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Seriously, enough with the excuses already. 
Quit procrastinating & dismissing your ideas to actually start that business you’ve always thought about.

Fellow entrepreneurs, it’s time to make some damn changes already. Put the excuses aside, take action and make the decision to transform your life forever. Here are five things you must do to change and turn your idea or passion into your new thriving business, stat.

1. Define your niche

Your passion means something. More importantly, you can totally monetize it in today’s world. What is your special talent or area of expertise? Do you work with moms? Are you a baker that only cooks gluten-free desserts? Do you love handmade jewelry pieces? Think about what you enjoy and what you do best. Then think about who would benefit from it and where you fit in? If there’s not a category inside of your business market that you feel you belong to, create one!

2. Research your market

New entrepreneurs often skip this step, but it is literally everything. You need to know what is going on in the market where you about to live & breathe. Be careful not to compare yourself to other businesses that have been around longer than yours or that have different resources available. Market research should be simple, you getting to know the other companies that offer similar services, and what types of products people are interested in buying. It’s also about getting to know your ideal customer, but we’ll get into that later. Don’t be oblivious to the things that are going on around you because customers will most likely price check, fact check and inquire more than one business that offer similar services before making a purchase decision.

3. Let the customers tell you what they want

Once you have researched your market, you should have had a few light bulbs go off in your head with ideas on what you can sell. This is why step #2 is major key! Whether the product or service is physical or digital, you will first need to test the idea with your audience first. The key to a successful product launch is to design the product for your audience, not design the product first and then go find an audience for it.

4. Systems + Processes

Envision how you would want the customer to come in contact with your brand/ company and then eventually buy. Once you have an idea of how you would like this process to go, you can then begin to put together a sales funnel that will guide your customer to buy the products and services you are focused on selling. Remember that your workflow and plan to move along the potential leads down the pipeline, into customers is the ultimate goal & major key!

5. Business plan

Right here is where most people drop the ball. Do not overthink this step. Writing up a business plan will only clear the path for you. It will allow you to remain on task, always know what’s next and keep you going in the right direction. Steering off into the woods is so easy to do when you don’t have a plan. Some tools that can help with this part are: Asana, Trello, Evernote, Google Keep, Google Docs, or my personal fave, a pen & paper. Some key points you will want to include in your plan is:
Client Avatar, Market Research, Legal Components, Deadlines, Budget, Marketing! You can learn more about what’s needed to get a biz plan drafted up, right here.

Starting a business is no walk in the park. But this whole success thing, it ain’t for the weak. Although it may seem tempting to kick rocks to your dreams, it only gets better once you get started. Overwhelm and confusion doesn’t deserve all the attention it gets, trust. Most of the pieces are starting points and can be adjusted and expanded as your business grows. Following these basic steps to starting your business is like laying out the red carpet for your future self. And she is waiting for you at the end, blow big kisses your way.

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more in tips + tools

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