how to start a business

How to Start a Business: 4 Entrepreneur Tips
Oct 12, 2020

According to research from a United States Bank study, 82% of businesses fail in their proposed business plan due to problems with their cash flow. Statistics like this can make it seem daunting for aspiring entrepreneurs or those looking to start a business in today’s market. Fortunately, there are ways to make your business model work. The key is in your first steps. This post will cover four early steps on how to start a business, including how to avoid common entrepreneur mistakes.

Plan Your Business Model

How to start a business? That’s not a simple question, and many elements go into the answer. Licensing, bookkeeping, and employee management are only a part of the details of running a business. But the bottom line is: what do you want to build? What problem can you solve for people? What skills do you have? Who will benefit from those skills? What are your business goals, and how can you break them down into actionable steps? Answering all of these questions will help you to build the foundation of your business. They will become the basis for the following steps. It is also important to remember and note: you won’t be able to do this completely alone. Finding a business partner, or partnering with other businesses or entrepreneurs who have skills and services that complement your own can mean that your business grows stronger than if you tried to learn every skill yourself.

 

Find Your Niche Interest

This should be one of your first goals when deciding on a business plan. The key to being successful and rising above the dozens or even hundreds of other businesses out there is to be unique. What can you offer that no one else can? What can you do that no one else can do? There are hundreds of businesses offering marketing and design services, for instance, but perhaps only you can focus your business on specifically designing marketing copy for fantasy and science fiction authors, because of your background as a writer. Find your niche, that thing that makes you different, and your business will be off to a good start.

 

Know Your Target Audience

One of the most important aspects of learning how to start a business is to know your audience. In fact, knowing your audience is almost as important as knowing your niche. The two go hand in hand. Going back to our example above, your audience would be indie sci-fi and fantasy authors. By having your audience narrowed down, you can start advertising and building connections with those authors who would benefit from your services. This allows you to narrow the focus of your networking and marketing, which can make your time and money even more effective and can ensure that you don’t waste either. This leads us to our final step.

 

Network and Market

One of the most important entrepreneur tips is to network, network, network. This can mean to network digitally by building a mailing list and connecting with your audience on social media. Or it can mean networking in person by traveling to conferences, either as a guest or a public speaker to connect and share your knowledge of the industry. Basically, it boils down to making connections and building friendships with people in your chosen niche industry.

Finding your niche, following a well laid out plan, knowing your audience and what they need, and networking yourself and your business within your industry are all steps you can take to help reach success. Starting your own entrepreneurial business is no small feat, but the rewards are more than worth it if you are patient, hard-working, and dedicated.

tech entrepreneurship blog

6 Ways Your Tech Startup Can Beat the Competition
Jun 10, 2020

If you’re thinking about starting a new business in the tech industry, you’re not alone. In fact, the tech industry is one of the most competitive fields out there nowadays. However, there’s good news, too. Nearly 80% of the new small businesses started in 2014 made it to their second year. You just need to figure out how to make your startup a success to get there. But, before you become a tech entrepreneur, there are six ways to get a leg up on the competition. Here’s what they are.

 

Make a Useful Product

This may seem like an obvious tip, but many common entrepreneur mistakes include making a useless product or one that doesn’t hold a candle to their competitors’. You should have a good product that you would want to use. If you don’t, no one else will want to use it either. Even if you think you have a good idea, you should test it out first. If you can’t live without it, chances are others won’t be able to either.

 

Keep It Simple

When there’s a lot of competition for business, customers can become overwhelmed by their options. You’re more likely to win over those customers if you keep it simple. You should have a clear message and simple instructions. No one wants to deal with confusion or have to search for answers about a product.

 

Set Yourself Apart

When you enter a competitive market, the chances of getting lost in a crowd are high. You should figure out what sets you apart from your competitors early on. Have a completely different technology, business model, or user experience. Play up those differences to win people over.

tech entrepreneurship blog

 

Reach Out With a Tech Entrepreneurship Blog

You probably already know to market yourself and find your target clients. A great way to do that is by starting a tech entrepreneurship blog. A tech entrepreneurship blog allows you to reach out to potential clients as well as potential advisors. You should be letting people know about you, your business, and your product. Offer them useful information and you will be more likely to stand out from your competition.

 

Don’t Waste Time

While you should know what your competition is, don’t waste too much time trying to figure them out. Your time is better spent improving your own product and marketing yourself. You also don’t want to lose your uniqueness, which can happen if you start mimicking what your competitors are doing.

