THE BASICS OF STARTING A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS
(Scroll down for English version)
Versione in italiano
Settimo appuntamento con le “NEWS & (RE)NEWS”, che potrete trovare raccolte nella pagina “CONTENTS” del blog “FAR FROM BEING JUST FM” (https://farfrombeingjustfm.com) e nel gruppo LinkedIn dedicato alla Community (https://www.linkedin.com/groups/8948117/).
Lunedì 20 Luglio 2020, su FAR FROM BEING JUST FM, nella rubrica editorials ho pubblicato un mio articolo inerente l’opportunità di valutare bene un eventuale cambio di direzione nella carriera, proponendovi come alternativa il fractional management, coniando il termine Fractional Facility Manager.
Questa settimana vi ripropongo un articolo di Anna Porello, pubblicato circa due anni fa su sul sito web intraprendere.net, ma assolutamente attuale.
L’articolo, intitolato “Come fare impresa in 12 infallibili step: i consigli per avviare un’attività di successo”, fornisce una serie di importanti informazioni che, se pur semplici, risulteranno utili a chi si avvia a programmare un’attività professionale come freelance. L’articolo è più orientato al campo dell’impresa, tuttavia fornisce molti spunti adattabili anche alla libera professione.
Qui trovate il link alla pagina web su cui è pubblicato il contenuto originale.
Nel dettaglio, l’articolo pubblicato dal sito di cui sopra, a cui vanno tutti i crediti per i contenuti, ci offre una panoramica di quelli che devono essere gli elementi da considerare in fase di startup di azienda, tutte informazioni facilmente riconducibili anche all’attività di freelance.
Un interessante articolo che può offrire spunti di riflessione e che può mettere in guardia coloro che pensano che un’attività da freelance possa essere una passeggiata.
Buona lettura.
English Version
Seventh appointment with the “NEWS & (RE)NEWS”, which you can find collected in the “CONTENTS” page of the blog “FAR FROM BEING JUST FM” (https://farfrombeingjustfm.com) and in the LinkedIn group dedicated to the Community (https://www.linkedin.com/groups/8948117/)
On Monday, July 20, 2020, on FAR FROM BEING JUST FM, in the column editorials I published an article about the opportunity to evaluate well a possible change of direction in your career, proposing as an alternative the fractional management, coining the term Fractional Facility Manager.
This week I propose an article by Anna Porello, published almost two years ago on the website intraprendere.net, but absolutely current.
The article, entitled “How to do business in 12 infallible steps: the advice to start a successful business”, provides a series of important information that, although simple, will be useful to those who start planning a professional activity as a freelancer. The article is more business-oriented, however, it provides many ideas that can also be adapted to the freelance profession.
Here you will find the link to the web page on which the original content is published, you will find a free translation of the article for all those who do not speak Italian.
In detail, the article published by the above site, to which all the credits for the content go, gives us an overview of what should be considered in the startup phase of the company, all information easily traceable to the freelance activity.
An interesting article that can offer food for thought and that can warn those who think that a freelance activity can be a piece of cake.
Good reading.
Article freely translated, published by intraprendere.net, original version written by Anna Porello:
How to Do Business in 12 Infallible Steps: Tips for Starting a Successful Activity
You want to find out the secret to doing business?
You don’t need a degree or a big bank account, countless work experiences to become a good entrepreneur. Of course all these factors can help, but many success stories have taught us how often it is not necessary to have these pre-requisites to do business.
Just think of Steve Jobs, or other entrepreneurs who have entered history from the bottom up and very often without money.
There are many other characteristics that allow you to become a true entrepreneur and start a successful business. Surely, in addition to perseverance and a good idea what allows you to start your own business successfully is the realization of a precise plan, a series of actions that can help you to start a business and become an entrepreneur.
That’s why I’m here today, to help you understand how to turn your idea into a business and start a real successful business.
Here are the 12 steps you need to follow!
- Make an assessment of your skills and ideas.
The first question you have to ask yourself, or rather the first questions, are a real assessment of yourself and above all of the business you want to start.
You cannot choose to go down this road without having clear goals you want to achieve and the skills you have (or not) to be able to put all your ideas on paper.
Of course as soon as you have an idea the first thing you think about is to start quickly to make money as soon as possible. But it doesn’t work like that!
When you choose to start a business you have to use every moment of your free time in a smart way, but you don’t have to be in a hurry to get to the finish line, because often when you’re in too much of a hurry you miss some fundamental steps.
Back to us, what are the questions you need to ask yourself to do business today?
The first question you need to ask is:
Why do you want to start a business?
After you have answered this, then you can take a notebook and start answering each of these questions truthfully:
What skills do you have?
What is your passion?
What are your areas of expertise?
How much can you afford to spend?
How much capital do you need?
What kind of lifestyle do you want to live?
Are you ready to become an entrepreneur?
Obviously be brutally honest with yourself when answering all these questions.
- Think of a business idea
Do you have an idea to start your own business yet? Then you’re already one if not two steps ahead!
If not, then you need to start brainstorming in order to get a good idea, a profitable one that is different from those that are already present or successfully started at the moment.
