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Entrepreneurs – What Do You Need To Ensure Before You Start Your New Business?
Written by: Lee ListerArticle Overview: You are ready to start your business, but you are not sure it will be a success. What do you need to ensure that you do before you start your new business? Here are the important items:
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Free Download - What Type of Business Should I Start? By Lee Lister |
Entrepreneurs – What Do You Need To Ensure Before You Start Your New Business?
You are ready to start your business, but you are not sure
it will be a success. What do you need
to ensure that you do before you start your new business? Here are the important items:
·
Legally
Sound: You need to ensure that your business is properly set up, your
personal assets protected and you have informed the tax authorities. You should also ensure that you have all the licences
and certificates that you require to work in your business environment.
·
Clearly
Planned Out: You should have a well thought out business plan. Not any old template where you have changed a
few words, but one that you have worked on – preferably with an expert’s assistance
– so that you understand and buy it to its contents. A good business plan provides a firm
foundation to your new business.
·
Clearly
Defined Goods and/or Services: You must have a very good idea of what you
want to sell and have a group of them available at various price points. With services this is much more complex. It is no good saying “secretarial services” –
you need to define what these services are in hours and deliverables. Similarly if you are supplying consulting
services you need to define what the aim of these services are with a time
frame and deliverables. They would thus
read something like – “deliver a business plan of between 25- 30 pages within
one month” as opposed to “write business plan”.
With goods it is important that you provide a group of goods with an
upgrade path so that you can offer your existing customers a variety of items.
·
Something
Someone Wants: It may seem obvious but many companies fail because they
forget to check that someone (and preferably lots of people) actually wants to
buy their super new widget! Undertake a
lot of market research and check forums and search engines to find what people
want and are buying now. Asking friends
and family will only get positive responses.
·
A Price
That Will Sell: Once you know what you are seeking to sell and to whom, you
need to ensure that you offer them at prices that people will buy. Even in recessionary times, people still seek
quality but they won’t pay more than the perceived value of the item. Once again it is research and trial and error
that will find your pricing levels.
·
Capability
To Provide Goods and/or Services: Now you need to ensure that you can
provide the goods and services that you wish to sell. With goods, have you got manufacturers and
wholesalers contracted and can they provide the amount of goods that you are
likely to require. When you start up –
getting goods delivered or supplied in small measures is particularly
difficult. Don’t go chasing the likes of
Walmart or sign onto a shopping channel until you can get large amounts of your
goods into your warehouse – and more importantly can pay for them before they
are sold! Similarly with services, do
you have enough skilled staff to meet the potential demand? On an administrative side, do you have the
ability to handle customer fulfilment, enquiries and invoice chasing?
·
Ability
To Be Found: Lastly, and again it
can be a problem with small start up companies, can you be found by your
customers. Do you have a memorable phone
number and quality web site that are all displayed on your advertising and
marketing material? Is you domain easy
to remember and reasonably short? Does your office look like an office – or if
you work from your spare room – can you look business like from the outside?
If you have sorted out all the above problems, you are well
on the way to starting a successful business.
Good luck.
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About the Author: Lee Lister RSS for Lee's articles - Visit Lee's website  From an early age she began an unparalleled journey through business consulting that continues to span across the UK, USA, Europe and Asia. She has consulted for a considerable number of companies all over the world. Specialising in business change management, start up consultancy and trouble shooting. Lee's experience in marketing and internet marketing is also keenly sought after. She is a prolific published writer of books, ebooks and articles and can easily be found on major search engine and Amazon. Her books include: FastTrack Bid Management, Proposal Writing For Smaller Businesses, How Much Does It Cost To Start A Business, Entrepreneur's Apprentice and a series of Start My New Business books that do as they say in the title! Her major web sites are: Click here to visit Lee's website   Good at Sewing and Want to Turn it into a Business What Type of Business Should I Start The Dolly Parton Business Model Entrepreneurs Need To Produce A Costing Model To Assist You In Estimating Or Bidding List Building Some Off Line Methods To Build Your List |
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One More Thing...
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