Who has time to study anymore? If you are thinking about starting a small business, or if you’ve just started one up and it’s struggling to earn money, welcome to Entrepreneur University. In less than 400 words, you’ll get a Start a Business Course that will teach you everything you need to know about running a successful business.
These tips have been developed from years of personal experience as an entrepreneur, as well as observation of my colleagues who have also started up their own businesses.
Start a Business Course 101: Gather. The first thing you need to do is gather an audience. Start building up a group of people who think that you add value and who come to respect what you have to say. A big audience is good but a targeted audience is better. Find them on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and through a blog.
Start a Business Course 201: Sell. In the early days of your business, you need to sell, then sell again, then sell some more. Small businesses need to start generating cash flow as early as possible and sustain that flow indefinitely. Even if you’re not profitable yet, cash flow will help to keep you going. The moment you stop focusing on cash flow is the moment that you will need to tighten your belt for lean times. Cash flow is king!
Start a Business Course 301: Profit. With an audience who is buying, you can start to focus on your margins. Chances are, you gave it some thought before, which is good, but it is not as important until this stage. Find ways to be profitable: Lower your expenses, raise your prices, sell more to repeat customers, offer ancillary products, and encourage referrals.
Start a Business Course 401: Reinvest. Once you have a revenue-generating business up and running, put aside some of your money to reinvest back into your business. Upgrade where you need to upgrade, invest in training for yourself, hire someone to help you by taking care of the administrative details, and put some money towards innovation. In doing this, you’ll create a stronger business.
Graduation! Congratulations, you’ve just gone through Entrepreneur University in less than 400 words. You have the “head knowledge” that shows you how you can be successful. You have just one thing to do: Apply it! If you apply what you learned in these four Start a Business Courses, you’ll be far more successful than the majority of start-ups out there.
