It involves the whole processes of getting your business running, including all the steps, actions and decisions that would land your business to the desired level.
What social media tells you about being an entrepreneur...
They describe it as a way of guaranteeing a stress free financial freedom to work from any part of the word. Taking a look at many Instagram handles, you'd see photos of so-called successful entrepreneurs, showing you photos of the latest Mercedes Benz and Bentley that they just acquired.
What entrepreneurship really is...
I've read the biographies of many real entrepreneurs and majority of them have so many things in common. They spend hours daily reading and researching on how to bring out the best from their business.
Warren Buffet, the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and one of the most successful investors in the world stated that he devotes about 80% of his time to reading.
Mark Cuban reads 3 hours a day, Bill Gates, the CEO of Microsoft Corporations reads 50 books a year.
Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook stated that he reads a book every two weeks. Inasmuch as he reads fewer books than the others in our list, the fact that he still deems it necessary to expand his knowledge is worth appreciating.
That is to tell you that being a successful entrepreneur has a whole lot more than just snapping with a MacBook in a beach.
Before launching that your dream business with a lot of potentials, it's very important you understand the entrepreneurial process, and how you can use it to achieve success.
As Rome wasn't built in a day, your dreams too won't. You need to understand how to grab the trends and change tactics fast when you notice any newer development in your field.
5 Critical Stages You Will Go Through As An Entrepreneur
Wikipedia defines entrepreneurship is the process of designing, launching and running a new business, which is often initially a small business.
So, an entrepreneur is simply a business owner. Majority of big entrepreneurs in the world today started small. If you follow the right steps, your business will in a few years, hit the peak that you ever wish for.
Some critical stages that every budding entrepreneur must pass through are:
• Finding the right business idea
The first step in becoming an entrepreneur involves identifying and evaluating the right opportunities. It is the primary step because without a business idea, you can't be termed a business owner (entrepreneur).
You shouldn't just venture into any business without conducting the necessary market researches. Try to find out how demanding your product or service is and who you intend selling it to (your target market). Remember that no matter how promising a business idea appears, if you lack the capacity to properly execute it, it'd still end up a failure.
• Developing the business plan
A business plan is a formal written description of your business's goals. It tells what you plan to do and how you plan to do it. As a startup, you might not necessarily go for a formal business plan, you can just write down a few points to target and what you intend achieving in a specified period of time.
I cancelled the formal above because many new unique businesses tend to crash after a short period of time due to poorly written business plans. You can write a business plan with high hopes and if at the end of the day you don't achieve that, it can mark a beginning point of your business failing.
After running your business for a few months (or even years), you should be able to know what and what are involved and the challenges you face. At this point, light tests, corrections, and re-tests, will go a long way towards growing your business to a better level.
If however you intend going for a bank loan or grant, drafting a business plan would be necessary as it's one of the criteria for getting such approved.
Before we proceed to the next stage, if you are not yet experienced on how to write a professional business plan, kindly check out this article on step by step guide on how to write a professional business plan.
• Raising your seed capital
At this stage it is assumed that you've identified the services you want to offer to your customers and have penned down the full financial implications of the project.
Getting funds for your business is usually not so easy, especially as a start-up. There are a number of ways you can raise seed funding including getting an investment from angel investors, going for a loan, grant, amongst others.
If you intend going for any of the options above, you might have to go a long way towards proving to your sponsors that your business will generate them good profit. You can also decide to borrow directly from your friends or family members.
• Getting customers
The major purpose of every business owner is to get paying customers, this also at the lowest possible cost.
No business can succeed without customers. As a good entrepreneur, you should consider two different factors when about dealing with your customers:
- your customer acquisition costs, and
- your customer retention costs
You should employ the cheapest available means of acquiring new customers and also, try your best to retain them. We earlier shared 10+ amazing places to advertise your products online in Nigeria. The platforms we listed their will help you reach thousands of people at very affordable rates.
If you don't have enough funds, you can also explore these ways of advertising your products and services free in Nigeria.
While hustling for clients, also map out ways of retaining them. If your business is online or you have an official website, you can keep in touch with them via email lists or bulk SMS.
Most importantly, the easiest way of making your customers to return back to you is by offering them an exceptional customer service. Always remember that, every customer is special, deserves to be treated special and enjoys being treated special!
• Success or failure
Well, the blog failed because we didn't figure out ways of monetising it. Our readers were Nigerians who rarely buy digital products, especially when it doesn't tutor them on various business tips. In February 2017 we sold the blog and started a new one with a great potentials.
As a business owner, if your business doesn't turn out the way you planned, don't give up on the plan. Instead, retreat and revisit the events that led to its failure. Find out what and what went wrong and figure out how it'll work, then give it another trial.
If your business plan goes successful, don't just sit down and relax, plot on ways to improve. Remember the saying that the only permanent thing in life is change. What if another brand start offering the same (or a better) service?
Conclusion
Taking a look at the things shared above you'd see that entrepreneurship involves a whole more other than just launching a business. For your business to succeed, you'll have to work
We also have another article on the top 10 qualities of a successful entrepreneur, I'm sure you'd enjoy it too!
Meanwhile, don't forget to drop us a comment and share with your friends. Also check out our next post on 10 factors affecting entrepreneurship development in Nigeria.
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