18-Phase Program
A guided path from first question to running business
Business Math is planned as an 18-phase program followed by ongoing guidance. Every founder completes the same decisions in the same order; the wording, examples and evidence adapt to your business. Each phase hands its approved results to the next.
Program stages
- Phases 1–2DiscoverUnderstand the founder, then compare businesses and choose one that fits, with three starting services.
- Phases 3–6Validate & designTest real demand, define one deliverable offer, work out the economics and create minimum credibility.
- Phases 7–9Get ready to sellSet up the legal, financial and fulfillment foundations before any customer is charged.
- Phases 10–13Prove & buildMake a first controlled sale, correct the business from real results, then build the sales system and public presence.
- Phases 14–18Grow & operateTest marketing with real numbers, then launch fully, improve delivery, document procedures and run the business.
- OngoingConsultant ModeDaily, weekly and 14-day guidance that adapts to real results.
Stage groupings are for reading convenience. The phases themselves, and what each must produce, come from the Business Math specifications.
Rules that apply in every phase
- Reuse before asking. Approved answers carry forward; you only correct what changed.
- One decision per screen. Usually no more than four related inputs at once.
- Evidence, not clicks. Viewing, uploading or buying something never completes a task by itself.
- Targeted corrections. A contradiction returns you to the exact earlier decision, and only affected work reopens.
Select a phase to see the details. Task counts reflect the current specifications.
Phases 1–2
Discover
Understand the founder, then compare businesses and choose one that fits, with three starting services.
Key outputs: Founder Thesis and Business Discovery Record
Founder DiscoveryYour life, skills, money, time and goals.50 tasks in 10 sections
Build a complete, confirmed picture of you before any business is suggested. It is the first thing every founder does; everything else stays locked until it is approved.
What you provide
- Your situation, how urgently you want to start and what stage you are at
- Strengths, weaknesses and skills, with skill levels and whether you enjoy the work
- Work history (upload, paste or enter), credentials and any proof of credibility
- Household responsibilities, protected times and lifestyle boundaries
- Weekly availability, energy, and when you need income
- Monthly expenses, savings, borrowing limits and funding preferences
- Assets, contacts and customer groups you can already reach
- Preferred type of work, business model, customers, motivation and risk
What you work through
- Ten short sections, from basic information to risk and motivation
- Partners invited to their own accounts; one founder’s answers are never copied into another’s
- Reviewing advantages the system detects from your answers
- Resolving contradictions in what you have said
How Business Math guides you
- Calculates your needs-only expense floor, income gap and runway (emergency funds ÷ monthly needs-only expenses)
- Separates money you could safely use from money that must stay protected
- No credit check; a credit range is optional
What you produce
- Founder Thesis: your financial survival floor, income targets, startup capital, runway, time and energy, skills, advantages, risk profile, preferences, restrictions, and business characteristics to favor or avoid
When it’s complete: You review the generated Founder Thesis section by section and approve it. The approved version is locked as version 1 and stays editable; later changes are saved as new versions.
What carries forward: Opportunity Discovery imports the Founder Thesis instead of asking the same questions again.
Opportunity DiscoveryCompare businesses and choose one, with three starting services.86 tasks in 12 sections
A guided business-strategy session, not a generic idea generator. It turns the Founder Thesis into a Business Vision, a ranked list of realistic businesses, one selected business, one target customer and three starting services.
What you provide
- Where the business would operate and how far you will travel
- Income you need, investment limits and the effort you can give
- Why you want a business and what success means to you
- The size, role, schedule, customers, sales style and revenue you want
- A ranking of your business priorities, which becomes part of the scoring
- Up to five of your own ideas and any evidence for them
What you work through
- Resolving tradeoffs such as fast income versus long-term value
- Approving your Business Vision before any ideas are generated
- Reviewing 10–20 ranked businesses and any that were removed
- Comparing up to five finalists side by side and working through tradeoff scenarios
- Selecting the business, then accepting, replacing or editing each starting service
How Business Math guides you
- Generates about 30–75 ideas from your record and evaluates your own ideas the same way
- Removes legally, financially and operationally impossible businesses, with a stored reason for each
- Researches demand, competition, pricing, startup cost, working capital, time to revenue, licensing, risks and more
- Rates each business one to five stars for fit, with research confidence shown separately
- Explains every ranking against your Founder Thesis and Business Vision
- Recommends a best overall fit, safest fit, fastest path to revenue and highest long-term potential
What you produce
- Business Discovery Record: Business Vision, selected business and why it fits, target customer, operating location, three starting services, preliminary budget, pricing and unit economics, time to first revenue, major risks, and the assumptions that still need validation
When it’s complete: Complete only when you confirm: this is the business I want to validate, these are the first three services I want to consider offering, and this accurately explains why they fit me.
