When starting your own business, there are countless matters to plan and things to do. However, regardless of your industry or the scope of your business, there are key elements that can help you succeed. To guide you along the way, check out these essential small business tips for startups.
1. Write A Business Plan
Many fledgeling entrepreneurs think they only need a business plan if they are applying for a loan. While many traditional lenders require a business plan, loan applications aren’t their only use. Beyond that, a business plan helps you identify short and long-term goals for your company.
Throughout the time your business lasts, you should revisit your business plan on a regular basis and ensure that it reflects your current goals and expectations. Setting clear goals is key to moving forward in an organised and orderly fashion.
2. Be Ready On Day One
Ideally, you should never open your business doors until you are completely ready to go. Similarly, if your business only has a web presence, that should also be fully functional before the launch.
Let’s say you get a rush of customers the first day, but you’re not ready to serve them due to lack of inventory, poor employee training or other issues. In most cases, those customers won’t come back, or it will definitely be an uphill battle to get them back. Whether it’s dating or business, first impressions are everything.
3. Test, Test, Test
To ensure you’re ready on day one, test everything. If you’re manufacturing a product, get the prototype into use so you can identify and address weaknesses before you order a large batch. If you’re opening a restaurant or cafe, have a ‘dry opening’ with friends or family so you know the front and back of the house is ready. Regardless of what your business offers, make sure to test as much as possible before opening day.
4. Visualise Your Corporate Culture
As part of your business plan or as part of a separate document, you should define your corporate culture. What’s important to your company? What are your values? How can your customer service model reflect those values? Similarly, how can your employee compensation and benefit packages reflect those values?
Those are the types of questions you should consider as you fine-tune your corporate culture statement. Ultimately, your corporate culture should inform everything, from how you deal with clients to how you treat employees.
5. Sketch Out A Worst-Case Scenario
Hopefully, your business will go perfectly, but mostly, that’s not the case. To ensure you’re ready to deal with bumps on the road, you should sketch out several worst-case scenarios. For instance, let’s say you have a budget that outlines projected sales and expenses. To be on the safe side financially, you should see what happens if your revenues are half of what you expect and your expenses double. Can you make it? What’s your plan?
6. Set Up Three Months Of Operating Capital
As a general rule of thumb, you shouldn’t expect to take any money out of the business for at least a year. Unfortunately, that’s simply not realistic for most people. As you run your business, you will need funds to cover day to day living expenses.
Even if you can’t fathom not taking money out of your business for a year, you should set aside three months of operating capital. That can be in the form of savings, small business loan, a line of credit, or even a credit card if you have no other options. Those funds can be a lifesaver until your revenue gets firmly established.
7. Learn From Others
Other industry professionals can provide a wealth of knowledge, experience and guidance. Consider connecting with other professionals through local or online groups. Alternatively, set up a mentorship for even more guidance.
8. Don’t Forget Finances And Accounting
As an owner of a small business, you have a lot of financial obligations. And to stay on top of all of them, you need to be organised financially. Whether you’re opening a business that consists of just you or starting up a firm with dozens of employees, you need to make an accounting plan early on.
You should start tracking business-related expenses long before you ever get your first client. Depending on the size and scope of your business, you may want to check out a streamlined accounting app, a more detailed accounting program such as QuickBooks, or even consider outsourcing the job to a third party accountant.
9. Hire Conservatively
When your business is just getting started, it’s important to not over-obligate yourself, even with employees. Whenever possible, you may want to hire freelancers instead of employees. If you need employees, be careful about promising things you can’t provide. For example, you may want to be clear with employees about how many hours you can provide — you don’t want to commit to full-time hours and then only be able to provide part time work.
10. Get Your Name Out There
Finally, marketing is essential. You need to get your name out there and make sure that people hear about you. That can take a variety of forms from traditional marketing to social media posts. If you don’t have the funds to carry out paid advertisements, check out each the business pages of social media sites (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter all have them) for tips and tricks on how to organically boost your social presence. Once you’ve built a big enough following, you should reach out to industry influencers to see if they can promote your brand.
Starting a business can be arduous, and you might not always know where to start. Each industry has its own challenges, but this guide can help you no matter what kind of business you’re opening. With these tips, you’ll be on your way to running your business in no time.