement are not opposites.
If you've been performing "fine" for longer than you'd admit, that's your real starting point.
Sunday, October 25, 2026
Seller-initiated deals close at nearly double the rate of buyer-initiated ones. Here's why proactive selling beats waiting for inbound, and how to shift the ratio.
Sunday, October 25, 2026
The best customer-acquisition channel most SME owners ignore isn't an ad platform — it's the audience someone else already spent years building. Here's how to borrow it properly.
Sunday, October 25, 2026
Most strategic plans don't fail in June — they fail the day they're signed off, while everyone still feels confident. Here's the one-page exercise that catches the fatal flaw first.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
79% of SME owners can't make a strategic plan stick, and it's not an ambition problem. Here's the one-page fix that turns an annual plan into a system you actually use every week.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
SMB customer acquisition cost rose 18.4 percent year on year in 2025. Here's Alex Hormozi's Value Equation, and why improving your offer beats outspending a rising ad market.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
A 2026 Bluehost study found 87 percent of small business owners now use AI daily, yet only 6 percent trust it with their brand voice. Here's exactly where a business coach still earns their fee.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
Gallup found 55 percent of US business owners have no real plan for their business beyond themselves. Here's the two-week test that reveals how dependent your business really is on you.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
LinkedIn's 2026 research found 40 percent of B2B deals end in "no decision," not a loss to a rival. Here's how to build urgency into your sales process so your pipeline stops dying in silence.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
Organic reach on Instagram fell roughly 14 percent year on year in 2026, and every platform is heading the same way. Here's the channel SME owners already own that no algorithm can throttle.
Saturday, October 24, 2026
Up to 90 percent of strategies never get executed, and it's almost never the document's fault. Here's the team dysfunction actually behind it, and how to fix it before you rewrite the plan again.
Friday, October 23, 2026
Two-thirds of small business owners are raising prices in 2026. If you're in the third who won't, the real problem is probably your offer, not your price point.
Friday, October 23, 2026
Revenue was fine. Profitability growth wasn't, for the first time in a year and a half. Here's the one number to track through your own busy season so the same thing doesn't happen to you.
Friday, October 23, 2026
Just 25% of business owners have natural delegator talent. Here's the Clockwork test a good coach runs before any strategy conversation happens.
Friday, October 23, 2026
31.7% of small business owners have never taken a full week off. Here's the handover document that actually fixes it, and how AI turns a week of writing into an afternoon.
Friday, October 23, 2026
Four in ten small business owners say they discount often, and a third still report sales down anyway. Here's the SPIN Selling framework that gets you to full price without the price cut.