More than ever, entrepreneurship is ‘on-trend.’ It’s a weird way to put it, but more and more Americans are searching for ways to earn extra income independently.
Type in a quick search into Google about starting a business, and you’ll discover a slew of ‘gurus’ with guaranteed success strategies and quick and easy steps.
The truth is that there are no catchall strategies and quick and easy steps. For any tips and tricks to work, the correct approach is necessary. You first have to face the reality of the undertaking you’ve accepted and how it will change and affect your routine and daily life.
Ready for the hard truths?
Things Nobody Tells You About Starting a Business
Starting a business is hard.
Starting a business with no capital and minimal experience is even more challenging.
Many wannabe entrepreneurs go in with the wrong expectations, and they fail. Not because their business idea wasn’t ‘good,’ but because they’re unprepared when faced with unexpected challenges.
Let’s explore some truths awaiting your entry into the entrepreneur life.
1. It's a consistent learning experience.
Learning is never-ending.
Self-development never plateaus when you start a business. Changes in your audience’s wants and needs, technology, and other external factors influence your business’s inner workings. You’ll constantly be updating your knowledge to keep pace with the trends related to your business.
The investment you make into furthering your education feeds your business. Your current skillset may be enough to start, but it won’t sustain growth and future developments.
Your source of information can also determine your success. Some preach messages they don’t follow. Sorting out trusted and reliable sources can be tricky in such a highly saturated market. Often you’ll discover more from making mistakes and learning from them.
Test the waters. Don’t be afraid of mixing and trying out various techniques. You may discover a new system to help others in their entrepreneurial journey.
An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.
2. Self-motivation and discipline outweigh talent.
Never get comfortable with the notion you are talented. Talented people fail all the time. What sets apart the success stories is their drive to succeed. Their ability to overcome trials and motivate themselves despite their failures pushes them.
That is why self-motivation and discipline are so important.
You won’t be “in the mood” every day to work, especially during hard times. Showing up for your dreams is how you turn them into a reality.
Decide on a daily routine and follow it as best as possible, barring unplanned life detours. Repetition builds habits. It trains your brain to show up regardless of your mood.
Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is hard work.
3. Scheduling your work and family time is essential.
Friends, family, and other external distractions can hamper your progress if you allow them. Set aside time for the things that matter, from your family to your friends and your business. And not just schedule the time but live by them.
If you schedule private time for your wife or husband on Saturday between 4 pm to 6 pm, focus on that alone. No phones. No distractions. Maximize and respect the time.
The same goes for when you set aside your business hours. Have a family meeting. Let your spouse or significant other know you have this thing you’re trying to accomplish; this is how you plan on doing it and how their love and support can help.
If you’re a parent, the same openness applies. Schedule your family and business time and stick with them as best as possible, barring any unexpected life emergencies.
All time management begins with planning.
4. Your success requires sacrifice.
While you’re mapping out your schedule, you may have to cancel or eliminate things. Starting, growing, and promoting your business will take time, especially in the beginning stages. You haven’t yet built your audience base or established your brand. Your product or service can’t “sell itself” without exposure. What you sacrifice is dependent on your lifestyle and financial situation.
One sacrifice you may have to make is going out with your friends. For one, you need money to run a business. How much depends on the type of business you start. Early costs include your website subscription, buying a domain name, and a registration fee if you’re forming an LLC.
These added expenses mean cutting back on non-essential spending. Make the necessary sacrifices to free up your time and money by prioritizing the tasks to help you achieve your goals.
True success requires sacrifice.
5. Balance is not always possible.
Though you should always strive for a happy balance between life and work, it won’t always be possible.
Balancing both is easier if you’re single with no obligations other than yourself and your business. Balance becomes a juggling game if you have a significant other, with or without children. Your family will pull your time and attention in different directions.
Some days, life will disrupt your well-laid plans, or you may reduce family time in favor of a project deadline or a launch.
