by 3 years ago | 5 Min Read
You might have a great idea for a business and you might be excited about making it a reality but those things will only take you so far. You need to understand the process involved with starting a new business, in order to really put your idea into action. If you’re new to entrepreneurship, it can seem overwhelming to consider all the steps you need to take. Luckily, you can give yourself some direction and build your confidence by acquiring knowledge that is specifically relevant to your business idea. Here are 5 of the most important steps you need to take when starting a new business.
#1. Write Your Business Plan
Once you have an idea for a product or service to offer to your customers, you need to take the time out to write your business plan. Your company should have a mission. This will always stay the same, throughout everything your company does. Your mission boils down to what you hope to achieve by starting your business. You might want to solve a problem that is specific to your community. You might want to solve a bigger problem that’s more widespread throughout society. Figure out your main goal. This will be like your company’s North Star, always helping to show you the path toward success.
Once you have a mission for your company, you should start focusing on smaller details. You should have a clear vision for each project, product or service you work on. Figure out the process for each thing you work on. You should also focus on a specific target market or audience. Your product could cater to a wide target market or it could be focused on solving problems for a small niche of potential customers. Your vision and target market will change, with each new thing you work on. As long as you always keep your company’s mission in mind, you will be able to make the right decisions to keep moving your business forward.
#2. Don’t Reinvent The Wheel
In the words of Tony Robbins, “success leaves clues.” You should study the people who have succeeded in the field you are pursuing. Figure out what obstacles they overcame and how they overcame them. Study their business model. How do they sell their product or service? How do they price them? How do they market them? You don’t need to do something radically unique. You can just tweak some aspects of how successful companies have run their businesses and use that as the basis for your own company.
If you personally know people who have succeeded in your field, you should try to speak to them about it. Pick their brain and get as much information and guidance as you can. They can teach you how to avoid the common mistakes that stand in the way of many entrepreneurs’ dreams. You might even want to ask them to be your coach or mentor.
#3. Focus On Sales
You can have the greatest product or service in the world but if you’re not successfully selling it, your business will be doomed to fail. Every business needs to make sales to bring in revenue so they can pay their bills and reinvest in the company. Figure out how you can sell your product or service and design a marketing campaign to educate your target market about it. You want to figure out a system to get your company as many sales as possible. Always remember your ABC’s: Always Be Closing!
#4. Understand The Numbers
Being successful in business always boils down to the math. You need to understand the numbers involved with running your business. Do you rent a location for your business? Do you have any extra costs, such as insurance or security? How much do you spend on the materials for your product? How much do you spend on manufacturing the product? If you offer a service, how much do you spend on the tools you need to perform the service? If you’ve hired other people, how much do you need to pay them?
You also need to know the amount of money that comes in from sales. Do you generate enough money to cover all of your costs and make a profit? If your business isn’t making a profit, you will need to restructure your business model. If you can’t figure out a way to make your business profitable, you should consider cutting your losses and trying to start a different type of company altogether.
#5. Hire Freelancers
As you grow your business, you will eventually get to the point where you can’t accomplish everything on your own. At that point, it’s probably time for you to consider hiring freelance workers to do specific tasks for your company. You may be an expert on about half of the tasks that are involved in running your company but there are probably some things that you aren’t so good at doing. Find people who are experts at those things you don’t do so well. If they can perform those tasks better than you can, you will be elevating your company higher than you could on your own.
If you carefully consider all 5 of these steps and take the time to implement them into your new business, you will significantly raise your chances for success. Take the guessing work out of your business, get clear about your plans and put in the work. If I can do it, so can you.
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I hope that you’ve found value in this blog post! Feel free to share it with anyone that you think will benefit from it as well.
If you’d like to hear more of my thoughts on this subject, you can check out my video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjgHif-5OCs
If you’d like to be even more effective as an entrepreneur, check out my blog post on How To Be Happy And Positive Every Day.