What carries forward: The assumptions that need validation become the starting queue for Market and Customer Validation. Nothing is described as proven yet.
Phases 3–6
Validate & design
Test real demand, define one deliverable offer, work out the economics and create minimum credibility.
Key outputs: Validation Brief, Minimum Business Model, Financial Starting Brief, brand kit
Market and Customer ValidationTest whether real customers need this and will act.24 tasks
Produce credible evidence about a defined customer, their buying situation, their problem, the alternatives they use and their willingness to act, then make an explicit decision to proceed, revise, retest or go back.
What you provide
- Corrections to the loaded business record, where facts changed
- Results from real conversations, observations, tests, quotes, pilots or preorders
- The source, date, scope and limits of each result
What you work through
- Separating who has the problem from who buys, approves or pays
- Choosing the first customer segment to validate
- Describing the trigger that makes customers act, and what they do today instead
- Choosing the least expensive ethical way to test the most important unknown
- Running the check and returning with evidence
- Testing willingness to act or pay, and recording objections
- Deciding: pass, revise, retest or stop
How Business Math guides you
- Classifies every claim as verified, observed, reported, inferred, assumed or unknown
- Prepares exact scripts and checklists; never a vague instruction like “research demand”
- Does not force interviews when behavior or transaction evidence would answer better
- Treats likes and compliments as interest, not payment evidence
- Keeps conflicting evidence visible instead of averaging it away
What you produce
- Confirmed customer-and-problem record
- Validation Brief: methods, findings, evidence, risks and next questions
When it’s complete: Status is Ready to build offer, Conditional, or Return for correction. Stopping returns to Opportunity Discovery without deleting history.
What carries forward: The Minimum Business Model builds the offer on the confirmed customer and problem.
Minimum Business ModelOne clear offer you can price and deliver.24 tasks
Turn the validated customer and problem into one coherent, priceable and deliverable starting offer. Pricing itself happens in the next phase.
What you provide
- Decisions about what the offer includes and excludes
- Results of an outside check with a provider, platform, expert, customer or official source
- A comprehension check: a relevant person restates the offer in their own words
What you work through
- Studying two comparable offers and the customer’s current alternatives
- Defining what the customer receives, the limits, and the customer’s responsibilities
- Choosing the delivery unit and what “done” means
- Testing the scope against easy, normal and difficult practice requests
- Walking through one representative delivery from start to closeout
- Verifying the resource most likely to block delivery
- Practicing a reply to a sample inquiry, then choosing the lead offer
How Business Math guides you
- Adapts wording, examples and units to your business model
- Shows one decision per screen, with no more than four related inputs
- Accepts an accurate restatement as a passed check; praise alone does not pass
What you produce
- Working offer sheet
- Lead offer and delivery-unit definition
- Preparation backlog for missing capabilities
- Versioned Minimum Business Model
When it’s complete: Status is Ready, Conditional or Hold, with no claim of success or legal readiness.
What carries forward: Economics, Pricing and Capital receives the quantities, time, resources, revenue model and payment timing.
Economics, Pricing and Capital PlanPrices, costs, cash flow and what the business must earn.48 tasks (3 run later, after real sales)
Turn your goals, resources and offer into provisional prices, a staged spending plan, realistic operating targets, a cash-flow plan and your next assignments.
What you provide
- Confirmation of income and funding boundaries from Founder Discovery
- Verified costs, such as supplier or platform quotes
- Owner pay and personal runway decisions
- The immediate income goal you want to plan for
What you work through
- Defining the priced unit and every direct cost, including your own time
- Building monthly overhead and a staged startup spending list
- Choosing a pricing method and comparing candidate prices with market evidence
- Stress-testing the economics and saving a provisional price card
- Turning your available hours into a working calendar and testing income targets
- Building a dated cash-flow timeline and testing a slower start
- Setting first targets and next week’s assignments
How Business Math guides you
- Ordinary software does the math: contribution, margin, break-even, cash and funding gap
- AI drafts explanations and next actions but cannot introduce numbers the calculations did not produce
- Keeps estimates, research, observed results and simulations visibly separate
- States that a calculated workload is not a sales forecast
What you produce
- Provisional price or revenue card for each offer
- Staged startup and overhead budgets with a cash reserve policy
- Cash-flow timeline
- Financial Starting Brief
- Next week’s assignments
When it’s complete: You confirm one version of the plan: ready for next preparation, conditional, or hold for correction. Confirming does not authorize purchases, publishing or delivery.