To do business the first thing to find your business idea is to think of the next one. You have to think about satisfying a need, a necessity, a problem, a desire. Once you understand this then you will surely be on the right track to refine your business idea.
Remember that people always prefer to have more beautiful, better performing, stronger, and less defective things, so your business idea could also be an enhancement of an existing product.
Your business idea should also be about the field in which you are competent. Building a working robot may be a good idea for a robotics expert, but not for a scholar. So look at your previous answers and find something innovative in your field of expertise.
Another aspect you can evaluate for a new business idea is a better approach to something pre-existing. For example, you can try to make a product faster, cheaper, or both, create a better or more convincing offer.
In short, there is always room for a new business idea, the important thing is to know how to choose the best and most suitable for you!
- Do a market research
No business idea can be successful without market research. Once you have chosen the right business to focus on, you need to start studying your competition, understand what your potential partners in the market may be.
Start conducting interviews or surveys with a potentially target group of people to understand how to create an efficient service, how to really give users, future customers, what they need.
When you do a market research or survey you need to remember to do more and more research, to use both online and offline resources, always look at potentially targeted people and especially people you don’t know.
- Get feedback
Now that you understand the needs and options that can improve your business idea, put it in writing, and now try to set it up so that people can discover it, so that they can interact with your idea.
These people, who will try or understand your product first, should be able to give you honest advice.
THEIR OPINION MUST BE UNFILTERED, BECAUSE WITH THEIR NOTES YOU MAY DISCOVER SOME PROBLEMS THAT YOU MAY NOT HAVE SEEN ON YOUR OWN.
Surely, the first people you ask and who will help you start your business will also become the most ardent supporters of the brand, especially if they appreciate the product.
Having feedback can be very difficult to manage, because your idea is a bit like a child and seeing the negative points highlighted, or receiving non-positive comments and criticism can be hard to bear.
So how do you manage negative feedback about your future business?
Always thank people who give you feedback, even when it is negative, and encourage them to be honest in the future too.
Don’t listen indiscriminately to all negative reviews, some people may not like an idea.
If many negative comments are all about a specific aspect of your idea, then re-evaluate that point and try to understand why it doesn’t work.
Ask questions to find out exactly why someone didn’t like something and look for a solution to improve.
To help you manage negative feedback you can also opt for a wall of positive comments, a bulletin board where you can read all the feedback from those who like your idea.
- Start the bureaucratic process
Of course the idea is important and also understand if this can work or not but you also have to worry about starting to set up your business, you have to open the business make official the path you are taking.
So the first thing you should do is to go to an accountant and understand how you can move in this area, if you have the opportunity to ask for financial credit, or if there are some facilities that you can access.
Find out about any permissions, if you need to register the trademark of your business, etc…
The bureaucratic paperwork for starting a business can be really difficult to manage but it will help you both to formalize your project and at the same time to get all the information you need to really start your business.
- Create a business plan
You can’t do business without a good business plan. This action plan is really important to start your business idea.
A good structured business plan doesn’t have to be as long as a book, but it has to incorporate in a short text of about 10 pages all the essential points of your strategy, including earnings estimates and initial budget setting.
To create a good business plan you should:
- Make a cover page by entering your company name, and logo if you have it.
- Create a summary, this page includes the entire spirit of your business idea, it should summarize the action plan and you should describe the form of your company, but also report the problems that the company is trying to solve.
- Make a specific description of your business, identify your industry and describe your plans for the future.
- Outline the market strategy, what is the target market? What is the target market you are referring to?
- Competitor analysis. What does the competition do? How can you offer a better service than theirs?
- Design and development plan: how can you develop your project? What is the budget you need?
- How to manage the company? What are the operations you need to do every day to achieve your goals?
- Finance: do you already have the money to start your business? Do you need to ask for a loan? If so, from whom? How and how much do you have to ask?
These are certainly the main aspects that will allow you to develop a good business plan, but also to understand how to start and do business in a correct and productive way.
- Doing Business: How to get financing for your business?
There are many different ways to get the resources you need to start a business. Of course, looking for an investor at first may seem really difficult, but if your idea is good, then you will be able to convince someone to finance your idea.
But let’s see what the main solutions for starting your business and doing business can be:
Self-financing: Start your project as you go, using the money you earn from your work as an employee.
Ask for a personal financing or loan, or a business loan from a bank. In this case you will need to provide guarantees such as: a permanent salary, a guarantor with a fixed salary, or take out a mortgage on a property you own.
Look for a lender through crowfounding. Crowfounding involves proposing an idea and setting a budget to achieve. Through this platform users can choose to donate an amount of money to you as they wish until you reach your budget. This system is very popular online, where you can find various crow-founding platforms.
Find a Financial Investor, i.e. a person who is looking for interesting projects that he or she can finance with his or her own money by requesting a return as a percentage of the earnings from the business.
- Develop your product or service
This is definitely one of the most important points to do business and start your own business! You have to develop your idea! When you enter the development phase you will surely feel excited and can’t wait to get to work.
