Career & Entrepreneurship
10 Steps to Start your Own Business
Melitta Campbell is a Business and Communications Coach who specialises in helping women communicate their value, and build successful businesses in ways that feel natural to them and meaningful to their clients.
Vivamost asked her to share her best tips for starting your first business – here are her ten steps to follow …plus some bonus tips.
1. Clarity
The first step for any aspiring business owner is to get clear on what it is they want to build and why. I recommend spending a good amount of time to explore this fully.
While the entrepreneurship journey is exciting, it’s also hard, so you need an inspiring vision to keep you focused and motivated. It will also help you make better decisions as you start to build and grow your business.
2. Know your Ideal Client
It’s amazing how many businesses are not clear about who they want to serve. Without knowing exactly who your ideal client is and how you can add value to their lives in meaningful ways, you are always going to struggle to attract enough of the right prospects into your business. Without clients, you have a hobby, so this is an important step.
Once you know your clients, you want to factor this into every decision you make and you can create a business that stands out for all the right reasons. It’s worth noting that not everyone is going to be your ideal client, so getting clear on this will also save you a lot of wasted time and energy trying to attract unsuitable clients, or fielding the complaints from those who are not right for your offer.
3. Slow Down
There’s a great saying: “Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast” that I’d love to see become the mantra of all new entrepreneurs.
I see many people get excited about their business, jump into their marketing and spend a fortune on advertising, before they have a clearly defined offer that is already selling well.
This may seem a bit backwards, but until you have a product or service that people want – and prove this by paying for it – your advertising efforts will be wasted.
Instead, spend your energy on building your early customer base organically. Listen to them closely, then use their experiences to help you improve your offer and grow your business.
4. Create an Experience
Today, most marketplaces have become pretty crowded. This means, the opportunity lies in being different.
One of the easiest ways to be different is by creating an exceptional client experience that is inline with your brand values and enables your clients to fulfil more of their goals and desires. If you can do this, you’ll position yourself at the top of the market and you’re integrity will speak volumes.
5. Develop Clear Goals
To keep yourself and your team (if you have one) focused and moving forward consistently, you’ll need to develop inspiring goals, backed by clear plans and milestones. Link all your goals to your dreams, the value you want to create and who you need to become in order to achieve everything you want.
Unlike the goals you may have set in your corporate job, you want these goals to be exciting and stretching. The idea isn’t necessarily to achieve your biggest goals, but for them to guide your personal and business growth.
6. Upgrade Your Skills
What got you here, won’t get you there. While you will undoubtedly bring some incredible skills and experiences with you into your business, you’re unlikely to have all the skills you need. And that’s part of the fun!
Do a SWOT or strengths analysis to see what skills you already have and what you need to improve or learn. Then determine how best to do this.
7. Adopt a Growth Mindset
Mindset is everything in business – you won’t find a successful entrepreneur who disagrees with this – so make this your priority. It’s impossible to achieve your dreams if you don’t fully believe in yourself.
Your mindset refers to the way you think. And how you think, determines your actions, and your actions determine your outputs, so it’s important to pay attention to your beliefs, thoughts and feelings.
As a business owner, you will have to step and learn and do things you’ve likely not encountered before. Therefore a growth mindset, i.e. believing you can learn and become better in any area of your life, will underpin this. Start by reading ‘Mindset’ by Carol Dweck.
7. Know Your Value
The biggest struggle for most businesses is attracting enough of the right clients. I speak to a lot of people who are doing what they feel are all the right things, but not getting the results they desire and as a result are fast losing faith.
The number one reason they fail to attract clients is because they are not clear in articulating their value. A confused mind doesn’t buy or buy-into anything.
Therefore, having the clarity and confidence to consistently communicate your value is essential. It’s hard to develop this alone, so if you are engaging a business coach, this is another area where they can help you and prove invaluable.
7. Build Your Presence
Once you are clear about your audience, your purpose, your offer and your value, the next step is to start building your visibility and presence. You can do this using social media, networking, articles and interviews, live or online workshops and training…the opportunities are almost endless. What you need to keep in mind as you build your marketing plan is what is meaningful for your clients and what best reflects your brand values.
At this stage, you’ll be tempted to build your website. I would advice against this unless you already have happy clients (or an eCommerce business). Until you have real paying clients, you won’t understand what they value most about you, your business and the experience you offer, so you won’t be able to communicate this clearly. Remember: slow is smooth and smooth is fast!
9. Consider getting help
Building a business can be as confusing as it is exciting, so getting professional help to guide your steps, keep you focused on the right things, support your personal growth can prove invaluable.
Take time to find the right coach for you – it’s never too soon and a good coach will save you a lot of time, effort and frustration…not to mention money!
Most coaches offer a free trial session or discovery session where you can get to know more about their methods and they can learn more about your needs. Choose a coach who inspires you and whose approach is clear to you and addresses your current needs.
10. Enjoy What You Do
While entrepreneurship is highly rewarding, it’s not easy – so it needs to be fun. Stay focused on what you enjoy most and purposefully design enjoyment into your processes. This is your chance to create your own environment, so make sure it’s one that sparks joy!
All photos credit Melitta Campbell
