6 valuable tips for new entrepreneurs

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Dec 2, 2016 / by
6 valuable tips for new entrepreneurs

Making the transition away from a traditional office job to pursue your ambitions as an entrepreneur can be daunting. Say goodbye to a stable income and hello to a long, treacherous journey filled with obstacles.

Entrepreneurship is high risk and high reward, which is a path that not everyone wants to walk. However, if you’ve made the decision that you want to start a business and escape your 9-5, it’s best to do everything within your powers to maximise your chances of success. Here are 6 valuable tips that will benefit your journey.

1 – Think long-term

Business coach Charles Gaudet states:

Successful entrepreneurs are in it for the long haul. They are not after a get-rich-quick scheme.

If you can’t envision yourself running your business several years from now, you probably shouldn’t be starting the business in the first place. Entrepreneurship normally takes years before you can rake in the kind of money that most people would describe as successful. Although there are stories of overnight successes, these exceptions only serve to confirm the rule that victory as an entrepreneur takes years of hard work and effort. If you’re not thinking long-term, then you will falter as soon as the first hurdle appears.

2 – Make delivering value your first priority

Most people start businesses for the primary aim of accumulating wealth. While there’s nothing wrong with seeking financial abundance, if you remain focused on your own wallet rather than what you can deliver for your clients, you’re destined to fail. Ironically, when you make the mindset shift to providing as much value as possible to your customers, they will sense it and you will be rewarded financially. When it’s obvious that you’re solely concerned about maximising your own profit, people will sense that too and will be less willing to deal with you!

Unique selling point3 – Have a USP

Entering a niche that has plenty of competitors is perfectly acceptable. However, it’s crucial that you come up with a unique selling point (USP) to differentiate your brand. There needs to be a valid reason why customers will purchase from you instead of your competitors if you want to be successful in the long-run.

4 – Don’t ditch your job straight away

Fortunately, we live in an era where it’s possible to create a business in your downtime while still working a fulltime job. While the notion of burning your ships at the shore and committing 100% to your new business is romantic, relying on an unproven business to pay your rent can create enormous amounts of monetary stress (which will inevitably make it more difficult to achieve success). You can always get a part time job to alleviate the stress – just make sure you have enough to live on so that you’re not reliant on your business until it’s already off the ground.

5 – Work with people with complementary skills (and personalities!)

As an entrepreneur, it’s important to work with people who you actually like – otherwise your daily grind can get extremely unpleasant. Additionally, pick people with complementary skills to your own. An introverted and extroverted partnership can be highly productive, as in the case of Apple’s Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. One person can take care of the product development while the other specialises in sales and marketing.

Working with people who have similar values to your own is also incredibly important. If you’re someone who wants to create a lifestyle business in order to achieve location independence and freedom, don’t partner with someone who wants to work 7 days a week and create a world-changing business.

6 – Aim for consistency instead of perfection

Perfectionism can delay projects and destroy entire businesses. It’s hard not to be a perfectionist when you are heavily invested in your business (both emotionally and financially) – you want it to succeed because it reflects positively on who you are as a person. However, you need to ship in order to generate a profit. Aim to please your clients consistently rather than create products that are perfect in your own mind and you will be rewarded financially. After all, your clients are the only ones that matter in your business as they’re the ones keeping it afloat with their money!

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