Technology Businesses Dominate Inc 500

Let's get right to it since I meant to blog about this subject in September.

If you read Inc Magazine you would have seen the latest Inc 500 list in September. If you don't read Inc Magazine, you probably should, by the way.

Either way, they put out their annual list exposing the fastest growing privately held companies in the US. They are all 5+ years old with the last 3 years having growth rates of 500%+. Many in the 1000% range. Now that's growth.

The reason I wanted to make sure you knew about this list is because we dominate it. We meaning those in the technology world.

As a matter of fact, almost half of the 500 businesses profiled were technology based businesses. And that's not including those that are purely in the manufacturing or construction world which I still consider to be technology based businesses for the most part.

IT, software and generally computer based businesses made up over 100 of these businesses. Wow! That's very good news for the techie business owner.

But I also wanted to break some things down to get you some goals to reach. Some are my own observations from being in your shoes before and some are extrapolated from the statistics given on the companies in the Inc 500 list.

Now don't get discouraged with the numbers I am throwing out here. You can be as big or small as you wish but these are averages. Most of these tech companies have about $8 million in revenues and 60 to 75 employees. It really does vary on what they provide so this is a very rough estimate without breaking down each business.

The way I always ran my show, and how I coach others, is to have about 30% admin/exec/sales/marketing people to 70% revenue producing staff (engineers, technicians, programmers etc). If you are a one person show, this obviously doesn't apply, but the next part will.

It seems the magic number for revenue producing staff is about $160,000 generated per person with said staff costing 50%-60% of that revenue. If you are on your own, you are doing well at this number and should (and probably will need) at least a part time admin. I could go deeper into these numbers but it would do no justice on an individual business basis. Feel free to contact me through the consultantscoach.com site to discuss your business directly.

The bottom line is that these technology companies on the Inc 500 list are doing it and most are still considered small businesses, with a few reaching the medium business level. Whether you are on your own, growing, or looking to grow it can be done following the benchmarks and footsteps of the businesses on this list.

You are in the right industry no matter what the economy looks like.

Technology is growing but also ever changing. As an owner of a smaller business and a true entrepreneur, you have the ability, and should have the desire, to keep up with or ahead of this curve. The key is to not just educate yourself and invent better ways to use technology to help your clients, but to also put forth the effort to have your business follow the where you go with the technology.

To Your Business Success

George Sierchio
The Consultant's Coach