 

Make Friends

Another idea to beat the competition is to not beat them at all. Instead, make friends with your competition. You never know, a partnership or collaboration on a project could make you both successful.

 

In some instances, too much competition can mean that you won’t succeed. However, if you follow these simple steps, you’ll be a formidable opponent.

 

Avoiding Entrepreneur Mistakes: Help Your Business Thrive with These Tips
Nov 11, 2019

It is easier than ever to start a business, but it is a challenge to manage a company and take it to the next level. Reports show that of all the small businesses that started in 2014, only 80% made it to 2015. This is because many startup entrepreneurs do not know how to avoid dangerous mistakes.

Entrepreneur mistakes can affect your business tremendously, so much so, that you might end up closing up shop in the span of a couple of years. Therefore, it is vital to know the tips for avoiding entrepreneur mistakes. These tips apply in all fields, including the tech one. If you want to be a successful tech entrepreneur, you need to have strategies for avoiding entrepreneur mistakes. Here are tips that will give you a guide on how to succeed as a tech entrepreneur.

Become a Successful Public Speaker

Most people in the world are not technology gurus. Therefore, you need to be a successful public speaker to help people understand the idea that you are bringing to the market. Many unsuccessful business founders in the tech industry concentrate on bringing their idea to the market instead of ensuring that their products are understood by their consumers.

Learning top skills from an international public speaker is a great way to make sure that your content is accepted globally. Ensure your presentations include demonstrations, pictures, and notes so your listeners can follow along.

Other aspects of becoming an international speaker include maintaining eye contact, using humor, and using stories to explain your product. This will increase your rate of customer acquisition, which is a win for any startup.

Ask for Help

Another tip to avoiding entrepreneur mistakes is by not trying to do everything by yourself. This is because you will get less done before releasing the product to the public. Ask for help from marketers, graphic designers, social media influencers, and investors.

Working with a group helps you get the best part of the business started, which is a relaxing step for a business founder. This also includes finding a business partner who will help you handle finances and managing employees. Having a tech entrepreneur partner helps you get off the burden of figuring out everything on your own.

Hire the Right People

Hiring qualified tech experts is important when you are a tech entrepreneur. Unfortunately, a strong resume doesn’t mean that a potential hire is the right fit for your company. Employing the right people means that you need to take time during the hiring process. You can always hire part-timers at first and sign contracts later if they pass the trial stages.

Forget the Microwave Generation Idea

The microwave generation has given people the illusion of becoming successful overnight. Likewise, most entrepreneur mistakes are linked to wanting success within a few months, and if it does not happen, many startups usually close their companies. You should be patient and understand that it will get better if you’re willing to put in the time and energy.

Avoiding entrepreneur mistakes is essential when you are starting a business in the tech industry. For more information about avoiding entrepreneur mistakes and starting your business off on the right foot, rely on Rafferty Pendery today.

The First Steps To Starting Your Own Business
Aug 8, 2019

According to one study, 82% of people learning how to start a business will fail, due to cash flow problems in their startup.

That’s a pretty big deal. It means that if you plan and launch your startup in a way that will avoid cash flow problems in the first place, you’ll have eliminated the single biggest risk in launching a business — dramatically increasing your chance of success.

Whether you want to learn how to start a business to support your travels or creative life, or whether you have a unique product or business idea that you’re passionate about, it’s important to start on the right foot with your business planning. To help you avoid common entrepreneur mistakes, the following entrepreneur tips will help you determine how to start a business.

Conduct Research

Since you’re learning how to start a business, you’ve probably already settled on a business idea you’d like to get into. But before you take off and run with it, you’ve got to compare that idea to what the market wants.

To be successful, a business has to solve a real problem, fulfill a real need, or provide something people genuinely want.

However, for a new business to succeed, it isn’t enough to just offer something the public wants. The public has already been getting what they want, or else doing without it, for a long time. Your job as the business owner is to convince them that your offer is going to be better for them than anyone else’s. It’s not enough to give them another option — you’ve got to give them an option they can’t say no to.

On the surface that may sound daunting, but it’s very doable, as long as you’re willing to do some hard thinking.

You can identify what the market wants by talking to your target customers directly; by starting a blog on your target industry, and building an audience of ideal customers; or just trying different ideas until you come upon one that sticks.

