In short: Six South African founders, across catering, marketing, PR, consulting and coaching, were asked what they wish they’d known before starting. The pattern across their answers: get proper systems and pricing right early, and stop trying to be everything to everyone.
What tools do these founders wish they’d adopted sooner?
Tanya Haffern, author, wealth coach and property investor, points to the basics most new businesses skip: “You need a basic accounting system, and registering a company allows you to claim business-related expenses.” Munene Khoza, founder of MINT Language Consultancy, moved from manual Excel invoicing to an integrated accounting platform and calls it transformative for reporting, payroll and sales tracking in one place. Jacques du Bruyn, co-founder and managing director of digital marketing agency Flume, credits switching early to cloud collaboration tools (Google Workspace, later Slack) as “the best decision we’ve ever made,” specifically because it supported an agile way of working from day one rather than retrofitting it later. Hezron Louw, co-owner of catering company Sumting Fresh, wishes he’d adopted an affordable project management tool sooner to track sales leads and staff work, saying its absence held the business back in its early years.
What pricing mistake do most first-time founders make?
Khoza’s mistake is a common one: pricing services based on what freelancers charge for similar work, without accounting for overheads, payroll and the other fixed costs a registered business carries that a freelancer doesn’t. “You can’t look at pricing as if you are a freelancer,” he says. This is worth checking early, a business modelled on freelancer rates is quietly underpricing itself from the start.
Should you test demand before building the product?
Haffern is direct on sequencing: “Take a product or service to the market before launching, test the idea, test the demand, before you put too much time and effort into it.” Her advice reverses the instinct many first-time founders have to perfect the product first and validate it later, when checking demand first is both cheaper and faster to course-correct from.
How important is hiring the right people early?
Du Bruyn’s regret is specific: “I wish I knew to hire the right people first, even if it means lowering your salary to afford them. They will free you up in the long run to focus on what matters.” Learning soft skills (delegation, communication, giving feedback) earlier would have compounded that benefit further, in his view. Lizelle McDermott, managing director of PR agency McD Squared, makes a related point about staffing decisions: sometimes the right call is letting go of people who are holding the business back, even when that’s the harder short-term decision.
Why does having a clear vision matter this much?
McDermott names this as one of the biggest mistakes she sees: “One of the biggest mistakes an entrepreneur can make is to try and be everything to everyone. Know what your Unique Selling Proposition is and where you want to see your company in the future.” Nompumelelo Taukobong, founder and CEO of ZinTisa Holdings, adds a practical layer to this: planning marketing and activity around specific dates and seasons (Valentine’s Day, Youth Month) made her business measurably more relevant to customers than reacting to the calendar as it happened.
What do these founders wish they’d understood about marketing?
Taukobong’s regret is specific to visibility: “I wish I had known about the importance and costs involved in marketing and branding of the business, also how social media reach and mentions can boost your business.” Underestimating marketing spend early is a recurring blind spot even among founders who get their financial and operational systems right from the start.
Frequently asked questions
What’s the biggest early-stage mistake these founders warn against?
Pricing based on freelancer rates without accounting for real overheads, and trying to serve every possible customer instead of defining a clear positioning.
Should I validate demand before or after building my product?
Before, according to Tanya Haffern’s advice here. Testing demand first is both cheaper and gives you the chance to adjust before you’ve invested heavily in the product itself.
Is it worth paying more to hire better staff early on?
Several founders here say yes, even at the cost of a lower personal salary in the short term, because the right early hires free the founder to focus on higher-value work sooner.
How much should a small business budget for marketing?
These founders don’t give a fixed number, but consistently underestimated it early on. Treat marketing and branding as a real line item from the start rather than an afterthought once the product is built.
Originally published in February 2019. Updated September 2026.
