Top Advice for Nigerian Bloggers : March is National Start a Business Month and so my client Regus wanted to help small businesses by curating some of the best tips for entrepreneurs related to starting a business. With that in mind, we reached out to the CarolRoth.com contributor network of business owners, experts, advisors and entrepreneurs to find out their best tips. Their answers are presented below in no particular order.
You may notice some similar ideas listed, but I kept them separate, as something in the way one is framed may resonate differently with you.
Top Advice for Nigerian Bloggers
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1. Breakeven
In starting a new business, one should plan for a 5 year break even target. This MUST be a part of your business budget.
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2. Make Your Own Q&A
When starting out, I think the best tip is to answer questions. Questions such as: what does your company do (in as few words as possible), what are you selling, what are you charging, what are your long term goals for the company, what are your short term goals for the company, how are you going to advertise, how are you going to grow the company, how are you going to fund the company, where are you going to set up up the company, what licenses and fees do you need, etc.!
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3. Ohhh. No Money Coming in?
You’d better stay in that cushy cube or corporate office if you get worried at all about not making anything for all of your hard work. If you have a family and car payments to make, a mortgage and anything else that you have to pay for, stay put! But, if you share a passion for reinvention, for chance, for CHANGE… Then, join us.
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4. Don’t Stop Marketing!
Execution + Consistency are key!
Execution of a strategy and a marketing plan is critical. My motto is, “if you stop marketing, they stop watching.” Therefore, ensure that you are constantly nourishing and sharing your brand. Create a marketing strategy and execute it. Hire a team of professionals that will help elevate your mission and your movement to the next level. Be unique, be memorable, be helpful to the consumer, interact and network. Go on ahead, be a bold marketer!
5. Don’t Go it Alone!
6. Know the Competition
The most important thing that every entrepreneur should know is everything about the competition. And, never ever believe that there is NO competition. Competition is any entity that takes your potential customer’s money away from you. You must know everything about any business that pursues your customer’s money. You must be able to differentiate your business from all competitors and explain why the customer should spend their money with you and not others. Competition is your best friend in business.
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7. Hanging Out Your Shingle
8. 24/7/365
9. Don’t Stop Before the Miracle!
Stay focused, keep your eye on the result you’re looking/intending/hoping for and don’t stop before the miracle.
If we were all walking a tightrope or on a zip line, of course we wouldn’t stop ¾ of the way across or down, am I right? Don’t stop before the miracle simply means keep going for what you want and don’t let anything stop you. Be tenacious. Stay focused; stay on point.
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10. Stop Planning and DO!
Business plans and research can be very valuable. But many new entrepreneurs spend so much time planning that they never really learn how their business is going to run. During the early stages, make sure to divide your time only 25% to planning and 75% to doing.
Think of it this way: if you spend all of your time writing recipes, everyone will be hungry come dinnertime.
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11. Be Generous
12. Bye-bye Evenings
13. Keep it Simple
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14. Actions Not Plans
I will take full responsibility for myself and my actions, and accept the challenge of becoming a top performer.
I agree to face the negative invisible scripts that I have created in my life and replace them with the positive and productive scripts of top performers.
I will not quit when things get challenging. I realize that top performers take action even when life gets hard.
Hustle for opportunities, build authentic relationships and plan accordingly…
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15. Don’t Try to Be a Know-it-all
Entrepreneurs are often going it alone early in their endeavors, but the key to growing in success and doing so rapidly is realizing what you know and what you don’t know. Then, determine what you want and need to learn and find others to surround yourself with that can help with the rest. Isolation as an entrepreneur gives time for reflection, which is needed, but partnership and teamwork will lead to expanding the impact and difference that one’s efforts can make. Know when to ask for help.
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16. Confident Business Decisions
17. Time Clock
I was informed when I started my first business that I would not be punching the time clock anymore, except once – IN. To be successful with a new business, you must be focused 24/7 on the people, events and opportunities that guide you toward your ultimate goals. You’ll discover that your social circle will change as you begin spending more time with other successful business people and learning from them. Entrepreneurship is a FULL-TIME job, seven days a week.
