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3 Crucial Strategies Every Entrepreneur Needs to Start a Business

Guest Author — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 08:36:10 +0000

Owning your own business is like going on a new adventure every day, without knowing where it will take you, what dangers you’ll face along the way, or even whether you’ll make it out alive. That last part depends mostly on the business you’re in, but hey, it can certainly feel like your small business is going to kill you, or at least get the better of you on any given day.

A very close friend of mine, who happens to own his own apparel company, came to me recently, shaken, unshaven, and obviously stressed. He began telling me how he was missing meetings, losing track of time, neglecting personal relationships, and generally forming more bad habits than he could keep up with, on account of his business was taking over his life.

I definitely related to his situation, and then started thinking about ways to help him (and other small business owner like him, myself included).

Here’s what I came up with:

Know How (and When) to Say No: Small business owners should have four legs, we scramble so much. And while the world appreciates our hustle, we often agree very hastily to much more than we can actually take on, in the hopes that we can cut a better deal here, or get more funding there.

Much of this hustle is necessary, but much of it is not. Yes, it is important to make contacts, to pitch your product, and to get funding, but missing meetings because you have too much on your plate is much more damaging to your reputation than saying no ahead of time. If you are feeling like your business is running you instead of the other way around, than examine your current commitments to see which are essential, acknowledge to yourself that it is OK to say no, and then, in the future, say no to the things that aren’t.

Plan Every Second of Your Life: No, I’m not exaggerating. What kills many small business owners is ambiguity in their schedules. Don’t allow this to happen. Get a planner, a journal, a piece of notebook paper, or a napkin — whatever it takes — and write down exactly what you have to do that week, and when you will be doing it. Zero in as microscopically as possible, to the point that you include such details as “eating ham sandwich alone at 12:05,” or “meeting with (x) investor at Starbucks on 1234 Main at 1:39pm.” Specificity in activity and time count. Don’t leave any “wiggle room”; free time is time that is unaccounted for, unless, that is, you schedule it in. See how that works? You can’t feel guilty about free time if you knew you were taking it.

This should go without saying, but often we small business owners need to hear what goes without saying, so: DO NOT VARY FROM THE SCHEDULE. Once it is written, DO IT.

Take Free Time: This is extremely important. There’s a reason the normal work week is only Monday to Friday: Neither the human body nor the human mind were designed to work 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. With that in mind, plan some free time, and even some vacation time, into your week. You will be able to focus better, and will feel more in control of your life if you do things outside of running your business, and, best of all, you will be able to run your business better when you are refreshed and thinking clearly.

By the way, after I presented my friend with these strategies, he adopted them, and while I can’t vouch for his business, I can vouch for his health and happiness, and I can say that after following my advice for a few weeks, he looked like a million dollars, and felt like it, too. And you can’t run a business if you feel like anything less.

This is a guest post by Eliza Morgan who is a full time blogger. She specializes in writing about business credit cards. You can reach her at: elizamorgan856 [at]gmail [dot] com.

The Secrets To Getting Customers Before You’re Even Open for Business

Guest Author — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 23:25:17 +0000

One of the greatest hurdles a start-up company will face is getting customers before the company has even started. Many assume that a company just starting out may not have the resources necessary to fully perform, so why take the chance? This is a mentality that you must stop as a new business owner. There are a few universal tricks listed below that work well for a start-up company of any kind:

Tricks to Get Clients Hooked on Your Company

Market – A large part of bringing in new customers is your marketing. If you have the right kind of marketing, your customers may not even know you are a start-up company. If your website looks professional and you have knowledgeable employees, your customers will have no reason not to go with your services. Consider local marketing, it is often more cost effective and produces results. Have a marketing plan and the customers will slowly but surely start adding up.

Contacts – Another great way to nab those first customers is through family, friends, and any contacts you may have in your phonebook. Even if you think these specific people would not be interested, ask them to spread the word to everyone they know. Ideally, you would have a great email message to send out to everyone that your friends can forward to everyone they know. Through a ripple effect, this should give you plenty of exposure.