What carries forward: Brand and Minimum Credibility works within the approved budget.
Brand and Minimum CredibilityName, message, look and a first customer-facing asset.32 tasks in 6 sections
Turn the approved business into a Brand Strategy and Minimum Credibility Kit. Business Math does the brainstorming, research, comparison, drafting and preparation; you make the decisions.
What you provide
- Brand preferences and ratings, with reasons when you have them
- Name-conflict and availability research results
- Feedback from relevant people who tested your asset and contact route
What you work through
- Choosing how to do the work: use what you have, create it yourself or hire help
- Naming criteria, a ranked name shortlist and conflict research
- Positioning, honest differentiators, promises and voice
- Visual direction, colors, typography, logo and imagery
- Choosing the customer’s first action and a working contact route
- Producing the smallest useful customer-facing asset and testing it
How Business Math guides you
- Shows ranked options, then lets you rate, compare up to three, choose, explain and adjust
- Keeps its recommendation stars separate from your own preference stars
- Previews options with your own business name and offer
- Rejects unsupported superlatives and uses honest placeholders instead of invented reviews
- Optional provider referrals are disclosed; declining is always valid
What you produce
- Written brand strategy
- Working name with screening record
- Palette, typography and logo or wordmark, with usage rights
- At least one customer-facing asset and a working contact route
When it’s complete: Ready, Ready with tracked follow-ups, or Needs correction. A missing asset or broken contact route cannot pass.
What carries forward: Legal and Regulatory Setup receives the working name and identity.
Phases 7–9
Get ready to sell
Set up the legal, financial and fulfillment foundations before any customer is charged.
Key outputs: Legal readiness record, tested financial systems, Launch Authorization
Legal and Regulatory SetupWhat must be legally true before you accept money.30 tasks in 6 sections
Answer one question: what must be legally true before this business can accept money and perform each activity in its controlled launch?
What you provide
- Who owns and controls the business, and where it operates
- Results of filings and official research, with evidence
- Input from a qualified professional where a review is required
What you work through
- Defining the launch scope and every legally meaningful activity
- Comparing legal structures, separately from tax classification
- Preparing, submitting and verifying formation and name filings
- Determining tax identity and registrations
- Building a license, permit and location-permission register
- Identifying worker, customer, data and intellectual-property obligations
- Building a compliance calendar
How Business Math guides you
- Provides source-linked checklists, outside assignments and professional handoff packets
- Labels each source and how current it is
- Treats a submitted filing as pending until the authority confirms it
- Is not a law firm and never certifies compliance
What you produce
- Legal and Regulatory Readiness Record
- Compliance obligation calendar
- Professional handoff packet when needed
When it’s complete: Completed for the recorded scope only when every gate passes. There is no “complete with a known legal blocker” status; a blocked activity can be removed or deferred instead.
What carries forward: Minimum Financial Rails uses the verified identifiers.
Minimum Financial RailsReceive, protect, record and reconcile money.34 tasks in 7 sections
Make sure the business can receive a payment, know what it means, reserve what must not be spent, record it, reconcile it to actual cash and decide from reliable numbers.
What you provide
- Account applications and verification results
- Payment-provider setup and a passing payment test
- Decisions on owner pay, spending limits and reserves
What you work through
- Mapping every inflow, outflow, transfer and reserve
- Choosing and opening accounts, with permissions and recovery controls
- Setting up checkout, invoice or subscription payments, refunds and disputes
- Choosing an accounting basis, chart of accounts and receipt capture
- Mapping taxes collected and owed, and scheduling tax reserves
- Setting cash-allocation rules, minimum-cash alerts and a reconciliation routine
- Running a first controlled close
How Business Math guides you
- Imports approved prices and costs instead of re-pricing
- Never treats pending, held, refunded or disputed money as available cash
- Is not a bank, accountant or tax adviser
What you produce
- Minimum Financial Systems Setup, tested
When it’s complete: Every advertised payment method has a passing test and the first close reconciles. There is no “complete with a known payment or recording failure” status.
