Thomas Griffin August 31, 2021 Are you thinking about starting a business for the first time? Or maybe you’ve already begun and have doubts.
While you can always pick up marketing knowledge and develop your skills in building a business, it’s often harder to maintain your motivation and keep the frame of mind needed for success.
Getting insights from one entrepreneur to another is a powerful way to avoid critical mistakes. You’ll also stay motivated and develop a mental resilience that will keep you going through difficult times.
I’d like to share what I think are some important things every entrepreneur should know before starting a business.
With the tips shared here, you’ll start your business with the right mindset and may even see better results faster.
Be customer-first
A lot of people inadvertently start businesses by being product-oriented. Maybe they had an idea or developed a product that they believed is ground-breaking.
But have you ever had the experience where your amazing idea simply didn’t connect with others? Perhaps people couldn’t see the potential of your product or it may not serve anything more than a small group of people. No matter how good a product you have, it won’t matter if your audience doesn’t have a need for it.
If your product isn’t connecting with your audience, then you need to tweak it to match their needs. And this applies to every area of your business: writing, web design, customer service, and more. Whatever you do, ask yourself if this is what your customer wants.
A great place to start is to understand your target audience. Use SEO platforms, Google Analytics, and your own data to study customer behavioral patterns.
And also ask your customers directly what they want by creating surveys and sending feedback forms. You can also listen to people on social media using social listening tools. By learning about your customers, you’ll build and market products in ways that appeal to your audience. And will create success for yourself.
Overnight successes don’t exist
We often see plenty of stories online of how entrepreneurs experience instantaneous success and gain business fame as well as top revenue. But this kind of overnight success rarely ever happens.
In virtually every case, the business owner has likely spent years tinkering with their product or experimenting with marketing strategies before their business blew up and gained traction online.
In my journey, I didn’t start by knowing exactly what I was going to do. I began by trying to make some side income by creating a blog and writing. And then realized that I liked tinkering with a website than writing on it. And from there, I began to focus on WordPress which eventually led to the creation and success of my plugin OptinMonster which is just one of the other tools I built.
I had to build my skills in different areas, learn from my mistakes, and experiment before I built a tool that people genuinely cared about.
So, when it comes to your own journey, be prepared for a much slower journey. You have to take a step at a time and build your business from the ground up. Build your website and blog content, create a schedule to write every week, plan a content calendar for social media, focus on one solid feature in your product. You’ll see the results further down the road.
Look at the big picture
One of the challenges that any business owner faces is stepping away from the day-to-day activities of a business.
You may think of creating your business because you’re good at building a product or offering a specific service. But when you run a business, you need to be focused on broader-picture tasks.
You should work on marketing your business, managing its overall growth, communication strategies, and more.
And you need to leave the actual product building, customer support, and other tasks to your employees.
For many new business owners, quitting daily product development and not being more hands-on will be a tremendous challenge. But it is critical for you to embrace change and leave the day-by-day tasks to your employees.
You’ll give your employees greater flexibility and responsibility. And you’ll free yourself to troubleshoot and focus on what really matters – the growth of your business.
Marketing is as important as your product
I’ve already mentioned throughout this post that you need to step back from everyday product-building work and that you should focus on what customers want.
But it’s worth reiterating that giving your marketing and branding as much attention as you do your product is critical for your success.
Gone are the days when you could simply build a fantastic product and have the world beat a path to your door.
If you haven’t already, start building your marketing skills with online courses, books, and by joining communities that discuss the latest marketing techniques.
Conclusion
Entrepreneurship is a difficult but empowering career choice. Because of the pandemic, you may have explored it to earn more money or even to flex your creative side.
I’ve shared some insights that I know can help you focus on the right aspects of your business from the start. When you face struggles in your entrepreneurial journey, use the ideas shared here as checkpoints along the way.
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