Josh Hadley is the Founder and CEO of an eight-figure e-commerce business called Hadley Designs. Hadley Designs is an online graphic design boutique where customers can choose, design, download, and print home decor and invitations. Josh is also an e-commerce business consultant and the host of the eComm Breakthrough Podcast, which is dedicated to helping brands exceed eight-figure profits.
Before starting Hadley Designs and eComm Breakthrough, Josh graduated with an MBA from the Lassonde New Venture Development program at the University of Utah. Josh then took his talents to Dallas, where he honed his business, marketing, and project management skills as an executive for American Airlines.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- The five biggest mistakes Josh Hadley made early in his entrepreneurship journey
- How fear drove Josh to diversify his income streams too quickly
- Josh explains why you should double down on the e-commerce channel that works best for you
- Josh warns new business owners against hiring too soon
- Why a project manager should be your first hire
- Josh discusses his processes for hiring the best talent
- How to use social media and e-commerce channels to inspire fresh creativity
In this episode…
In our first thought leadership episode, Josh Hadley discussed his entrepreneurial conquests and the inspiration behind Hadley Designs.
Josh also mentioned his motivation for starting his podcast, eComm Breakthrough, which is a direct result of the lessons he’s learned from his entrepreneurial hiccups. In fact, there was a point early on in his business venture when Josh felt like giving up. Now, Josh shares the five mistakes he wants you to avoid.
In this episode of Josh Hadley’s eComm Breakthrough Podcast, Chad Franzen of Rise25 once again flips the script and interviews Josh in the second part of their Thought Leadership discussion. Together, these well-versed business-to-business podcasters discuss understanding e-commerce channels that work best for your business, the best time to hire and who to hire, how to inspire creativity for your brand, and more.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Josh Hadley on LinkedIn
- eComm Breakthrough Consulting
- eComm Breakthrough Podcast
- Email Josh: Josh@eCommBreakthrough.com
- Hadley Designs on Amazon
- Hadley Designs
- Rise25
- Chad Franzen on LinkedIn
- Roland Frasier on LinkedIn
- Seven Acquisition Strategies To Scale To Eight Figures and Beyond
Sponsor for this episode…
This episode is brought to you by Ecomm Breakthrough Consulting where I help seven figure ecommerce owners grow to eight figures. Of course…
Listen, Chad Franzen
I started Hadley Designs in 2015 and grew it to an eight-figure brand in seven years.
I made mistakes along the way that made the path to eight figures longer. At times I doubted whether our business could even survive and become a real brand. I wish I would have had a guide to help me grow faster and avoid the stumbling blocks.
If you’ve hit a plateau and want to know the next steps to take your business to the next level, then go to www.EcommBreakthrough.com (that’s Ecomm with two M’s) to learn more.
As a special bonus to my podcast listeners, this month I’m giving away one $10,000 comprehensive business strategy audit session at no cost. Email me at josh@ecommbreakthrough.com with the subject line “Strategy Audit” and tell me why your business should win the free audit for the chance to win and don’t worry, if you don’t win the free strategy audit this month, you’ll automatically be entered for future months.
Episode Transcript
Josh Hadley 0:05
Hi, Josh Hadley, here host of the eComm Breakthrough Podcast where I interview the top business leaders in e-commerce. This episode is brought to you by eComm Breakthrough Consulting, where I help seven-figure companies grow to eight figures and beyond. I started Hadley Designs in 2015, and grew it to an eight-figure brand in seven years. I made a lot of mistakes along the way, we’ll be talking a lot about those today. But along that path to eight figures, I made a lot of mistakes. And at times, I doubted whether our business could even survive and actually become a real brand. I wish I would have had a guide to help me grow faster and overcome those easy stumbling blocks that I encountered. If you’ve hit a plateau and you want to know the next steps to take your business to the next level, then go to eCommBreakthrough.com. That’s eComm with two M’s to learn more. And as a special bonus to my podcast listeners. This month, I’m giving away one $10,000 comprehensive business strategy audit session at no cost. Email me at Josh@eCommBreakthrough.com with the subject line “strategy audit,” and tell me why your business should win the free strategy audit for the chance to win. And don’t worry if you don’t win the free strategy audit this month, because you’ll automatically be entered for future months. Today, I am excited. I have Chad Franzen in here of Rise25, who has done hundreds of interviews with successful entrepreneurs and CEOs. We have flipped the script and he will be interviewing me today.
Chad Franzen 1:38
Hey, Josh, thanks so much. It’s great to be here. Hey, in our last episode, I spoke to you about some of the amazing success that you’ve had with Hadley Designs. But as you mentioned you you also made some mistakes kind of along the way. And I thought it would be interesting to kind of get into those. So people who are listening, maybe can learn from your mistakes to prevent them from making them in the future. Why don’t you give me some maybe a broad view of some of the maybe primary mistakes that you feel like you made and then we can kind of dive into them.
Josh Hadley 2:08
Yeah, that I think this episode could go on for hours and hours, maybe even days and days in terms of mistakes that I’ve made and failures along the way. Like I mentioned, kind of in the introduction, you know, my path to eight figures was not just an easy walk in the park, so to speak. It definitely came with a lot of challenges. And genuinely there were times where I really doubted myself, and could I actually grow a real brand? Could I actually run a successful business. And so let’s let’s dive into some of these, I’ll kind of give you a high level overview of what you know, kind of the top level mistakes that I want to share with the audience. Because ultimately, my goal is that for everybody listening, you’re able to avoid these mistakes that I made, and help you move faster in your own journey as an entrepreneur. So let’s talk about mistake number one is thinking that I have to be diversified in every sales channel possibly are possible out there. Okay, number two is going to be hiring people without having like clearly defined roles, and probably hiring people to just solve the problem without me actually understanding the problem. And very clearly defining that role. Number three is going to be waiting too long to document the processes in my business. And then number four is hiring, trying to hire people at the cheapest rate possible. And then number five is launching, you’re creating me to products that aren’t 100% original, or unique. So those are gonna be like the five big mistakes that I’d love to share with the audience today. Chad, where would you like to start?
Chad Franzen 3:51
Yeah, you know, when I hear you list those mistakes, I think like, I think most people would probably think along the same lines that you were thinking maybe when you first started making those mistakes. So I think it’ll be very interesting and informative to hear some kind of your journey regarding these mistakes. Why don’t we start with the first one having you felt like you had to diversify the business and communicate through all channels. Tell me maybe what your thought process was going in? And why that seemed like a good idea at the time.
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