The following are some questions you should try to answer, as you formulate your ideal business idea:

  • Is there a real need for this product or service?
  • Who needs this product or service?
  • Who is my ideal customer?
  • What other businesses are currently providing this product or service, or something similar?
  • How much competition is there for my idea?
  • How will my business idea fit into the existing market? How will it contrast from other options already available?
  • Am I a member of the community I’m trying to sell to? Am I my own biggest fan and customer? Will I enjoy building this product or providing this service long-term?

The last question may be the most overlooked idea for aspiring entrepreneurs, often considered only as an afterthought. It’s important to remember that your business is going to be your full-time job, at least at the beginning. Make sure you’re doing something you’ll genuinely enjoy.

Make a Business Plan

Before you can start building your business, you’ve got to have a plan for what you will do. Your business plan will act as a blueprint, guiding your decisions from startup through initial growth to keep you on track.

A business plan doesn’t have to be complicated. If you’re funding the venture on your own, and it’s just going to be you and perhaps one or two other people working on it part-time, a basic one-page outline of steps to follow is all you need.

If you’re going after investor funding, you will need a traditional business plan to show investors or banks. This type of plan is usually very long, very thorough, and very specific. Business plans of this kind always provide a common set of information that investors always look at before deciding on whether or not to invest in a startup.

Even if your business is going to be simple — a blog that you intend to monetize, for example — it’s still incredibly important to have some kind of written plan. It doesn’t have to be long or complicated. You just need an idea of where you’ll be going and what you’re going to do before you get started.

Armed with these insider tips for entrepreneurs, you’ll be well ahead of the competition when you launch your startup.

rafferty pendery

So, Who Is Rafferty Pendery?
Jun 1, 2018

Rafferty Pendery is an impressive example of someone who has spread his message over the world and succeeded in business while doing it.

He is known for working in the website design, marketing, business development, and public speaking industries. He has a wide variety of business interests that we’ll discuss in this article.

Who is Rafferty Pendery?

We’ll go over some of Rafferty’s strong points, successes, and value in the business market. He is a successful entrepreneur that has a lot to offer in the way of vision, management, and business development.

How He Started

Rafferty did not start out in a wealthy family. His family instilled the values of dedication and effort that have carried with him throughout his life.

He started his career with the idea of creating a skateboarding clothing company. At the age of 11, he coordinated a designer and printer, selling 100 shirts at 25 dollars a piece.

His first business venture was a success, and he later went on to school and enter the business world. His interest in a clothing company carried into his adult life, and he soon realized that he needed to create a website to push his business.

He created the company Studio98 while he was learning to create his own website. This company now works in the web design and business development realm.

He focused on building an organization rather than working for himself. Realizing that the most intelligent thing to do in business is to work collaboratively, he utilized the fact that there are talented individuals out there willing and ready to produce great work.

Many entrepreneurs have the idea that their work is simply their own. Turning over responsibilities to others is integral to business growth. There comes a point when an individual can only do so much, and their responsibilities begin to bottleneck.

Achievements

Rafferty has earned a position at the top of his own organization with staff, designers, and developers working under him.

He has the honor of speaking with business owners around the world. His ideas of vision and business management have inspired numerous business owners to change their thinking of how to operate a business.

His branding work has benefited numerous big-name companies. Time Warner, Humana, Red Bull, and NASA are just a few of those names.

What He Does For Business Owners

The primary benefit that Rafferty Pendery gives business owners is insight into his vision. He promotes the idea that there is an art to envisioning, beginning, and diversifying a business. Heuristics on division of labor, brand management, and progress are just a few of the things that his lectures offer.

For example, most people don’t recognize that growth requires a business owner to adjust their previous ideas. Things like training, branding, and organization require consistent refinement as a business develops new needs and protocol.

As something like training becomes more streamlined, business owners find themselves with more free time to move forward in their personal lives.

It’s an exhilarating, confusing feeling to be comfortable with the fact that your business has been built in a way that allows it to function on its own, under the thumb of your employees.

This allows the owner to direct attention to new, further reaches of their business’ potential.

Find Out What Rafferty Has to Offer

This article scratches the surface, but there is a lot more that Rafferty Pendery has to offer. There is a lot to learn by exploring the web and doing a little more research on his business coaching and international speaking.

If you’re interested in Rafferty’s work or would like to get in touch with him, check out his site and reach out.