Promotions – Giving away discounts or free gifts is a great way to get new customers. However, be weary that there are a lot of companies out there that offer this and don’t follow through, leaving many customers skeptical of free gifts. A good idea would be to bring in new customers with the other ideas first, and then offer a gift if those customers refer someone else. At this point, you will have the people who know you are serious being offered the gifts, so the incentive should work better.

Network – Whenever you have the chance to go to any sort of community event (or personal event), attend and plan on discussing your new business. People are far more likely to take a leap of faith with someone they have seen face to face as opposed to an email (especially if the email isn’t personal).

Persistence – Getting a solid customer base is not an easy task, so you need to be persistent. If anyone expresses even a little bit of interest, you need to pull out every card you have to play. In other words, give potential customers what they want right away – in the end the payoff should outweigh the costs.

Amanda DiSilvestro is a writer on topics ranging from social media to home security systems. She writes for an online resource that gives advice on topics including document software to small businesses and entrepreneurs at Resource Nation.

11 Reasons Why Your Founding Team Is Important To Investors

Thomas Oppong — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 13:36:39 +0000

A solid and strong startup team cannot be overemphasized. Every outcome of the company you are forming is based on the performance of the core founding team. A perfect startup team is therefore essential to create and run a startup successfully. Investors who are who to invest in your company will always consider the team structure and your strengths. Investors always ask who is the team, why they are on the team, what roles they are playing, what they’ve worked on in the past, and what they accomplished in previous positions.

Why is the founding team so important? At the beginning, there is nothing but an idea.
Your team should understand the market in which you are operating, have experience running a company, have the necessary expertise to successfully implement the strategies in your working document.
A start-up team can be more than the founders and the employees; it is also the corporate advisory board members, mentors, and customer advisory board.
If the founding team isn’t a good team, it not likely to get better.
The visionary leader has the ability to influence the skeptics among the customers, market, and investors.
Team members of a startup are going to work to achieve the goal of the company.
Many challenges and stressful situations arise during the initial stages of establishment of a startups, the team should be prepared to overcome it.
A start-up needs to demonstrate the diversity of roles needed to make a company successful.
Investors want the entrepreneurs to run the show, so they would like to deal with entrepreneurs who have established credibility within the industry.
Startups are synonymous with huge risks, and the management team should not only be extremely passionate and willing to persevere about an idea, but also have the ability to take a calculated risk.
If the startup idea is based on an innovative idea, Investor would like to have the inventor or a technology expert on board.

Sprouter(Startup Q&A Site), To Shut Down On August 2nd

Thomas Oppong — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 17:04:47 +0000

Sprouter enables collaboration and networking between entrepreneurs globally. According to the Sprouter team led by Sarah Prevette(founder) Sprouter is shutting down for “capital constraints”reasons. In a blog post on Sprouter’s blog the team said “On August 2nd, Sprouter will be closing its doors and shutting down. We’re devastated to have to shut down the service but unfortunately, due to capital constraints, we’ve simply run out of options.”

They further stated that “We’re currently exploring options for all of our content, including our weekly publication. Sprouter Weekly has been incredibly successful in its own right and if it’s at all possible for us to continue with it, we will.” Its very unfortunate Sprouter has to shutdown so soon.

Sprouter is where founders get help with their startups. Sprouter allows entrepreneurs to get curated answers to small business questions from people who know what they’re talking about. The site’s carefully chosen panel of experts provide advice on a variety of topics including law, marketing and funding.

When In Doubt, Don’t Hire-Keep Looking

Thomas Oppong — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 15:39:49 +0000

When you need to make a people change, or a position needs to be filled be sure you do not have a someone in the wrong seat. The ability to attract the right people is one of the most important things to consider when hiring.