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18. Don’t Pass By the Little Guy
Because no man [or business] is an island to himself, there will come a time when you’ll need people. When launching a business, you’ll definitely need service providers.
Don’t be so quick to look up the biggest name that you can find. There are plenty of fellow small business service providers who are far more economical, personable and can better heal your start-up pains.
Besides, the greener grass you’re certain only a big brand can deliver could be just beautifully-packaged AstroTurf.
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19. Be Best at What They Want Most
20. You Can’t Do it All Yourself!
Many entrepreneurs tend to be one-man-bands where they write the proposals, design the product, and market the concept all by themselves and in reality, you can do that! But, you’ll never be great at all of those tasks.
The most important skill that I have found is to be able to spend money properly to find the people to help make your vision a reality.
Don’t be afraid to take on partners. Just remember that 40% of a successful company is always better than 100% of a failure.
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21. It’s Not Your Money
22. The Risks You Don’t Know
Risk doesn’t get much respect, especially from entrepreneurs who are so passionate about their new offering. Identifying the risks delivers two huge benefits. It alerts you to areas you didn’t consider, and it will impress your investors or advisors. THE best and most comprehensive source for risks specific to your industry is a prospectus. Find one for any company that is closest to yours and read the section on risks which often lists a dozen or more. You will learn new risks.
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23. Don’t Try to Do EVERY Thing!
24. What are You Building?
Focus on the “what” before getting caught up in the “how.” The business is yours to create however you want, so choose to create a business you love!
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25. Create Your Company’s Culture
26. Get Real!
You can write a detailed business plan, design a clever logo and rent plush office space, but your business isn’t a real business until you have customers.
Whether your company is selling a service or product, focus on how you’ll generate revenue. How will you attract buyers? That’s the real deal if you want to succeed.
27. Find a Mentor
28. Do it!
The person who gains the most must make the call and that is you. You must call and keep calling. When someone says that they will call you, they won’t.
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29. Set a Start Time
30. Get Your Money
The biggest thing that I didn’t know but needed to know when I started my business was “manage receivables closely.”
Prior to getting into business, my paycheck would be deposited into my checking account on the last day of the month.
Once I started my consulting business, I took too long to get invoices out to the clients and ran into cash flow problems.
Don’t make this mistake. Mange your receivables. Send invoices promptly. Follow up one day after the due date.
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31. Beware of Too Much Flexibility
Many people think that once they’re entrepreneurs, they set their own work schedules and can work whenever they want. That’s true to some extent – but your customers will also partially dictate when you have to be at the store or in front of the computer. The “flexible” work hours you look forward to might not be as easy to organize as you think!
If you want flexible working hours, set clear expectations with your clients about how and when you work with them.
32. Nay the Naysayers!
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33. All That Glitters isn’t Gold
34. LOVE What…
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35. Don’t Be Afraid to Succeed
36. Seek Guidance
and investors. Apply their strategies, tactics, mindsets, and ideas in a way that works best for you. Aim to make your company a lean, keen, innovative machine.
37. If You Do it, Measure it!
Paying attention to ROI is one of the most important things that a business owner can do. When you spend money on marketing, advertising, paid search, SEO or even employees, it is important to know what your return is on that expenditure. If you know what works, you can do more of it. If you don’t know, it’s difficult to grow the business. It’s also important to stop spending money on outlets or expenditures that are not working. If you are spending money, measure your return!
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38. Leave Your Comfort Zone & …
39. Show Up for You, Inc.
40. Use a Grunt Fund
A Grunt Fund is a method for implementing a perfectly fair equity split in a bootstrapped start-up company, unlike other models that rely on unreliable valuations based on guesses (also called assumptions).
