Starting Your Business With A Plan And Growing It
Starting a business is a challenge too far for some people, and just by beginning the process of turning your ideas or skills into a company you are already a step ahead. One of the difficulties that can arise is that you aren’t sure where to start or how to develop your business. Well, there are answers to those issues and we are going to take a look at some of the ideas you might want to explore to help you succeed.
Planning
The first thing you should do is sit down and create a detailed plan for your business. This should be a detailed breakdown of your goals, your structure and organisation, and your target market. By having an idea and setting it down on paper, you are turning your ambitions into something tangible that you can take to potential investors or clients. A mistake that a lot of new businesses make is thinking that this doesn’t apply to them and just jumping two feet into the process of starting up. However, it doesn’t matter if you’re writing a personal training business plan or founding a new tech company, you need to get something in print to demonstrate your strategy.
Business is a lot more than just having an idea and selling it to the world, though we will discuss that process next. You need to be able to persuade people that your company isn’t a fad, that it has legs and will be around for years to come. Specifically, you will need to persuade the bank if you are going to pursue a business loan or the aforementioned investors to get your cash flow started.
Marketing
The success of a lot of business is based on how well you can sell your product or services to the general public or other companies. That is where advertising comes in, you should take the time to learn this tool or employ someone who already knows their stuff. Here is a breakdown of some types of marketing you should consider.
- Digital Marketing
The whole world is online nowadays it seems and that should go double for your company. A lot of business in the modern world is conducted through the screen of a PC, tablet or smartphone and you will need to figure out your place in that market in order to succeed. These are two vital types of digital marketing for your company to employ.
- SEO
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of making your website have greater visibility on the world wide web through the organic results of a search engine. There are several reasons to make sure your business has a website that engages with search engines, but the main one is that 90% of search users don’t look beyond the first page. That means if you fall on to page two, three or four then you effectively don’t exist. You should ensure at the very least that your company’s website has the basics of SEO management such as keywords, backlinks and high-quality content.
- Social Media
There is a very good chance that you are reading this now in between checking your social media. That is, in part, because the likes of Facebook and Twitter are everywhere these days. And that is pretty much the main reason for you to ensure your company has a comprehensive social media marketing plan. Your aim here isn’t to flood social media channels with posts about your product, but rather approach from a targeted perspective. Find your demographic online and figure out a way to be part of their conversation and attract them to your site.
- Offline Promotion
As important as digital marketing is to the modern day, offline promotion has been to the world of business for centuries. However, this style of advertising continues to evolve as well and so here are two ways you could consider using to get involved.
- Traditional Media
While everyone seems to be on social media, there is still a core market of people who use traditional media. That means newspapers and magazines are still being bought and therefore there are eyes out there that you can be targeting in print. Find the specialist titles that suit your product or services and promote through them.
- Events
In a similar way to traditional media, the aim of events based marketing is to find where your demographic is going to be captive and target them. Your aim should be to have your more-informed people on the floor of these events with branded banners and tents to attract potential customers and clients. The idea here is that you are going to where the buying power is, and you shouldn’t be leaving without making a sale or two.