What carries forward: Risk and Fulfillment Readiness uses these accounts and payment rules.
Risk and Fulfillment ReadinessProve you can deliver safely, then authorize launch.36 tasks in 6 sections
Confirm you can safely and reliably deliver the exact offer and promise approved for launch, using the people, protection, contracts, equipment, vendors and capacity you actually have.
What you provide
- Insurance and bonding quotes and proof of coverage
- Customer agreement, refund and change rules for approval
- Results of a controlled operational rehearsal
What you work through
- Building a risk register and responsibility map
- Determining, comparing and binding required insurance
- Defining customer agreements, cancellations, refunds and warranties
- Writing safety and incident procedures
- Verifying equipment, software, vendors and inputs
- Mapping fulfillment, quality standards and capacity limits
- Building backup plans and running a rehearsal
How Business Math guides you
- Never binds insurance without your authorization or guarantees coverage
- Restricts launch to the activities that passed, rather than blocking everything
What you produce
- Risk and Fulfillment Readiness Plan
- Launch Authorization for the recorded scope
When it’s complete: Authorized for the recorded scope, or Restricted to named activities. No customer may be quoted to close, charged or scheduled before authorization.
What carries forward: The Proof-of-Revenue Soft Launch may sell only what was authorized.
Phases 10–13
Prove & build
Make a first controlled sale, correct the business from real results, then build the sales system and public presence.
Key outputs: Proof-of-Revenue Report, revised model, CRM, connected digital presence
Proof-of-Revenue Soft LaunchYour first controlled, real sale.36 tasks in 6 sections
Test whether you can reach the right prospect, present the approved offer, complete a lawful exchange, deliver the value, collect the money and record what actually happened.
What you provide
- A small, relevant list of prospects
- Messages you send yourself, then their actual results
- Real delivery time, costs, fees and customer feedback
What you work through
- Setting the test scope, contact limits, spending limits and stop rules
- Defining the proof event before starting
- Contacting prospects one at a time and triaging responses
- Qualifying, presenting the offer and capturing acceptance and payment
- Delivering, checking quality and closing the exchange
- Comparing estimated and actual results and choosing the next step
How Business Math guides you
- Prepares each message and explains what not to add
- Opening a channel does not mean a message was sent; you confirm what happened
- Silence stays “waiting” instead of being treated as a rejection
- Does not require a website, ads or a CRM for this test
What you produce
- Proof-of-Revenue Report with actual price, cost, time, payment and feedback
When it’s complete: Valid outcomes are revenue captured, a valid no-sale test, partial, blocked or stopped. A quote, a friend’s promise or a mock order never counts as success.
What carries forward: Refine From Real Data receives the actual evidence.
Refine From Real DataCorrect the business using what actually happened.Specified with Phases 12–13 (144 tasks combined)
Turn the first real transactions and customer feedback into a corrected business model before anything is published.
What you provide
- Invoices, payment records and delivery notes to verify each first-sale record
- Daily customer interactions and permitted feedback
What you work through
- Verifying the first-sale evidence and marking gaps honestly
- Setting up a daily customer-learning routine
- Reconfirming the priority customer, problem and trigger
- Correcting the offer, promise and public pricing
- Building an objection and FAQ library from real questions
- Rechecking capacity and setting intake limits
How Business Math guides you
- Shows real customer language next to the original assumptions
- Routes changes to price, offer or risk back to the phase that owns them
What you produce
- Validated Business Model Revision, the only source for public copy that follows
When it’s complete: The revision is approved and every material change has been approved by its owning phase.
What carries forward: The Sales System and CRM is built on the corrected model.
Sales System and CRMA repeatable path from lead to customer.Specified with Phases 11 and 13
Make the path from first contact to paying customer repeatable, and record it in one system.
What you provide
- How your sales actually happened in the first sale
- Trials or demos of CRM options, or the decision to use a sufficient manual system
What you work through
- Mapping the lead-to-customer journey
- Defining lead, prospect, opportunity and customer
- Setting pipeline stages, qualification, response times and follow-up
- Approving scripts and templates
- Selecting, configuring and testing a CRM or approved manual equivalent
How Business Math guides you
- Ranks CRM options one to five stars with costs, data portability and cancellation terms
- Does not require a paid tool when a free, existing or manual option is enough
What you produce
- Sales Workflow and Pipeline System
- A configured, tested CRM or system of record
When it’s complete: The sales workflow is approved and the system of record is owned, configured and export-tested.
