Launching a business is so easy, a child could do it. There are thousands of children the world over running businesses from home; by way of a drop site business where all trading is carried out online, or more traditional businesses and enterprises such as gardening, dog walking and other sweat inducing labour.
Aim for Perfection
When you make the decision to launch a new business, it really is so important that you aim for perfection. If you aim for perfection you may never achieve it, but at least your customers will know you sell great products and services with great back up and after sales service. At some point you will fail and not live up to customer expectation; it isn’t a perfect world. Failure shapes you into being a better person; your brand will benefit from any failure or stumbling block you encounter along the way.
Build a Support System
Building a business which has staying power takes time and tenacity. Wherever the roots of the business, no matter if you plough in your own money or use borrowed funds, you will need a support network in place. That network support my be family, it may be via a local chamber of trade, where you can converse and learn from mentors who have built a large business from scratch, and fought against the odds to win through.
Some 90% of all business start-ups fail within the first year. With a good network of support you can mitigate the potential for failure. If you can navigate the first year in to year two, you will have a more than 50% chance of growing the business in to the future. Only 50% of businesses survive the first 5 years – don’t be a statistic of failure.
Consider the long term
Set down in writing the long term goals for your business. Have you thought about where you want to be business wise in 5 years time? Are you happy to stay local or do you see national or even global expansion. Are you able to bootstrap your business, that is to say fund expansion and growth with your own funding, or will you need to seek funding from a third party or investment in the form of venture capital?
Setting out a plan with significant landmarks and timeframes in which you want to achieve those landmarks is essential. With a 5 year plan in place, you can see where you are and tweak month to month operations to maintain track of your targets.
Marketing honestly and fairly
How you market the business is crucial, depending on what your products, goods or services it supplies. There are different rules, governance and legislation which are relevant to different industries. For example, if your business operates in the UK as a food retailer, the Food Standards Agency polices all elements of food retailing as follows:
- Export and import of ingredients, raw materials and finished products
- Food safety – manufacture, packaging, distribution and sale to the public
- Traceability, labelling, recalls, withdrawals etc
All marketing and publicity has to conform to standards set down in law; packaging and labelling as well as claims made about the products have to be factual, lawful and not misleading.
Another industry which is heavily regulated is the online betting and gambling industry. As an example, Irish luck at www.casino.com/ie/ has several online games which can be played, on which real money bets are placed by players. Strict governance has to be complied with. The online gambling industry is highly regulated; like the food industry, transgressions of law or regulation can result in massive fines and extremely bad publicity.
The online betting industry is policed by The Gambling Commission under the umbrella of the Gambling Act of 2005. Advertising, as in the food industry, has to remain factual, lawful and not misleading/
Regardless of the business you may be considering starting, there will be lots of legal stuff to take care of. If you want the business to survive and thrive, consideration of the law in the country or countries in which it operates should be part of the business plan.