The Grunt Fund uses a simple set of calculations that determine the relative value of time, money, ideas, relationships and anything else that a person can contribute. It’s the most precise equity model on the planet and it works in all types of companies.
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41. Start Off Small
42. Expect to Fail. Do it Anyway
43. Just Know What You Love
When starting a new business, do your research and study your competition and how your product differs from what’s available. Road test your product or service and get feedback. If it is truly your passion and you get a good response, don’t concern yourself with how much money it will make. Live your dream, your passion, and let the end results evolve. If you start by trying to justify the ultimate reward, you will be disappointed in the early goings. The money and growth will naturally evolve.
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44. 4 Tips to a Successful Startup
Use the “Harvard Rule of Four” to determine if you have a viable business:
a. Something everybody wants
b. Something nobody has
c. Something priced to sell
d. Something priced for profit
If your idea passes this test, then you should pursue it vigorously.
45. Minimize the Challenges
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46. Promote to Everyone
47. Address a Compelling Need
48. Stop with the Excuses!
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49. Find People Who Care
50. Love Thy Customer
51. Even Your Mom May Not Help You
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52. Know Your Why
53. Be In it for the Long Haul
Many people go into their own business hoping to make millions. In reality, this happens to a small percentage of owners. The rest of us are putting in 70-hour weeks, dealing with everyday chaos & living paycheck to paycheck. If your 3-year business plan ends with, “We will be bought out,” you probably aren’t going into business for the right reason.
You need to believe in your product and want to be in it for the long haul.
There are no shortcuts to success, just early exits.
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54. Be Bold and Brave
55. Find a Co-Founder Quick
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56. Learn From My Mistakes!
Here’s what I wish I knew:
1. Everything you go through in the corporate world will serve you well as an entrepreneur! Consider it group training in speed & uncertainty.
2. If you did a function in corporate life, don’t think you can do it for yourself in your business.
3. DON’T TRY TO DO EVERYTHING YOURSELF! You’ll fail.
4. You WON’T get to do what you love full time. You must sell first!
5. Taking care of yourself is taking care of the business. You ARE the brand.
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57. Listen to the Iron String
58. Not for the Money
Photo credit: Kit Campbell
59. You Don’t Know What You Don’t
You’ve checked lots of businesses. Wholesale, Retail, Manufacturing, Service Bus, the list goes on. BUT before you start to move ahead, have you really found out what the DAY TO DAY reality is, of running that business?
I suggest you speak to owners about their experience.
What do they like or dislike about it?
Would they do it again if they knew what they knew now?
Ask if you could spend time watching.
You may be surprised at what you see & possibly re-think your decision.
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60. Do Your “Homework” First!
61. Strategy for Getting Clients
I’ve worked with several start-ups to help them launch a new website for their new business and many have complained to me about the lack of new clients and reduced cash flow while in start-up mode. Just building a website is NOT the answer to getting new clients.
You should have a strategy! Have at least 1-5 clients lined up before leaping in to start a new business.
Start to build a client base and cash flow before quitting your job. And launch the website as early as you can!
62. Something Only You Can Make
My best tip as a marketing expert to entrepreneurs starting a new business is to create something only you can make! Every successful start-up has a monopoly. You must have a monopoly on what you make- that someone else can’t make it the way you make it or provide it the way you provide it.
Brilliant marketing is around figuring out that product you can make or that service you can provide that people are willing to cross the street to get or search/poke around the web to buy.
63. Invest in Automation
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64. Crocodile Bite it
65. Watch Out for Charge Backs!
Many people do not know that if your ratio of charge backs exceeds 1%, you may lose your merchant account and be placed on a black list called Terminated Merchant File (TMF). After this, no one would give you a merchant account, unless you pay over 9% in transaction fees. I had to find out the hard way. When I started out, I did not bother to fight charge backs less than $25 and these piled up to a point that I lost my merchant account. On top of that, they locked up $25K of my funds for 6 months.
