Three Things Every Entrepreneur Should Know
With so many people trying to make it out there today, entrepreneurship seems to be the growing trend. They say there's no better way to succeed than by being your own boss. However, with being your own boss also comes more risk. No one wants to have to fail; the bigger the risk, the bigger the reward. Here are a few tips to help you stay focused, get your ship on board, and make the best of your entrepreneurship.
It’s Okay to Make Mistakes.
Trial and error is how we learn. If you have an idea, try it out! You’ll never truly know the result of something until you give it a try. A good way to test things out is through small test groups. When you want to try something new but aren’t 100% about it, don’t make a drastic change to your current idea right away. A good way to see if something will work or not is through some target-market specific trial and error, maybe test it out on 5% of your customers and ask for their feedback. One example of this is with features to a product. Before you put something out in the market, you need to make sure it’s correct, or as close to correct as possible. Putting something out there that is not perfected could have a negative connotation on your business and its success.
Money is Out There.
In today’s business world, start-ups and investing into them are the hot trend. When it comes to the time when you need to start making moves and get funding, you should think about the long-term effect of your source of funding. For instance, Venture Capitalists are always glad to fund new exciting ideas. However, what you don’t know is that if your idea is really a good one, and you believe in it, VC may not be the best route for you. You have to remember that the way they think is: The return on investment is ___ percent; they care nothing about your personal growth and success, they just want more money.
Aside from pitching to the Venture Capitalists, there are other ways you can get to where you’d like to be. One way is through fundraising. When you fundraise on your own without a direct investor, the money more or less is yours to keep. The downside to this is that it’s a lot of work. While you need to focus on your ideas and getting the best product or service out in the market before someone beats you to it, fundraising takes a lot of time away from that. Your next best alternative to raising the money yourself is applying for an accelerator program. While these programs are super-competitive and hard to get in to, they give you a significant advantage. Going through one of these programs will not only take the stress off of fundraising, it will also give you the skills and resources needed to focus solely on your mission and make that growth progress.
Choose Your People Wisely.
When starting a business, the people you bring on board make a huge impact on your overall success and the direction you’re headed. A definite must-have for the people you work with are similar values. If you don’t surround yourself with people who are like-minded in the way of goals and personal characteristics, you’re not going to get very far. Values and culture are two of the most important things to consider when adding people to hop on-board of your ideas. Being smart and having the skills is also important, but without similar values as yourself, the company may not do its best and think as one.
Massiel Scheibner
Author