Hiring people is one of the biggest, most challenging decision startup founders and leaders have to make. You cannot overemphasize the importance of passion and commitment. Don’t just focus on getting people on board with the right qualifications at the right salary. Your company will pay the price in the end.

A company’s employees are its lifeline. Without the human resource to perform the daily routines of your business, your business will not survive, grow or achieve the desired results. Do not just fill a position because you are desperate, the right person for the job can achieve more for less within the shortest possible time.

A core team of passionate, committed people will always go the extra mile for each other and achieve the desired goals you set for them or they set for themselves. Passion or commitment cannot be bought, look out for these traits and qualities when hiring. when in doubt, don’t hire-just keep looking.

The key point here is that who comes on board is more important than what the person is about to do. The right employees are practically partners. You need them to stick it out through thick and thin, and be as devoted as possible. You need them to create the culture and spirit for future hires. You need them evangelizing the business. You need them taking ownership. You need them to be the driving force of success of the company especially if you are a startup.

When you find that right person, you’ll never second guess your decision about giving them the job. It is always obvious if you get the right person. Everything fits when they start working. Customers are happier, Customer Care representatives are happier, and he’s providing constant ideas to improve operations. The cycle could go on for a very long time. Hire the right people for your team and you have the most important asset for your company. And remember, WHEN IN DOUBT, DON’T HIRE-KEEP LOOKING.

12 Of The Best Web Marketing Case Studies

Thomas Oppong — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:47:48 +0000

Social Media for Customer Service- Mashable
Reaching Out To a Wide Audience: A Twitter Case Study-IdealWare
5 Small Business Social Media Success Stories- Mashable
How Social Media Drives New Business: Six Case Studies-Techcrunch
3 Things We Can Learn From IKEA’s Facebook Campaign-Penn-Olson
Lady Gaga Case Study-Mashable
Case Study: 5 Factors Behind One Startup’s Rapid Growth-Mashable
I now pronounce you monetized: a YouTube video case study-Googleblog
Google Marketing Case Study-Mashable
Case Studies in Freemium: Pandora, Dropbox, Evernote, Automattic and MailChimp-GigaOm
Lessons Learned from 21 Case Studies in Conversion Rate Optimization-Seomoz
Case Study: Cars.com Mobile Marketing-eMarketer

16 Of The Best Startup Tips For The First Time Entrepreneur

Thomas Oppong — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 20:51:52 +0000

Check the reason you are starting-up a new business.
Everything starts and ends with your desire to WIN.
If you can sell your passion to your investors then you can have a working relationship but only when you can show them a profit.
Be passionate about an inspiring business vision and build it passionately, step by step
Cold listen to your marketing research findings
Check your cash. Plan your cash. Manage your cash. Insufficient cash to finance the operations is another top cause of start-up failures (it has to do with poor planning) .
Start-ups should aim to get as much free advice as possible
Raise twice as much money as you think you need and spend half as much as you initially budgeted – it will take longer than you estimate
Separate your business funds and expenses from your personal funds and expenses. It will make book-keeping, budgeting, and tracking of profit / loss much easier.
An excellent Idea with poor Execution is a lost stake and is a fundamental cause of failure in any business or venture.
Break the day down into tasks you are accomplishing.
Failure.. The fear of failing -LOSE IT
Be totally honest with yourself about your own weaknesses and get people around you with complimentary skills who totally share your vision, commitment and passion
Focus on bringing in the cash.
Making sure you have a tight hold on your budget.
Do something that you like, but also have somebody else that has already done it and can teach you what to do, and what not to do.

VerticalResponse To Mentor Startup Weekend Entrepreneurs

Thomas Oppong — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 11:19:52 +0000

VerticalResponse, a provider of self-service email marketing, online survey, social media and direct mail marketing solutions for small businesses, has partnered with non-profit Startup Weekend to help arm entrepreneurs with the marketing technologies and advice needed to launch their ideas.

