You have already leapt successfully over the first hurdle of entrepreneurship and have shunned full-time employment for the bright lights of working for yourself. You no longer have to answer to anyone, you are responsible for your own successes and failures, and you have dedicated your working life to a passion. This might be upcycling retro Scandinavian furniture, importing ball bearings or helping startups with their SEO capabilities. Whatever your niche, this is the direction you have chosen to take, and you are now thriving. There will come a point in every successful entrepreneur’s life when they have to consider expansion. Sure, it’s a risky prospect, but complacency never helped any money making venture reach its full potential.
Expand Your Market
The idea of going global with your service or product is the stuff of dreams, yet ultimately doable if you have the cash flow and reputation to back up your plans. Expanding to other territories is expensive and can prove risky, but the rewards are great. However, to be successful, you need to conduct thorough market research to work out if your current range of kids clothes is going to prove as popular in Europe or South America. You may find you have to tweak your product a little, alter the price, or change your point of sale. If you want to go international, ensure you have the finances to embark on such a venture without putting the quality of your current project in jeopardy.
Hiring More Staff
As your business becomes more successful and grows at an exponential rate, you will inevitably need more staff to complete orders and keep to timescales. Make sure that you hire those candidates that will fit into your current staff team, and that echo your company ethos. If your working environment is relatively laid back and relies on high levels of interaction and teamwork, don’t hire the guy who likes to work on his own from home, no matter how stellar his resume might be.
It’s vital that you are clued up about the relevant employment legislation your sector needs to abide by. Experts at Ogletree Deakins can help you with health and safety laws, litigation and immigration legislation if needed. Outsourcing this facet of your business is vital if you are to make any expansion plans a success.
Do More
Expanding your current market might not suffice. Spotting gaps in related niches can be the ideal way to expand your brand. Finding solutions to consumer or business problems can be a lucrative and simple way of increasing your sales, revenue and profits. You may end up with a product that people simply cannot live without. Ensure that you look at your competitors and try to break the markets they are also trying to hit.
Expanding your business can be daunting. Think about why you entered the world of entrepreneurship in the first place and harness this passion for your expansion plans. With the right preparation, research and finances, you could be sure of future money making success.
Car accidents happen far more often than we like to admit. If you’ve never been in one, then you’re probably in the minority. Since the very first car accident, people have been working on ways to reduce their frequency and make the roads a safer place.
Now, with rapid advancements in modern technology, there’s one fundamental question; can tech put an end to auto accidents for good?
We know there are already vehicle safety systems and other things in place to help prevent accidents or make them less deadly. But, will we ever reach a point where there are barely any accidents on the roads?
So many things can cause one car to crash into something else. Speeding is a major one, as is reckless driving or driving while drunk. But, if you speak to a car accident lawyer, they tend to say the main cause is distracted driving. If you’re not fully attentive – because you’re texting or singing along to some tunes – then there’s a high chance an accident will happen.
By looking at some causes, we can try to see ways technology might help prevent accidents. As mentioned before, we have vehicle safety systems that are already trying. They have things like automatic braking sensors that help a car come to an emergency stop if the driver isn’t paying full attention. Surely, as time goes by, this technology will get even better and can help negate some of the accidents caused by distracted driving.
Likewise, we could maybe see things like lane control or assisted steering technology that kicks in when someone swerves out of a lane and corrects it for the driver. Again, this can stop distracted driving accidents, and reckless driving as well.
To add to this, there is already a piece of technology out there that’s used to restrict the speed a car can reach. Things like this can easily prevent speeding and reduce accidents caused by that factor.
Thinking further into the future, what if someone developed a sensor that worked like a breathalyzer test and locked a car down if high levels of alcohol were detected in the driver. This would be potentially revolutionary as it stops drunk people from driving and causing fatal accidents.
Then, we have the idea of humans not even driving cars at all. Autonomous car technology is kind of the big thing right now, but would an AI controlled car be safer or not? If all cars ended up controlled by AI, then it’s possible.
Will technology put an end to car accidents?
I doubt we’ll ever live in a world where there are no car accidents. But, if car safety technology keeps advancing at the current rate, then we’ll 100% see fewer auto accidents. It’s all about coming up with technological solutions to address the main causes of accidents. Think about how much money and how many lives are lost to car accidents all over the country. This is definitely something car manufacturers should be focusing on, and I look forward to seeing what lies ahead.
When you’ve found your strength in your products or services in your startup; it’s time to hit the ground running regarding your impact on the market. Competition is fierce, and you’ll need to expect that another company is doing what you do already. Therefore, you need to have a more appealing brand identity and travel down every avenue that will help you tempt your target audience to your website. A few social media updates and a business logo is not enough to gain consumer traffic; people have plenty of options to choose from, so be the one that looks the best. The following are the areas of your business that you’ll need to put your effort into in order to get as many people to notice you when you launch your fledgling company.
It’s the beginning of your business, and it’s where strategy and planning are the most crucial; you need to begin working out everything from your brand’s aesthetics, to how you’re going to engage with potential consumers. Work out your company’s value, ethics, and beliefs, and how each can be represented through your brand clearly. Having a strong character and personality in your business will ensure that people are tempted to invest in you because of more than what you sell or offer. Consumers are becoming more adept at sourcing products and services online from companies that reflect their own ethics, and there is a growing demand for a deeper meaning to a business, other than just what’s on the surface.
