Think Big to Become an Entrepreneur

Do you want to be an entrepreneur? Planning to start your very own business soon? Think first if you can really handle the "rocky path" you'll be experiencing. Business responsibilities aren't that easy. In fact, not many people are willing to step out of their shoes and venture in business. One can get green-eyed at successful entrepreneurs because of the money they can earn and the freedom they have. If you have been dreaming to become one and are willing to take the risk of venturing out, go ahead! Gear up with your passion, creativity and right attitude! If you possess these qualities, success will ring at your doorbell!

Advantages and Disadvantages of Entrepreneurs: Have Your Risks Calculated before Jumping In!

Advantages:

Entrepreneurs earn in direct proportion to their hard work - having excellent sales would mean lots and lots of moolah! Employees earn what has been set by their employers.
Independence. Need more elaboration? Entrepreneurs are their own bosses. They answer to themselves and they can't get fired. They set the rules and the structure in their company. Another is that they may have flexibility in their time to do other personal stuff due to the fact that they control work schedules. Also, Entrepreneurs can decide freely if they want the company to wear business suits or not.
Entrepreneurs can get to practice their creativity. Innovation is essential in the business world as people want new, fresh ideas or products all the time. Business owners are also surrounded by the Marketing staff to help them out.

Disadvantages:

Entrepreneurs don't get regular salaries. If the business is low or the economy is experiencing a recession, lower income will flow in the company. More so, if the target market is not responding to your advertised products.
Time. Yes, even though entrepreneurs have flexible time schedule, there will be days in which they tend to work longer or overtime. Stress and pressure will come to them as they plan on how to improve the company. Most employees work on the regular nine-to-five pace or even less.
Major decisions are made by entrepreneurs. It can be a disadvantage and a burden to them because every decision they make will greatly affect the business.

Qualities That are Needed to Become an Entrepreneur:

Creativity.
Stability
Risk - taker.
Passionate.
Honest.
Optimism.

You can insert some positive qualities there as well. Also an entrepreneur has to be observant when it comes to the company's environment. Now, these characteristics will help the business owner cope with daily tasks.

So then, what else is needed to become successful in the world of entrepreneurship?

Starting up a business requires ideas. You plan what product or service you will provide to people. Make sure that your product is in-demand or marketable, or else there will be no sale. Continue to innovate your desired product so that your customers will not get bored by looking or experiencing the same thing all over again. If you have plenty of innovative ideas, save some for the future! Be honest when it comes to pricing your products. A hundred dollars for a pillow will not work! This is also where you have to think how much money or capital you would like to invest in the business. Any ideas on how to finance your business? Alright, grab that piggy bank you have since 3rd grade!

After planning what product or service you will be selling, determine who are your target audience - Barbie Dolls won't work for boys, unless they're dads who wanted to buy dolls for their "princesses" or older brothers who wanted to give their little sister some Barbie Dolls. You do get the picture right?

Decide whether you want to have a business on a store or online. Business-in-stores may have few customers at first, but within time, by exerting a lot of effort, it will grow into a huge company. Having an online business may lessen the start-up costs. However, beware of false buyers, they will only waste your time. Moreover, try securing all your data before someone else will steal it! After, decide whether you can register your business with the government to make it official.

Now, in order to have some customers, advertise your product or service! Choose whatever media you will be using that may reach your target audience - television, radio, newspaper, posters or even the Internet. Teenagers might hear about your product on the Internet or the television.

If you need any help with your business call your friends or post an announcement. Staffing may be difficult, but if you know proper staffing, then your problems might be lessened.

Always remember to BUDGET the money. Don't overspend for further renovations or productions. Also, don't be overly stingy with money either.

Now you know what it takes to be an entrepreneur. If you still wish to continue, brace yourself and don't get discouraged. Think BIG. Endless possibilities will come in your way.
by : Luminada Jenkins

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Habits of successful entrepreneurs

Starting a new business is an exciting experience so it is all too easy to get carried away with the process and forget to make sure you are ready for the ride. One of the great ways to help prepare for becoming an entrepreneur is to take a look at some of the habits of other successful business owners. While there may not be a singular recipe for business success, those who make it tend to have a few things in common. The following is a short list of some of the habits that you can try to adopt to make your business a success as well.

Look at the Glass as Half Full

Instead of lamenting on what goes wrong, try to take a more positive outlook. One of the few guarantees all new entrepreneurs can expect to have is that things will not go according to plan, but your response to unexpected problems can help to define your path to success.


Have a Plan, But Be Flexible

A business plan is one of the basic necessities of starting out on a new venture. A documented plan acts as the road map, and can save you lots of time, energy and money by illuminating what is likely to work and what seems to be the best way forward. However, just because you wrote it down, does not mean it will happen exactly according to plan. A successful entrepreneur is able to take challenges and turn them into opportunities.

