How To Start A Small Home Business – Starting a small business from the comfortable confines of your home is a dream that you can absolutely make come true. But dreaming is just the beginning. You’ll need to involve pen and paper at least a little bit. Also, probably tables. The important thing is that you are here, reading an article about starting that amazing new home business. I will do my best to lay out all the steps you need to take on the way to realizing your dream of an online store that exclusively sells “taxidermized” mythological creatures. Steps to Starting Your Home Business So let’s start our journey at the beginning, as is only natural. Start with a great idea First, an idea. The most important and obvious step to starting a business is to know what you are going to do. What will people pay you for? This may take some self-exploration. What are you really good at? Are you particularly creative? Useful with a loaf pan? A massive personality who needs an online following? You can sell dreamcatchers or pet costumes. You can apply fresh empanadas or distilled spirits. You can even research what is selling best in a particular market. Whatever your home business dream is, keep it completely revamped as you move to make it a reality. Luckily for you, we’ve compiled a list of 47 home business ideas! Who is your target market? Now that you know what you’re going to sell (be it a product, your services, or your personality), you can research the segment of the world’s population that is most likely to buy. Since you don’t have a business yet, you’ll want to do some research to pinpoint the details of who wants to buy your product. At this stage, your target market can be broad and narrow as you learn more about your customer base. Research other businesses in your industry. Who are they selling to? Are they mostly male or female? How old are they? Do they have children? You’ll want to write down all this information and then formalize it into something useful and practical. Enter Buyer Personas This is your chance to get creative if you haven’t already. Personas are fictional representations of your target customers. Given basic, usually alliterative names, these personalities paint a picture of who you’re trying to attract. Persons contain demographic information such as age, education, industry, position, salary, marital status, number of children, etc. Furthermore, you need to identify personality traits and preferred marketing channels. Any information you can add will drive your marketing decisions moving forward. This requires extensive customer research. You should end up with a few personalities by the end of the workout. Barista Betty, Farmer Frank, Coder Christy. You can name them whatever you want. It’s just for you. You can even create negative personas to identify who you’re not trying to sell to. This can help you keep your messages on point with your ideal audience. After some time in business, you can gather more insightful real data from real customers. Surveys can do a lot to illuminate your customer base. Once you’ve got the information you need, this free tool will give you a step-by-step walkthrough to help you create your personas. Competitor Analysis In the process of discovering your target market, you took a look at the companies that will be your competitors. Now, it’s time to dig a little deeper. This will give you real insight into the market you will be entering. To collect this research, you can do several things. The most obvious is a Google search for what you do. Say you sell organic dog treats. You will search for several varieties of “dog papers” and consider all the brands that come up. The best way to organize your data is a simple table. Add each company, line by line, in anticipation of all the important information you will add for each. For some this will be exciting. For others, boring. However, it will earn dividends in the long run. With all these companies in place (aim for 10), you can dig into each one and extract valuable information. You want to know where they are, what they do well, what their weaknesses are, what channels they focus on, etc. Here are some ways to find the information you need: Be a mystery shopper. Check out their website and navigate through it as a customer. What’s so hard about that? What do you really like? Use free tools to learn more. There are tons of browser extensions that help illuminate the hidden things about a competitor’s website. For example, you can use BuiltWith to find out the platform they use as well as the different software they use. How social are they? Notice how active they are on social media and what kind of engagement they enjoy. Dive into their content (or lack thereof). Do they have? If so, is it updated? What are they writing about? With all the intelligence you’ve gathered, your spreadsheet should be brimming with great insights. Now you know what seems to work, what to avoid and where to spend your energy. Unique Selling Proposition By fully accounting for those you are aiming to win business from, you will have some idea of what can set you apart from them. Your competitors have their unique selling proposition (USP). Go back to your competitor research and note each one. They have carefully chosen their USP, understanding that it makes them a desirable choice for their target market. For example, if you set up an e-commerce store that sells diapers and baby clothes, you might be competing with Coco Moon in the US or Kippins in Australia. Looking at Coco Moon, you’ll find a focus on super-soft fabrics in Hawaiian-inspired patterns. On the Kippins site, they are unequivocal about the importance of sleep with their breathing products as the answer. As you can see, a USP can really clarify who your customers are. The difference between Coco Moon and Kippins isn’t much, but the way they sell their story targets slightly different buyers. If they were competing in the same market, their selling propositions would set them apart from each other. So look at your product, your competition and your target market to find what makes you special. This is the seed of your marketing strategy. Do a Limited Test in the Real World It would be a shame if you did all the work to get your shiny widgets out into the world and the world wasn’t as receptive as you’d hoped. So a great way to avoid this is to test your idea among a small group of people. Before investing big money in your home startup, try to perfect your product/service among friends, relatives and a small initial customer base. This will allow you to iron out the creases before going all the way in. – Chane Steiner, CEO and Founder of Crediful One thing to consider is that the feedback you get from friends and family will be skewed. They just love you too much to say how they really feel. So beta testing is a great way to go. Find a bunch of strangers in your target market and offer them discounts to give you powerful feedback. You can find these beta testers at consumer events in your market (such as trade shows, street fairs, or farmers markets). Another way to dip your toe in the water is crowdfunding. With no initial investment required on your part, you can easily gauge consumer interest. If you meet your target investment, these presales will pave the way for the future of your business. For many, this will already be determined by your circumstances. Unless you have a nest egg for something like this, you may need to start your business as a side hustle. And, that’s okay! With your free classes, you can plan, test and create for the future where your full-time gig is. If you have the money to sustain your life while you are without income, you will be able to devote all of your time to making your business a reality. Your blood, sweat and tears will not go unrewarded. Legal Structure You knew we were going to end up with madness at some point. Well, here we are. The headline says it all. LEGAL STRUCTURE. But it is important! How you set up your business from the start will determine a number of things that follow. Much of this comes down to how much liability you personally take from bankruptcy and litigation involving your business and how taxes are collected. Types of business structures: Sole trader
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