If you don’t set your parameters and guidelines at the earliest point; you’ll have no benchmark to gauge how to speak through your website, social media, and the rest of your marketing tactics. Therefore it’s vital that you gain a strong identity from the get-go so that you know how to approach each area of your company and launch anything new in the future. Consistently reflecting who you are as a business will help to build customer trust and they’ll return to you on a regular basis. Understanding your history, and how your company became what it is, will give your patrons a better understanding of where they’re investing their money. Being clear on how and why you began your business journey will solidify consumer understanding and more people will follow suit; searching for a brand’s story just like yours. When you have a deeper meaning to your brand’s identity; you can build up the aesthetic elements and their design from strong foundations.
Once you’ve chosen your color palette and main aesthetic; you’ll be able to carry the design throughout your online presence, and people will begin to recognize your brand at a glance. Your company logo should tie together what your business is firmly and as simply as possible. People lose interest in over-complicated imagery and too much information in what should be a punchy visual impact. Look at the bigger picture of your business as a whole; before working with an expert team or reputable graphic designer to take each element and bring it into your logo.
It’s worth checking out what you need to know in regards to finance and ensuring that there’s enough cash in the pot to work with those who can help you bring your vision to life. Before launching; check and see how your branding comes across on both a screen and in print; it should be just as impactful on each. When it comes to fonts and typefaces; make sure that they work on both a Mac and PC desktop. When working with a designer; try to ensure that your branding will stand the test of time. It’s all very well having a logo and branding that’s expressive and unique; however, you don’t want it to date too soon, so it’s vital that it retains a classic and timeless element that can evolve and adapt to the changing market.
Once your branding and identity are firmly in place and ready to portray your business; it’s time to plan your marketing strategy and ensure that all the right people are seeing your presence. You should be planning your marketing and official launch throughout the process of fine-tuning your design elements. Know how you’re going to hit the market with force, so that your launch can go as seamlessly as possible and have the desired effect. Begin by remembering that only a select portion of the market are going to be interested in your business; so it’s crucial that as many of them see your brand as possible. It’s no use a plethora of consumers seeing your company if they’re not going to click through and invest, so targeting the right place should be your focus.
Take into considering the size of your market and where they’ll be; think about their age, location, income, and how they identify to help steer you in the right direction with your marketing strategy. Again, this is another point where you should be looking towards your competitors and those that have already succeeded; you’ll be able to gather some valuable data and knowledge which will assist in your set-up. Think about how to speak best, engage, and communicate with your desired audience, and then be consistent with everything to give to them. Think about what people will be typing into search engines when they’re looking for your services or products; this will help you to build a strong list of core keywords. Utilize the free information, statistics, and data available on the internet already and discover what people are typing into Google and what keywords have been or will be sending traffic your way; this is another great way to build your keyword list and strengthen its results.
Now you need to begin your attack on social media; find out when the best times to post are for audience engagement and ensure that you’re consistent with your updates. Start your social media and blogging before your website had launched; you want to have a following in place who a ready to head your way on the big day. Set up a landing page on your site, so that when people do click through they’ll see when you’re due to launch, and you’ll be getting your click-rankings higher and gaining data along the way.
Starting a business now isn’t like it was 20 years ago. 20 years ago, to start a business you needed money, an idea, and connections. You needed a substantial investment to get started, and plenty of help to keep going. In many ways, starting a business in 2018 is much easier. More companies are starting every day, and the internet means that most of these can start up with very little cash invested.
But, this also means that you need different skills. 20 years ago, even new businesses hired HR staff, accountants, marketing teams and lawyers. There was no way for them to do these things themselves, so a large portion of their capital went on hiring. Nowadays, new businesses often try to cut costs by doing as much as they can themselves. Even sole-traders and brand-new entrepreneurs can do their own accounting and put together a marketing plan. If you want to do well as a startup in 2018, here’s a look at some of the skills that you might need.
HR
If you work alone, HR might not be something that you need to worry about, and you certainly won’t need the skills of Yvonne Yancy. But, if you ever hope to employ staff in the future, HR is a skill that you should have. A HR department traditionally looks after recruitment, placing personnel, employee relations, and sometimes payroll and training. They are primarily there to look after your staff, and most large companies have an entire HR team keeping staff happy. If you are hoping to look after HR yourself, you’ll need to be an excellent problem solver, approachable, good with people and calm under pressure.
Accounting
Even if you use an accountant, it’s a good idea to have some basic accounting skills yourself. These can help you to save money throughout the year, make your tax return much easier to handle and give you the skills that you need to prepare business plans and financial forecasts and hold your own in meetings with banks and investors.
Marketing
Marketing is perhaps one of the industries that the internet and its growth has changed the most. Traditional advertising like newspapers, TV, and radio are still important, but online marketing is huge. The great thing about this is that you don’t need to hire an expensive team, you can take care of your online marketing yourself. You’ll need to be great at social media, able to build relationships with influencers and maybe even run your own blog.
Time Management
Time management is essential to running any business. Especially in the beginning when you might be trying to do so much for yourself. Being able to manage and organize your time is essential if you want to do well.
Leadership
Leadership is one of those skills that most people think that they have until they need to use it. Managing a team isn’t always as easy as you might think. A good leader can delegate, motivate, inspire and challenge.
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