What if I tell you that only 10% of new businesses become successful in the long run? It’s a bitter reality that starting a small business is much easier than actually sustaining it in the coming years.
As a small business owner, I, too, failed numerous times. Even though it was depressing, those failures taught me some invaluable lessons about building a business.
That being said, from creating effective marketing strategies to efficiently managing operations, I’ll share my experience and explain the top lessons I learned from those mistakes. So, let’s start by explaining how your business can thrive through smart financial management.
Cut Down Unnecessary Expenses
For a long time, I thought that expanding my business and increasing sales were the only ways to be more profitable. And for that reason, I rarely kept an eye on my ever-increasing business expenditures, especially overhead costs, which impacted my cash flow and eventually sank my first small venture.
Nonetheless, this failure taught me that reducing business costs directly translates to better profit margins. So, I kept this lesson in mind and, from the very first day, focused on business expenses, particularly the overhead costs.
Now, there are several ways to lower business costs. For instance, high-speed internet and phone were my business’s basic requirements, and I opted for both of them through Spectrum. But, instead of availing those services separately, I saved a considerable amount by bundling them through Xfinity Internet deals.
This way, I get to enjoy blazing-fast internet, essential for my business tools, and reliable phone services to stay in constant touch with vendors and suppliers.
All in all, it was just one example of how I cut down unnecessary expenses. And, I’d suggest you be creative about such expenses and think outside the box to reduce or completely eliminate them.
Create a Comprehensive Business Plan
I believe creating a detailed plan is the cornerstone of a successful business. However, as I was preoccupied with managing finances, it didn’t even cross my mind to create one.
Besides outlining your short-term and long-term goals, a thorough business plan should include the following factors:
- What are your financial projections for the next year?
- How would you scale your business?
- What are your KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)?
- How would you target your customers?
- What will be your sales strategy?
Here, I’d suggest you consider a business plan as a roadmap. With so much to deal with, small business owners can easily lose track of their goals. And this is where a comprehensive business plan comes into play.
Now, there’s no restriction on how you should write a business plan. Even though you can find several templates online, just ensure that it is detailed, clearly states your objectives, and highlights actionable steps for your small business’s success.
Analyze your Marketing Strategies
It’s a fact that most small businesses don’t have the resources to outsource their marketing. Eventually, they market their small businesses themselves and end up spending hundreds of dollars on inefficient techniques.
Also, while I won’t recommend you ignore the marketing efforts, make sure to be smart about them. For instance, instead of traditional marketing techniques like putting up billboards or printing ads in the local newspaper, use social media platforms.
Identify and choose the social media platforms your potential customers use. And, create effective marketing campaigns that resonate with your brand’s identity. This way, you should be able to target more customers, and that too, without breaking the bank.
Having said that, keep in mind that targeting every social media platform can be expensive. And, not to mention that optimizing and monitoring those ads can be a hectic task for a small business with limited resources.
Be Smart About Your Time and Resources
Speaking from experience, there is never a dull moment in running a small venture. With so much on the plate, small business owners rarely find leisure time. Also, you might enjoy such a hustling environment at the start.
But trust me, it can take a toll on you and your team in the long run, as it did with me.
Small business owners should learn to delegate tasks and projects smartly. Yes, they might not have ample resources to seamlessly manage every business operation. But they can always get help from free business tools.
For instance, I use tools like Asana, HubSpot, Zapier, and more. I can easily delegate tasks and assign deadlines, and keep a watchful eye on project completion with Asana. Other than this, HubSpot helps me with marketing, and like that, other tools ensure smooth business operations without burdening my team.
Always Prioritize Your Customers
Needless to say, customers should be the top priority of every business. But they become even more important for small businesses, since losing customers can significantly impact their profit margins.
For that reason, small businesses should always prioritize their customers over everything else. Now, there are several ways to make your customers feel valuable. But I believe offering them after-sales support and service stands out among all the other factors.
As a small business, I won’t advise you to open a full-fledged customer support and hire several service reps. Instead, create chatbots and deploy them on your business’s social media accounts.
You can train chatbots and feed them basic queries. Other than this, most chatbots can also redirect complex queries. This way, providing a reliable and ever-available support to your customers can help them feel valued by your small venture.
So, to wind up, I’d say again that starting a new venture is a lot easier than keeping it afloat in the long run. However, I believe that these five lessons, which I learnt the hard way after facing multiple failures, should help your business thrive, for sure.
Also, I’ve got one last advice to help your small business.
If you ever decide to invest in business software, always go for cloud solutions. It’s because rather than spending time and resources on creating in-house tools, cloud-based solutions are more scalable and customizable. Also, they’re based on a “pay as you go” model, and you don’t have to worry about maintaining or upgrading them.