But of course you have to take the whole business idea into account and better understand the stages of implementation.
Depending on the idea you have to realize, try to find the most suitable tools and focus mainly on two aspects such as simplicity and quality.
But you also need to make a checklist that allows you to check all the activities to be carried out to achieve your goal.
If you need to hire people to help you in the development of your project, remember to always focus on professionals and specialists in the field and avoid relying instead on generalist figures. Finally, make sure that you always follow a precise plan and never lose track of the progress of your activity and that you supervise every single operation in the best possible way.
- Start building your team
As I have already mentioned, in order to be able to do business and realize your idea in the best possible way, you will have to make use of collaborators and a team that can support you in the best possible way.
If you need an employee, a freelancer, a partner, or several employees or a secretary, an administrative department, you must choose people who are as reliable as possible.
Interviews, finding the right person is not easy, entrusting part of your idea to someone you don’t know could be highly complex. So how can you find employees? How can you create a team that supports you on the road to success?
The only way is to start a search for the professionals you need, read their CVs, evaluate their skills and finally face the interviews. Alternatively, you can decide to rely on the most experienced and professional “hands” of a temporary agency.
AFTER CREATING YOUR TEAM YOU HAVE TO CREATE A CORPORATE IDENTITY.
Your employees must be able to live in a positive climate, have the same passion as you, want to grow with you and want the good of the company.
- Find the right location
If you want to do business you will most likely need a physical location, an office, a company or one or more shops. But how to choose the right location, what are the priorities to consider?
In order to find the right location you need to consider:
The functional aspect: how much space do I need? Where should I open my business? Which is the most suitable point to carry out the production, sales or office functions?
Demography and pedestrian traffic: are there enough inhabitants? Is it important for me to be close to a population centre?
Competition: of course being close to the competition can sometimes be positive, but other times it is not, this is a point that you have to evaluate through the market research you did before starting your business.
Proximity to other services or goods: you need to assess whether you need to be close to other activities, and whether they can enrich the quality of your workplace.
Possible municipal permits: you need to consider whether you need to do some work, whether you need to ask the municipality for specific permits to start the business, etc…
Rent and utilities: finally you have to choose a place that can fit in your budget, so the monthly rent and the cost of any electricity and gas connections must be taken into serious consideration, as they will be fixed expenses that you will have to meet with the profits of your business.
- Start selling
No matter what product or business you’re setting up, the future of your business will always depend on the revenue and sales you make.
Successful entrepreneurs knew this well, think Steve Jobs started contacting potential investors when he was still in his garage and his product was only recently developed.
But what sales strategies to use? There are so many possibilities in this field, especially if you also consider the possibilities that today arise from online sales and marketing. Whatever strategy you choose to use to attract customers, there are certainly four principles you should always take into account:
Listen to your potential customers. As entrepreneur John Rampton said: “Always listen to your customers, find out what they want and need and try to understand how to make it happen.
Don’t be intrusive, but not too shy either. You have to find the right balance in communicating with customers, you don’t have to be afraid to propose your product, but you don’t have to make them understand that you want to close a sale at all costs.
Don’t be afraid of the word no. Often people even if they are not interested in a purchase will listen to you before saying that they do not want to buy. So what to do? Make the most of the time they give you to turn the initial no, into a potential interest or purchase.
Making profits must be your priority. Of course having a good inflow and number of requests is important, but it is even more important to turn as many of them into actual sales as possible. Few customers who buy often are better than many who only ask for information but then don’t buy anything.
To sell well, you will surely have to do several actions before you can do it, you will have to identify the targets, understand which users are targeted, get a good customer base, publish advertisements in the right places in order to find people interested in your business.
IN SHORT, YOU NEED TO IDENTIFY THE RIGHT TOOLS AND THE BEST STRATEGY TO CONVERT YOUR CONTACTS OR CUSTOMERS INTO PROFITS.
- Grow your business.
Finally, the last step that will help you to do business the right way is to always think about growing your business. Of course, this is a step that you can take once you have consolidated your initial business, but the concept is another: to grow and expand your business more and more.
For example, you might choose to acquire another business, you can start thinking about a new market, expand your offerings and more. Of course, a growth plan can only be thought of when you have already created a plan to market your product and your business at its best.
Today’s successful companies and businesses use social media effectively, influencers organize organic campaigns, have a mailing list and know how to make the most of it.
They know exactly who and how to reach their potential customers both online and offline through marketing campaigns.
So first you need to grow your business on this front and understand how to build customer loyalty. This is very important as it will be easier and easier to sell to customers who are already loyal to your brand and who trust your ideas, because by doing so you can create a relationship between your customer and your brand.
By starting to use these strategies, by investing in attracting clients, but also in the service you can offer them, you will have done much of the work to do business.
Remember that in this field, to be always successful you will never rest on your laurels, but you will always have to innovate, find and adopt new strategies and make the most of innovations in advertising, commercial and IT.
If you invest in the future of your business, and help it grow, you will be able to realize the “empire” you dreamed of when you first decided to do business.
Original content in Italian written by Anna Porello.
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