Startup Weekend is a global community and series of events fostered by technology-minded entrepreneurs, business mentors and influential movers and shakers. Each Startup Weekend event provides entrepreneurs a hands-on opportunity to see if their startup ideas are viable; they pitch their ideas, form teams, develop product prototypes, present to a panel of judges, get feedback and declare one standout idea – all within 54 hours. Startup Weekends are planned in multiple cities in more than 65 countries nearly every weekend.

VerticalResponse will be present at several Startup Weekend events as an on-site mentor. VerticalResponse representatives will be on hand to help participants refine their presentations, advise on any developer questions or issues, and integrate custom email marketing and/or online survey functionality into their product prototype. Participants who integrate VerticalResponse into their final product prototype will receive a free VerticalResponse email partner account, valued at US$2,000.

Additionally, VerticalResponse will offer teams at every Startup Weekend 1,000 free email credits, with the winner receiving 10,000 credits.

Top 37 Key Challenges Your Startup Should Expect

Thomas Oppong — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 17:18:40 +0000

Launch stage: finding customers BEFORE you start your company.
Incorporating, Accounting, Legal ramifications, contracts
Finding the first customers
Evolving from being a doer to a manager of employees and then eventually to a manager of managers
Having the discipline to maintain a narrow strategic focus
Transitioning from owner to leader
Confronting impending growth
Choosing right kind of investors
Having a team that work together well
Delays in processing intellectual property protection claims
Requirements changed in the middle of the cycle
Managing cash flow effectively
Managing customer their expectations
Financial .There will always not be enough cash
Keeping communications open
Lack of ecosystems and networks to support your startup
Founder conflicts on roles and tasks
Sticking to Product schedules
Team conflict
Building and growing a customer base
Finding the funding required for your business startup costs
Scaling your business
Delay in milestones delivery
Loss of focus.
Having the right business leadership skills
Creating a business not a job
Too small a database
Pitching the business plan with confidence to people who can help.
Salary.Making sure you pay yourself first.
Finding enough customers willing to pay for a service/product
Finding suitable office space in a good location
Gaining marketplace acceptance and penetration
Support – from your family, friends and customers.
Concentration on th BIG picture at the detriment of the details
Getting overwhelmed by growth
Running out of funds
Completing a sound business plan.

The Best Advice Entrepreneurs Are Actually Using

Thomas Oppong — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 09:20:20 +0000

If you have a hard time deciding whether to do one thing or the other, always choose the harder thing. That way, you rule out being lazy.
You have to have to have some sort of passion in order to be successful.
He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
Network relentlessly. Make it your mission to be the most connected person your age, and make quality use of your networks.
The stuff you learn now and the networks you build will be with you for the rest of your lifetime.
Take as much risk as you can as early as you can.
With blogs, podcasts, Twitter, more great books than ever. You are really in an absolutely amazing position.
Connect with other entrepreneurs, especially those who are older and have “been there, done that” before.
Aspiring entrepreneurs should first and foremost seek out risk-taking opportunities where they can learn.
Find the very best, most knowledgeable people you can afford and hire them with not just salary, but incentives
Remember, people who never make mistakes, never do anything – startups cannot afford such “prefect” people.
Conceiving an idea is less than half the battle. Assuming competent execution of the idea, getting the word out and selling to customers are a lot more important to the success of any venture.
Regardless of whether you’re a lone business-minded founder looking for your technical soulmate/co-founder or vice-versa, you have to do the early market development yourself.
Less time spent on paid marketing/advertising efforts and more time screening and building strong partnerships with influential journalists, writers, editors
Customers provide validation to your business model and can act as external champions of your product or service.
It’s important to get customer validation early on. You can have the greatest technology, or website, or service, or whatever, but it’s ultimately meaningless if you haven’t verified that there are actually customers willing to spend money on or around what you do.
Have a serious exit strategy & plan prior to opening doors
Focus on yourself as much as your product/service. The recipe is only as good as the Chef preparing the dish.
In the end it is all about cash flow