Know When to Delegate

Although one of the trademarks of an entrepreneur is the ability to do fill in the blanks in the business, there comes a time when it is better to acknowledge when someone else is better suited to the task. Don’t get carried away in the drive to do it all yourself that you avoid seeing that help is available and affordable. You may be able to save money by contracting certain tasks out because it means you are able to divert your attention to other tasks.

Do What You Enjoy and Enjoy What You Do

Finally, successful entrepreneurs are not just in it for the money. This might be a bit of a paradox, but passion cannot be bought. When you are excited by what you do everyday you are more likely to do your best and to succeed at what you do. Naturally, one of the objectives of your business will be to make a profit, but you may find that the more you focus on making your customers and clients happy and really getting fulfillment from your business, the money will follow.
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Business is about people

Products and services enhance the well-being and stature of consumers. Thus, if you didn't figured it out yet; haven't anyone notice that business is all about people.

In all areas of business whether it be selling, management or marketing, people even those who are internally related to the business play an integral part in the decision making process. More so, despite the fact that business firms are run for profit, they work on achieving one noble mission - to make the customers feel that they have done the right thing in terms of their buying decision.

Ultimately, business firms will give much concern on people whether it be employees, customers and other people within the company's network. The essence of every kind of business endeavor is motivation; motivating your employees to work harder, motivating consumers to buy from you and motivating investors and creditors to do what you want them to.

Nevertheless, a great amount of focus should be put upon motivating people, creating goodwill and maintaining healthy business relations.

Motivating People

In business or perhaps in all aspects of life in general, the best weapon we can wish for is knowing where to get at anyone. Each man has his own thumbscrew and all men are idolators. Thus, business firms should be critical at knowing the people's likes and dislikes. It isn't a coincidence that product innovations are done with regards to the specification of consumers.

Likewise, employees who are treated fairly would, as a sign of gratitude, work harder to impress the management - eventually, those kinds of attitudes will result into back and forth love-giving, creating not just a company but a family.

Creating Goodwill

Goodwill perhaps is the most underrated factor in a business' success. Goodwill is defined as some kind of a prudent value, an intangible asset which can be worth millions. Hence, it's so important to create goodwill among customers and employees. Needless to say, business relation doesn't end after the sale has been made or the payroll has been released.

In order to generate much needed goodwill, customers must be treated fairly regardless of their race or social class. Complaints must be treated promptly and of course; the paying customer is always right with regards to employees, making them feel special and making them feel that they are part of the company's success by giving awards and bonuses will work wonders.

Maintaining Healthy Business Relations

Building business relations is hard but entrepreneurs should understand that it's harder to maintain such healthy business relationships. Inevitably conflict will arise that may or may not ruin business relations and the task of damage control is up to the manager or owner to execute.

Management should know how to compromise and deal with problems voiced out by long-time customers. Customers are friends and losing a long-time friend will hurt everyone of us, one way or another. One thing that should also be given consideration in maintaining healthy business relations is socializing with customers, employees or networks.

It could be done through trade shows, fairs, office parties, meetings or simple seminars - it's like hitting two birds with one stone; first checking on your network and second, opening opportunities for the growth of your network. Next...

Tips on choosing a good brand name for your company

With China and India both gaining traction in the ever growing global economy, a brand name can make or brake a company. However, while the economy has become more agile than it was 50 years ago, the process of choosing a brand name is largely unchanged. It is hard to blame business owners for this, because most of them are not aware the endless uses the Internet provides as a resource. That said, the beginning steps in choosing a good brand name for your company are still applicable.

Step 1: Brainstorm 1- What is the company's product/service?; What sets this company apart from its competitors? What is the company's attitude?

Step 2: Brainstorm 2- Find the words that fit the answers from Step 1. The more choices, the better the brand name will turn out. Many people stop this process too early, and fail to find the best brand name available to them.

Step 3: Construct Brand Names- With the words that you now have, pick brand names. These should only be one to two words long, and they should represent your company well. Come up with as many combination as you can.

Step 4: Rank the choices

This is where the similarities with the old way of choosing brand names stops. Previously, companies might hire focus groups to listen to the proposed brand names and pick which one they liked best, or the CEO might have just picked the one that he liked best. However, marketers must now contend with the Internet and domain names, better known as web addresses.

New Step 5: Try registering for the domain name of your possible brand names- If the brand name is, "Company A", attempt to secure http://www.companya.com. This will make the company much easier to find on the Internet.

New Step 6: If there are multiple available domain names check to see how many searches were done for each word. This should help narrow down the choices, and increase the opportunities potential customers have to stumble upon the company website

Step 7: Hire a focus group to work through the final choices.

Step 8: Celebrate a new brand name- This is usually best done with a victory lap around the office, but any amount of excitement will do.