Go in understanding that you will drop the ball a time or two, fulfilling your family-business responsibilities. It’s an expected, though heartbreaking, part of running a business and a home. You can’t get both sides right all the time.
Do what you can to mitigate the fallout of dropping the ball, if you can, before a crisis hits.
To have someone who never makes a mistake, never finds her personal life in disarray, never worries about work-life balance? I think that would be unreal.
6. You’ll need all the support you can get.
Along with your family, you’ll need outside support. This support should come from like-minded entrepreneurs sharing the same journey with you. People you can commiserate with during the hard times and learn from as you grow.
Entrepreneurship can sometimes feel like a lonely journey; reach out to others like you.
It’s comforting being around others with personal knowledge of your experiences. They understand, more than most, what you’re going through.
Find your tribe and build your community. Join networking events and mastermind groups. Both will come in handy.
As a creative and as someone looking to start a business, your tribe is your safe place.
7. Working from home is a distraction in itself.
The distraction comes from all the free, flexible time on your hands. It’s easy to put things off until later, sometimes until ‘later’ becomes ‘never.’ Then there is the rabbit hole that is social media. It’s the most tempting of time-wasting habits.
If you schedule a task, change it only for emergencies.
Procrastinating causes all your work to pile up, and you become overwhelmed by your mile-long to-do list. Reviewing the list of incomplete tasks may even demotivate you.
Minimize distractions to maximize your time.
Set aside your phone. Turn off all notifications of your social media app or toss the phone out of the room. Social media is a blessing and a curse. It’s an essential tool in growing your business. Idle use of it, however, is counterproductive.
Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back.
8. Working smarter, not harder, is the key to your success.
We talk about working hard and putting in the hours, but I think it’s important to clarify one thing. Working hard is crucial, but you won’t ultimately succeed if you work hard at the wrong things.
Implementing smart work strategies is the way to go. Here are some areas to focus on:
- Time management: Categorize tasks by priority level and start with the high-priority things first, minus distractions. Switch off your phone, and don’t answer any emails. For added assistance in eliminating distractions, try using an app like Freedom or Focus. These apps block access to specific sites for designated periods.
- Create a system: If you’re offering services where customers sign up to work with you, map out the entire process beforehand. For each level, consider what you can prepare in advance. Be it client questionnaires and canned emails. You can copy and paste these messages with minimal customization, like the client’s name.
- Focus: Abandon all thoughts of multitasking. Choose a single task and focus on it alone until it’s complete. Tackling more than one task at a time cuts your focus and lengthens your time getting things done.
We think, mistakenly, that success is the result of the amount of time we put in at work, instead of the quality of time we put in.
9. Mistakes are inevitable.
Successful businesses don’t pop up overnight. If anyone tells you they do, they’re lying. With the proper knowledge, you can decrease your failure level, but you can’t avoid failures. Nor should you try. Embrace them. And learn from them.
There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.
10. You can start and run your business while working full-time.
Some people start small with their businesses. For example, if you want to be the next Erin Condren, you could start by selling digital planner pages on Etsy or Creative Market. You could also create digital templates to work on iPads.
Advances in e-commerce have opened up many options.
Look into all of them and consider your interests, the time and money you’re able to invest, and, yes, talents as well.
Learn what you need as you go, creating a study curriculum for yourself. You don’t need a fancy degree in an age where information is easily accessible online. If you require certification, online courses give you the advantage of the classroom from the comfort of your home. The flexible hours will be helpful with scheduling your learning around your full-time work schedule.
Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice, and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.
Conclusion
Starting your business is a remarkable undertaking. It helps you take charge of your time and follow your passion while designing the lifestyle you want. But the journey is not an easy one. You will fail. You will lose heart a few times, but you can overcome the obstacles with the right approach.
Don’t look for the catchalls and quick and easy ways out. Look for practical and effective solutions and assess their feasibility in your present circumstances. These solutions should encourage long-term benefits as much as or even more than short-term gains. These will grow your business and set you on the path to success.