What carries forward: Digital Presence connects every public channel to this system.
Digital PresenceAn owned, connected and measurable public presence.Specified with Phases 11–12
Build the business’s owned public presence and connect every lead source to the sales system.
What you provide
- Domain, email and phone decisions
- Approval of website pages, profiles and social accounts
What you work through
- Securing the domain, business email and phone
- Planning, writing, building and publishing the website when one is needed
- Setting up Google Business Profile and other listings when eligible
- Choosing social platforms and a 30/60/90-day posting plan
- Connecting every lead source to the CRM, with analytics and data rules
- Running end-to-end tests with one test lead from every source
How Business Math guides you
- Builds systems only; marketing tests come next
- Does not promise search ranking or platform approval
What you produce
- Integrated system of website, profiles, social, lead capture and analytics
- A list of channels the Marketing Funnel phase may test
When it’s complete: Every active lead source reaches the CRM or has a tested manual capture path, and normal and failure-case tests pass.
What carries forward: The Marketing Funnel tests these channels.
Phases 14–18
Grow & operate
Test marketing with real numbers, then launch fully, improve delivery, document procedures and run the business.
Key outputs: Marketing funnel results and Business Operations Record; later phases coming soon
Marketing FunnelMeasurable marketing tests, then ongoing guidance begins.120 tasks in 15 sections (current report)
Run a controlled marketing funnel, trace activity to leads, sales and profit, and decide what to continue, improve, pause or stop. In the current documents this phase completes the core pathway and starts Consultant Mode.
What you provide
- Goals from the long term down to the next 14 days
- Approval of a marketing budget and stop rules
- Daily results from each experiment
What you work through
- Linking goals: founder outcome → business objective → 90-day result → 14-day decision → experiment → task
- Defining the funnel and the most you can afford to spend to gain a customer
- Ranking and selecting channels
- Running experiments with spending caps and stop rules
- Diagnosing results and deciding what to continue, improve, pause, stop or retest
- Reviewing the Business Operations Record
How Business Math guides you
- Generates and ranks realistic channels before asking which one you want
- Never spends automatically
- Does not pick a winner on cost per click alone
- Counts a well-run experiment with no sales as valid learning
What you produce
- Marketing funnel model and results
- Business Operations Record
- Business-building pathway completion certificate
- Consultant Dashboard
When it’s complete: At least one valid controlled experiment is complete and you approve Consultant Mode after its first full cycle works.
What carries forward: Consultant Mode continues advising, and later phases add deeper capabilities.
Full LaunchWider launch, only when evidence supports it.Details coming soon
The planned phase order describes this phase in one line: wider launch, only when evidence supports it. Its tasks, deliverables and completion standard have not been published yet.
Delivery OptimizationImprove delivery using repeated operating data.Details coming soon
The planned phase order describes this phase in one line: improve delivery using repeated operating data. Its tasks, deliverables and completion standard have not been published yet.
SOP BuildoutTurn proven workflows into standard operating procedures.Details coming soon
The planned phase order describes this phase in one line: turn proven workflows into standard operating procedures. Its tasks, deliverables and completion standard have not been published yet.
Operating ModeOngoing operation, renewals and change-triggered rechecks.Details coming soon
The planned phase order describes this phase in one line: ongoing operation, renewals and change-triggered rechecks. Its tasks, deliverables and completion standard have not been published yet.
Ongoing guidance
Consultant Mode
In the current documents, completing the Marketing Funnel phase completes the core pathway. You receive a completion certificate and a Business Operations Record, and the workspace changes from a phase checklist to a Consultant Dashboard. Later phases add deeper capabilities without restarting you.
- As things happen: A new sale, expense, complaint, lead or changed fact updates only what it affects
- Daily: A short pulse: one priority, warnings and anything waiting
- Weekly: What moved, what stalled and what needs a decision
- Every 14 days: A strategic consultation that produces an approved plan of 3–7 tasks sized to your time
- Monthly: A business health report covering economics, funnel, operations and founder fit
- Quarterly: A strategy reset: continue, change, pause or retire priorities
- Annually: An updated thesis, strategy and operating baseline
The certificate records completion of the guided pathway. It is not a license, legal opinion or promise of business performance.
Follow the program as it’s completed.
Request early access to hear when Business Math is ready to try and when the later phases are published.