Starting a business from scratch

It is a dream, an ideal to work doing something you love, to work for yourself and to have a work-life balance.

The focus of starting your own business becomes very enticing especially if you have grown up in a family business. There is this entrepreneurial drive that kicks in, you keep getting all these ideas about ways to make money and this drive gets stronger and stronger.

With the availability of communications now, working from home is so much easier. It sounds ideal, for many it is. It can give you the flexibility of working from home and being able to fit in working commitments around the family.

The areas that anyone thinking of starting their own business needs to consider are:
1. What is your expertise?
2. Who are you wanting to sell to – who are your ideal clients?
3. What are your strengths and weaknesses?
4. Do you have the business skills or do you need to learn?
5. Are you passionate about this? Will you stick at it through thick and thin?

These five points are essential to think about if you are considering starting a business from scratch. These points, even if you have a business operating, you still need to keep asking yourself these five points.

Starting a business from scratch is a personal development journey. You will learn many things about yourself that you might never had known about or didn’t want to acknowledge. The process of creating a business looks at many aspects of a person from people skills to technical skills to communication skills to personal attributes. If you decide to take the journey of starting a business, you will find challenges along the way that will need you to preserve and persist.

With the creation of my business, there have been many areas that I have had to learn. I have had to learn about marketing. This is an essential skill – if you aren’t knowledgeable in this area then learn. You need to understand and use the skills associated with marketing every day – you need to love to market as it will build your business. This is all about creating awareness of your business.

Being an expert in a field is another area that is essential. Keep doing everything you can to build up your expertise in an area. Become an authority, a thought leader in this field – become the “Go-To” person for your topic. Write on this, speak on this, do everything you can to know as much about your topic as you can.
The fruits of your labours can be plentiful – it takes time, persistence and being focused on the outcome. It is a journey and the rewards will be many. But it needs focusing on the end result and strong problem solving skills.

If you love what you do, then go for it. But this is not a light weight activity – it is a long term endeavour that will blossom if you plant enough seeds.

photo credit: herlitz_pbs via photopin cc

Adrienne McLean
Adrienne is the Founder of The Speakers Practice which has been running since September, 2009. The Speakers Practice offers Presentation Skills training program for individuals, teenagers, groups, and small business people. Adrienne is passionate about developing presentation skills and assisting others with building confidence and overcoming nervousness when speaking in public. Adrienne is a regular presenter , blogger and a contributing author in four recent business publications. She helps with building confidence with presenting, developing methods to promote and build awareness with the goal to help build business.