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66. Plan Very Well! And Be Patient
67. Know When to Pivot
Knowing when the entrepreneurial spark is gone is the key to innovate in another area and the sign of a wise leader. I would advise my younger self to change direction early on if the values and mission of the company no longer resonated with me instead of having business decline and personal relationships suffer. Innovation and ideation are internalized- when the excitement is missing from any key member of the team- it is time to pivot.
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68. Hyper Focus on Customer Needs
69. Waking Up Sleeping Giants
70. First Plan Your Work
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71. Learn to Say ‘No’
72. The Weirder the Better
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73. Cash is King for a Start-up!
Top Advice for Nigerian Bloggers
74. Don’t Sell Tires with Flowers
75. Be Brutally Honest
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76. Listen & Validate
77. Act Now. Think Later
If you over-think everything, opportunity will pass you by. Experience is the only way to overcome your fear. Go out and make mistakes. Learn from them. Then, make sure to not make the same mistakes again!
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78. IRS Prevention is Key
79. Capital is King
80. Bet Big or Lose More
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81. Mind Your Business (Taxes)
82. ‘Want To’ and ‘Need To’
to do’ for your business to thrive. When your business grows, so will the list of things that have to get done and the to-do list.
To be successful, strive to finish everything on the ‘need to do’ and ‘want to do’ lists with the knowledge that this is an unobtainable goal.
83. How to Reach Sales Nirvana
Do you want to know if your new business will be successful? Answer this question?
What do I sell?
Simple, right? Wrong!!! The vast percentage of business owners cannot accurately answer that question.
If you sell a product, you’re selling what that product does for the buyer, not the product.
Example: Printers sell speed or quality or price, not printing.
If you sell a service, you sell *you,* not the service. People buy services from people they trust. Does your marketing sell you?
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84. Hire Now, W or W/O Skill
85. Bringing Change to the Market
86. Your Customers Really Do Know!
87. Financing the Dream
Difficulty securing financing doesn’t have to end an entrepreneurial dream. There are alternative options, including Rollovers as Business Startups. “ROBS” let entrepreneurs leverage retirement assets to finance a business while protecting personal credit and can be used along with traditional financing. It’s a trend that’s catching on; we’ve seen a 72% jump in ROBS since 2009. So, don’t throw in the towel. Rather, look at the options — the best course may be to invest your money in yourself.
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88. The One That Got Away
89. Know Thyself
90. Find Balance to Move Forward
91. Experience is the Best Asset!
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92. No One Cares
feel that their idea will be stolen as soon as they open their mouths about it.An idea will remain an idea unless it’s executed properly. Your idea needs validation from lots of people. The longer you keep quiet, the more the business suffers.
93. Dare as Youth Does
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94. When to Launch a New Business
95. “Anyone” Will NOT Buy From You
Whether it is or not, if you want to gain productive referrals or introductions, you have to be very specific in describing your perfect connection(s), i.e. I am looking for female professionals, VP or higher, in companies >$50M in technology vs. women in corporate. Which one works best?
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96. Reach Out to Influencers
97. Low or NO Overhead Business
Coming from a person who was strangled with tremendous overhead in my first business on the floor of the NYSE, my tip is go for a business with LOW or NO overhead.
In 2011, I started a business inside a networking model. This model is sharing products & health coaching, from which I’ve built a successful six figure income+ with no overhead.
I wish I had been taught many years ago that there are businesses out there that do not require overhead to earn significant money.
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98. Insight from Customer Behavior
99. Your Roadmap to a New Business
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100. Just Start
101. Clarity Pays for Your Website!
102. Uncle Sam is REAL!
103. Become the Expert!
Change your focus for awhile. Instead of thinking about the money you can bring in, think about the information you can give away. When we launched our business, we provided potential clients with a wealth of “DIY” information that they could use to improve their marketing and grow their business. We offered a monthly magazine full of tips, free webinars, how to videos, and white papers. We were quickly positioned as the experts in our field and a steady flow of new clients has been the result.
