Mark Cuban Warns Entrepreneurs Against This Single Mistake

It's easy to drop the ball when you're focused on the wrong things.

Mark Cuban feels so strongly about one common entrepreneurial trait, he's got his own word for it: "inventor-itis." It happens when a company offers too many products and doesn't focus on its core business. On a recent Shark Tank episode, the popular judge told Big Bee, Little Bee founder Amy Leinbach that he admired her resilience, but that she had inventor-itis -- to him, "one of the worst traits an entrepreneur can have."

How inventor-itis can damage your business

Big Bee, Little Bee makes various children's products that are fun yet practical. The most popular is a soft-bristled silicone scrubber, designed to make children want to clean themselves. However, Leinbach explained the company had had some manufacturing and supply chain issues this year, leading to significant losses.

It wasn't the losses themselves that had the judges worried. It was that Leinbach continued to invent and launch new products rather than get the engine running on her main offering. "You lost $77,000," said Cuban. "You've got to solve the problems that are in front of you first."

Indeed, later in the show, Cuban said he'd planned to make her an offer until she started showing them more products. "When you're really small, you have to be laser-focused," said Cuban. Lori Greiner, another judge and successful entrepreneur, added, "When you come up with an idea, you perfect it. You make that one product a huge success, and then you go to the next."

If you've started a business and things aren't going well, it can be tempting to launch new products to try to cover your losses from the original idea. Unfortunately, if you have, say, issues with suppliers or production, you won't solve them by making even more products. You can have genius new ideas, but they're unlikely to help if you can't address the reasons you're losing money.

Focus on your core business

Your core business is your company's main activity -- the one that brings in the majority of its revenue. For example, let's say you make artisan ice cream but you also sell cones, sauces, and cookies. The ice cream is your core and, while the other products might bring in revenue, they are extras.

If you're not sure what your core is, think about your mission and vision. What was your reason for founding the company? Think about your main customers and what they rely on you for. There are often so many demands on your attention as a small business owner that you neglect the core, and that's even without coming up with new products or services.

When you and your team understand what's important, it can make it easier to prioritize and make decisions. You might structure your team differently and set different goals around your main activities. It drives everything from the design of your logo to the keywords you use in search engine optimization for your website.

A personal example

I launched a local newspaper eight years ago, and at the time, there was a lot of pressure to do everything. As if printing a newspaper wasn't enough, it felt like everybody I spoke to had ideas about all the other things we should be doing. These included making videos, offering advertising advice to clients, increasing our social media presence, and even selling our content as an educational tool.

None of those ideas were bad; in fact, many of them were great and things we later incorporated. But it wasn't possible to do them all in the first year without sacrificing our core business. Instead, we focused on building a reputation for providing trustworthy content. We met our print deadlines and built relationships with clients. Once that was running smoothly, we moved into other areas.

Bottom line

Your time and money are precious, and when you're starting a business, you can't afford to waste either. That doesn't mean you can't launch new products or pursue new ideas. The trick is to first ensure your main product is generating revenue and things are working smoothly. That way you can invest a portion of the cash you're generating back to the core, and put some toward innovation.