Step 9: Immediately register the domain name.

In the end, always remember the goal. A brand name that represents the company, and a brand name that customers will remember.

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100 IDEAS FOR BUSINESS AS AN ENTERPRENEUR THE BENEFIT THAT COME WITH OWNING YOUR OWN BUSINESS

1. Going into business for yourself is not as difficult as is often supposed "Sacrifices", while you must be prepared to make them, are not always, in the fact, made and may turn to be easier than feared. Enormous talent is necessary; and as a matter of fact, may sometimes turn out to be a liability.

You will find that engineering, sales, and business experts" usually can be employed when needed. There is enough professional help available, on both a part-time and full-time basis, when you need it.

2. At no time in the economic history of Nigeria as an example have the conditions been so right for starting a new business. Imported goods and services and so many country today are too costly because the money has fallen very low in value. Practically everything in the market is very expensive, mainly because they are imported as finished goods, or the raw materials with ambition can find at least a product or service he can find the money and time to produce.

3. There are companies and individuals all over the country with great skills that will design, manufacture, and package your product, to your specializations. You don't need to invest fortunes in capital equipment or personnel to get started.

4. Dealers, distributors and retailers abound in the market to help you market and sell your products. In fact there are many people working in other companies who have experience and who in other companies who have experience and who are dissatisfied with their current ranks and positions, or with their pay or conditions of service, and who will therefore gladly jump ship to assist you in your new exciting venture, once you make a pitch to them.

5. The federal and state government are instituting a lot of programs to help small business this happens in soon many countries.

6. The personal and professional risks of a new enterprise are rather less than normally imagined or talked about. And besides, if you are unemployed you probably have little or nothing to lose.

7. Starting a business doesn't require as much experience as you might think. Naturally, business experience and contacts are usually important assets. However, the person who goes to work for a large company to get 10 or 15 years of solid experience before starting out on his own is just fooling himself. With a few notable exceptions , most big companies find themselves working upward through a functional specialty, such as manufacturing, accounting, research, or sales, gaining experience that is negotiable only in that or a similar company Enthusiasm, vigor, energy and the skin of a crocodile are for more valuable than the " many years of experience" which are all often the same year repeated several times over.

8. Finally, consider this: starting a new business is more fun than almost anything else. Of course, you're going to have to work long hours. Nights, weekends, holidays. The big difference is this: instead of immersing yourself in someone else's organization and struggling with its problems and making its owners rich, in new venture, you create your own organization (With its own problems) and run it as you think it should be run.
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Some Resources for Business Start-Up

Nowadays, business start-up costs can finish up being very expensive. It is a lovely thing that the net has tools that are available to help start-up a business. There is lots of different online resources that you can use to help you together along with your setup & guide you all the way through to the promotion technique. Here are 9 online start-up business resources & each resource is free, which is more of a reason for potential entrepreneurs to try it out.

Business Planner Templates
In case you are not positive if your business idea is a lovely suggestion financially, there is online resources that provide free downloadable templates for business planning. These templates will help you effectively format your designs so that you can get your business plan prepared for financial applications.

Beginning Costs Estimator
There is also sites that provide online calculators to help you work out your business start-up costs. By entering the preliminary expenses, capital, start-up stock, short-term assets & long-term assets, the business beginning costs calculator could show you an estimate of how much you might need for your business plan.

Business Link
You could also check out links provided by government sources for business support & information about the rules & regulations that your business will be operating under. You can also access government services & case studies that are related to the same business idea as the in your business plan.

Domain Checker
There is various online tools to check the availability of a domain name such as Domain Checker. They can help you to check if your potential domain name is available or not. All you need to do is enter the net site name in to the search box & hit enter to start the search. The device would automatically give you information about the availability of the domain name, whether it is available with .co.uk, .com or .net.

Survey Monkey
To give your business start-up the edge that it needs, you could conduct surveys with online resources that can provide you such services. With this device, you can effortlessly conduct surveys for market research & decision-making.

Namechk
In case you already have a business name picked out, you can see if it is available in social networks & social bookmarking sites by using a social network name checking program. Within seconds, you can fundamentally get information about which URL & nickname is available as well as other choices that are related to it.

Hootsuite
The net has several different social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter & MySpace. Managing all of these profiles individually can turn out to be impossible. This net site has a free service where you could set up a professional profile with up to social networking logins so that you can fundamentally promote your business.

DropBox
If your business communicates through the net, this online resource can help you to share files & documents together along with your co-workers no matter where they are in the world.

LinkedIn
Network online with LinkedIn. You can generate your own profile & accumulate contacts through this business networking site. It is a great way of accessing knowledge, opportunities & insights

Bird & Co can provide further assistance with business start-up. With a wealth of experience in promotion, brand identity & business web design, they can help you make the right impression within your chosen field. Next...