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104. The Art of Selling
Most entrepreneurs develop business plans, set up accounting systems, order inventory & make their businesses look good. The area they lack the most in is how to sell.
Even those who are adept at generating leads or driving people to their stores fail to recognize that nothing happens until someone sells something.
In order to persuade someone to invest in your product, you need to ask the right questions to determine their needs, wants, and desires. Then, guide them to your solution.
105. Focus on Failure
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106. It Starts with a Good Idea
107. Set Up a “Listening Station”
108. Pace Yourself
109. Know Your Limits!
110. Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff
111. Believe in Yourself!
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112. Persevere by Being a Bit Crazy
113. Don’t Let Others Set Your Bar!
114. Golden Rule: Plan for Success
115. Failure Happens. Embrace it
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116. Know Your Where, Why, and How
Know where you want to go, why you want to go there, and how you see yourself showing up.
Write down your 2-year Vision. Capture the promise you make to your clients, your team, and yourself and what it is that sets you apart.
Know the “Why”. Make sure you are building a business that is meaningful, fun, and compelling for everyone involved.
Next, consider your relationship to your business. Make sure that your role is a “healthy” one and that it will serve you for a very long time.
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117. Don’t Strangle Your Business!
118. Dream Within a Box
119. Failure is Your Friend
120. Creating Abundance in Start-up
My #1 tip when starting a new business is to create the financial map. This becomes the solid and concrete structure to which all else flows into.
Both the “forest and the trees” are considered with emphasis on process steps for the 1st year. Beginning with the annual revenue goal, work backwards, breaking down tangible, measurable, and detailed goals for each month, week, and day, which will produce results.
Remember that passion is key and with excellence, finance yield presents.
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121. Your Price Matters
122. Get a Coach!
123. Build to Sell from the Start
124. 3 Life-Saving Marketing Tips
You need LOTS of new leads to build your clientele and postcards are proven to deliver them.Create a Website with Online Follow-Up.
A website designed for lead capture and automatic online follow-up tools are essential to boosting your bottom line.Continue Marketing ALWAYS.
Profits can be seasonal, but one thing must be consistent: your marketing. Cutting marketing when times get tough only compounds the problem.
125. Marketing is an Investment
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126. It’s a Marathon, Not a Sprint
127. Simple Research for Big Profit
New entrepreneurs: Do Your Research!
Create a simple Facebook page for your new business and promote 10 different posts with different offers and marketing messages to your target audience. Keep coming up with new offers until you have several with a 0.8% click-through-rate or higher.
Then, you will know what offers your customers respond to and what messages they like. You will know what problems your customers care about and what language you can use to get the best response from them.
128 Taking the First Step
129. Get Your Self-Talk Straight
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130. Read Religiously
131. Complete Character Sketches
12. At Least One Phone Call a Day
133. Two Heads are Better Than One
134. Hold Workshops for Credibility
135. Don’t Forget This Crucial Step
As an entrepreneur, the best tip I have for anyone starting a business is to list down ALL THE TASKS that are required and estimate how much time it would take to complete those tasks. This should be done after you’ve finalized your business goals and objectives.
Often time, new entrepreneurs overestimate how much time they and their team have in a work week for all ‘priorities’.
From here, you can pare down or delegate tasks or adjust your goals as needed.
136. The One Thing
137. Know Your Worth
138. Have a Wandering Eye…
139. Change the Game
Build a marketing plan that you will use each day. Make sure it contains four elements: 1) Strategic business goal recap 2) Five key messages that support the goals 3) Seven frequently asked questions plus answers regarding the bu
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siness 4) Seven top customers you will capture/grow within 12 months. Most important and after building the plan – schedule media training for yourself plus another leader so that you will be comfortable with the media as you build your business and change the game.
140. Love Your Business & Yourself
141. A Place in Hell!
Do you know another tip for entrepreneurs just starting a new business that wasn’t included? If you do, please share it below. And as always, many thanks to everyone that contributed to this article!
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