Are you thinking about starting your own business? Have I told you about the sleepless nights? Have I told you about the stress you are about to have for the next umm….5 years? Are you breaking into a cold sweat yet? How about if I tell you every time you try to sleep, you spring right up again because you thought of an idea that can’t wait until tomorrow?
Still want to start your own busines?? Are you serious??!!?
I’ll let you in on a secret….there has never been a better time to start your business with very little money.
Download this book for FREE: The Bootstrapper’s Bible
This book is by Seth Godin of the famed books “Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable and Free Prize Inside: The Next Big Marketing Idea”
It is filled with great practical advices, how-to wisdom, ideas and some serious inspiration for startups, entrepreneurs and even seasoned veterans. It is about getting back to basics and away from the Enron and the dot com extravagances that brought a lot of devastations.
Here are some excerps from the book:
1 DISTRIBUTION. Never start by selling your product in major stores. Instead, use mail order. Or sell directly to just a few customers for lots of money per sale. Or use the Internet. The last step in your chain is traditional distribution.
2 ACCESS TO CAPITAL. Be cheap. In everything. Don’t pick a business in which access to money is an important element. That means that building a cable service, a worldwide cellular phone system, or a chemical refinery probably wouldn’t be on your list. When you do need capital, don’t pay retail.
Borrow from customers or suppliers. Find an equity angel. But don’t borrow at 18 percent! And don’t use your personal credit cards.
3 BRAND EQUITY. Position yourself against the brand leader. Be cheaper than Frito’s or faster than Federal Express or cooler than Levi’s. The more the other guy’s brand gets publicized, the more your positioning statement increases in value. Be brazen in the way you compare yourself to the market leader. Your story should be short, solid, and memorable.
You’ve probably already seen the Internet analogy. Almost every single dot com failure is due to studied ignorance of the points that lie above. Well-funded Net start-up companies didn’t act like start-ups. They figured that they had enough money to act like a big company. They were wrong.
4 CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS. You don’t have much of a chance of grabbing a big piece of an established company’s business away from one of its good customers right away. It’s just too easy for the company to defend against you. Instead, you can try one of these strategies:
THE INCHWORM. Get a little piece of business as a test. Then, with great service and great products, slowly but surely steal more and more of the big guy’s business. Focus on one client at a time. By the time the other guy catches on, it’ll be too late.
SELL TO SOMEONE ELSE. Either to companies that don’t already have a relationship with your target customer or to someone in a different department at your target customer’s company someone who doesn’t know she’s supposed to buy from any particular vendor. This strategy works at home too. For example, Saturn found that by marketing its cars to women, it could grab market share that might have automatically gone to Ford if the car-buying decision for couples had been up to the man.
5 GREAT EMPLOYEES. Not every employee is searching for great reputation, stability, and high pay. Amazingly enough, there are lots of people who would prefer a great adventure, stock options, flextime, a caring boss, a convenient location, or a chance to grow without bureaucracy. By focusing on what you offer that the big guys don’t, you can capture your own share of greatness.
and more great wisdoms in this book…..
Any one thinking about starting a business should definitely give it a thorough read, not once but many many times over….
Quote of the day courtesy of Francis Bacon:
” A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.”
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