.png)
How to start a small business. Step by step guide
You all have heard the benefits of small businesses for you and the economy and so on. That’s great, you can start your own business or better said micro business and this blog post will help you figure out how to start a business that can be successful. You also may have heard that so many small businesses won’t make it to the second year!
The good news is there are ways to design a business that has more chance to succeed and survive.
It is important to know what you are going to do and how to it. For this reason, you have to answer some questions before start; These questions will help you making sure you are in a right track.
Ok, you have a the business idea, right? Let’s discuss it more to find out why your idea is worth doing.
You can stop and think, then answer the following questions:
What is your personal strength? Does your business represent your strength?
What is your passion? Are you following your passion?
Do you have an urge to make a difference?
Do you see an opportunity that no one else has discovered?
All right, after thinking about above questions, now, answer this question as well:
What problem are you going to solve? How your business help customers have a better, faster or cheaper option.
After this you need to find out how your idea is different to the current solutions in the market?
Then you answer this question: what are the current substituted for your solution?
But, what is a substitute? Ok, let’s image you are making sunscreen, the other companies that make sunscreen are your competitors, but, substitutes are the actions or items that can be done instead of using sunscreen! For example, a hat, long sleeve shirt, umbrella, or even staying in the shade.
So, think about how many substitutes are available for the solution your business offer. Obviously, more numbers of substitutes make it harder for you to survive.
Now, there is another question you should answer:
Why customers should migrate from a current solution to yours? You may offer a good solution to a current problem, however, many customers are already using the existing solutions. What do you offer to make the customer come to you instead of your competitors? This is a very important question and may need a lot of time and thinking to figure it out. You need to have thoughts and strategies in place to achieve this goal.
Now, it is time to think more about the problem you are going to solve. Just think, is it a real problem?
Just be aware, that there are two kinds of problems:
Known problems; which is obvious and everyone knows about them
Unknown problem; this one is trickier. Sometimes people don’t even know they have a problem and do something based on their habit although it might be unpleasant. To find out this kind of problems, deep research and observations are required. There are hundreds of problems that still need to be solved. It is your job to discover them and offer a proper solution to it. Think about your industry, do some in-depth interviews, run focus groups or any other ways to gain some useful information.
Also, it is very helpful to know about the trends and movements, to be updated, listen to the news, attend the networks and talk to people.
Try to find out what majority of people are complaining about! By understanding the nature of the problem, you’ll have an insight what to fix and how to do it!
However, if you just copy the same business model as your competitors, you’ll be a “Me too” business, which is the least ideal version of the new business.
Again, you can pause this video and think about what value you’ll bring to the customers. What’s that number one thing or primary reason customers should choose you?
Your value proposition should explain how your product or service deliver specific benefits, and tell the ideal customers why they should buy from you and not your competitors.
Once you established your value proposition, you can start thinking about moving ahead your business idea.
In the next Blog post, we will talk about the target market and how to choose your suitable target market based on principals and techniques.
Until the next Blog, bye and good luck!
Originally published on Entrepreneurship and Innovation Hub Blog