As soon as you decide to start a business, there is an immediate amount of doubt and fear that prevents the entrepreneur from taking the first step.
And is it that all entrepreneurs experience a degree of frustration or doubt that creates a particular fear of what they will reconsider if…
The Self-Doubt is something common in anyone who is thinking of starting a business. And for each one, the origin of doubt is different: there are those who have doubts about their idea, others fear making mistakes, not being able to get clients, etc.
These are the guidelines that have worked best for us.
Self-care is important for making an effective idea
The first thing you should be clear about when setting up your company is that the idea you have chosen to start is a good one. You won’t do best if you’re tired, full of doubt, or taking an unhealthy diet, so self-care is important as you’re coming up with business ideas.
Actually, when we say that a business idea is good it means that it meets these requirements:
- There is enough demand: does your idea respond to a real market need? That is, are you going to find enough people interested in hiring your services? If not, you will hardly be able to create a business around it.
- Competition: analyze the competition well. It is good that there is other professionals offering products and services similar to the ones you want to give because that means that the market is moving.
- You enjoy it – even the most profitable business in the world will be doomed if it’s not something you enjoy. Remember that entrepreneurship implies dedicating many hours a day to your business, and to support that workload you need a bit of enthusiasm and desire. Getting money is the goal, but never the main motivation.
Be clear about what volume of income you need
Now that you know what you are going to do, it is time to turn the general idea into a concrete and well-defined project, as we told you above.
And that means defining the following points before undertaking:
- How much income you will need to earn each month to have a “salary.”
- How many clients will you need to reach that goal?
- What system are you going to use to get them?
Then you have to break this plan down into smaller goals.
For example,
Suppose you are a web designer. After doing your calculations, you decide that to meet your monthly expenses and have room to continue growing, you need to get at least a couple of projects each month.
For this reason, during the first months, you will create online advertising campaigns in your budget.
Also, with the idea of positioning yourself in Google and not always depending on advertising, you are going to upload one post a week on your blog. Your goal, in this case, is that, within a year, all your customers arrive through the organic channel.
Find yourself a mattress, before you start
Having clear objectives for your business and a path to achieve them will give you some security when it comes to undertaking. But keep the following in mind:
Even the best laid-out plan in the world can fall apart at any moment.
Because in all businesses unforeseen events arise:
- Late in payments client.
- A project that seemed safe was canceled at the last minute.
- Expenses that you did not have and that force you to redo your accounts.
That is why it is so important that you have a good mattress when starting your business.
And how “thick” should this mattress is?
To give you an idea, it should at least be enough to cover all the expenses of your business for three months in a row.
Keep training
For us, one of the most important things when it comes to the undertaking is to continue training. For example, books on entrepreneurship and business management.
In this way, you will avoid making typical mistakes and you will get your business to grow much faster.
Establish your day-to-day work
In your business plan, you have broken down your business objectives into smaller tasks. But that is not enough. Because, at the moment of truth, the day to day ends up overtaking you.
Between finishing your clients’ projects, attending meetings, answering emails, and a thousand other small tasks, the time you dedicate to your business is increasingly reduced.
And that leads you to overwhelm yourself because you are not meeting the goals you have set for yourself. And fear, that which you thought you had under control, reappears.
That is why it is so important that you keep a plan of everything you have to do each day.
For example:
- In advance establish your tasks: at the end of each day, decide the tasks to which you are going to dedicate the next day. In this way, you will avoid falling into improvisation and losing your goals of sight.
- Give each task a specific time frame: the typical “To do” lists are not the most effective. Instead, decide how many hours to spend on each task based on its importance. Include in this planning a space for email and social networks.
- Decide what is urgent and what is not: if you accept that clients come to you with jobs they need “for yesterday”, they will end up taking up all your time.
Now is the time to leave Self-Doubt behind…
… And you decide to undertake.
Because if we have something clear, it is that the only sure way to achieve your professional goals is to launch yourself. And if you follow these tips that we have given you, you will have a much better chance of achieving it without any doubt.
