If you are thinking about joining the world of entrepreneurs, it can feel kind of overwhelming, especially if you haven’t done that kind of work before. However, all entrepreneurs have to start somewhere and most try their first venture without any meaningful experience working for a startup. Making the transition from working a regular job to becoming an entrepreneur can be complicated, but you can take steps to make sure you are as successful as possible.
Go in With a Partner
Just because you are starting your own business, doesn’t mean you have to do it entirely on your own. In fact, you can increase your chances of success if you simply find a partner to work with. Your partner could be someone more experienced, who has started a business before. Or you could choose a partner who has a different skillset from you so you each can bring different benefits to the table. Finding a good balance with a partner can be an effective method for getting your new business off to the right start.
Look for Franchising Opportunities
If you want to start your own business but you also want to make things a little bit easier for yourself with a built-in structure, you could start out with a franchise. That way you get to start building up experience as an entrepreneur while you are engaging in that kind of work. You won’t have to make as many decisions about how to manage your business, so you can focus on finding a great location and making things run smoothly. According to Franchise Gator, commercial real estate is more available now than it was before the pandemic.
Make Sure You Know About the Industry
When you are new to the world of entrepreneurship, it isn’t usually a good idea to start a business in something you don’t really understand. Choosing a business in a sector that you know a lot about can help to balance out your inexperience, according to YourStory. Then you can take your industry-specific knowledge and use it to increase your chances of success.
It’s okay to be new at starting a business, and in some ways, it can be an advantage. Don’t be afraid to experiment and take risks, as well as apply the knowledge you do have to your new venture. When you can find a great balance, it will help your new business to flourish from day one.
There is no business that doesn’t have employees. And while employees may be under your authority while at the workplace, they are not beneath you, or any other manager or owner. There are certain rights that your employees have that your business is required to uphold. It shouldn’t be difficult walking the line between acceptable employer and employee relationships and unacceptable ones. You need to know what is expected of you as an employer. Here are three legal rights every employee has at your business and what you need to do to uphold these rights.
Protection Against Discrimination
The first legal right that every employee at your business has is protection against discrimination. You, the business, and the employees of the business are not allowed to discriminate against any other employee in the workplace. There is never any leeway with discrimination, you must treat your employees equally. This includes discrimination for reasons of sex, gender, sexuality, race, religion, nationality, age, or any other such reasons. Ensure that you take care to educate your employees and yourself on anti-discrimination tactics, and how to ensure that they are treating everyone fairly, equally, and non-discriminatorily.
A Right to Physical Safety
Another legal right that the employees of your business have is a legal right to physical safety. This one is probably a no-brainer for you: your employees are entitled to a safe working environment and practices that protect their physical safety. Employees have a legal right to know about hazards in their workplace. If you know that your working environment exposes your employees to any sort of chemical that can cause health effects, you are required to disclose that information to your employees. As a business, you need to do your best to always protect the safety of your employees.
Minimum Wage
The final legal right of all your employees at your business is minimum wage pay. You are required to pay your workers the federal or state minimum wage in your area, whichever one is higher. This also includes regulations that your employees are entitled to overtime pay and holiday pay. There is never any reason that you should be paying any employee less than the legislated minimum wage.
Making sure that your employees are legally protected and given their rights as workers is a part of your responsibility as a business owner. If you are not respecting these rights, it will catch up to you. Make sure that you are honoring your employees’ rights in the workplace. If you don’t respect these rights, you’re not just an A**Hole Boss, you are breaking the law.
I did a really great training this weekend and I want to pass on some of the goodness. It’s right on time since it is the beginning of the year which is, as everyone knows, goal-setting time!
Here is a visioning exercise that follows a different process for goal setting that I want to pass along to you. After you read this, take some time, not more than 5 minutes, and go through this exercise.
Take a minute and picture yourself on 12/31/2022. It’s the end of the year and you’re extremely happy. 2022 has been good to you. You are in a great place personally and professionally. You are giving a recap of what your year has been like. Your conversation starts off with “This was a great year because….”
Close your eyes and picture that conversation.
Where are you having this conversation? Someplace new? Your usual favorite place?
What will that conversation sound like? What does your year in review look like to you? What were the positive changes in your life? What did you do differently?
As you’re describing your year in review to those around you, what are you saying? Who are you talking to and what is the look on their faces as you talk? Are they surprised? Happy for you? Encouraged?
As you talk about what changed, think about what you had to start doing to get to that happy place at the end of the year. What did you have to stop doing? What did you have to do more of? What did you have to do less of?
Open your eyes and think about your year. To get to that happy place, what are 2-3 things that you absolutely have to get done to get there? Those are your 2022 goals. Let’s crush them!!
People ask me all the time why DiSC is one of my favorite products. My answers are simple. It works and it doesn’t put people into a box. It is more about learning how to communicate with people who give and receive information in a different way than you. For example, I am fairly direct and to the point. Long, meandering stories lose my attention quickly. At work, when someone had a request or if they wanted something from me, I would often find myself becoming quite annoyed and uninterested. We all know that annoyed and uninterested are not how you want people to feel about you at work. There were some people that I dreaded talking to, I knew that it would be a drawn-out conversation that would irritate me and probably put me in bad mood for the rest of the afternoon. I really didn’t understand why I could have perfectly productive conversations with some people and others, I just wanted to walk away mid-sentence.
I did all kinds of leadership training, personality profiles, you name it. I knew that I was direct. I knew that I liked when people got to the point quickly. I already knew what those workshops were presenting as new information. When I discovered DiSC, I was ready to write it off, yeah yeah, this is how I am… But the unique thing about DiSC was that it wasn’t just about me. It was about how other people viewed me, what they needed from my communication and how I could have truly meaningful conversations that moved the needle with people that I previously avoided at all cost. I never really thought about the fact that they were probably just as annoyed with me as I was with them.
I know that it sounds simple, but for me a tool that gave me clarity in terms of communicating with the people that I needed to help and needed help from me was priceless. It’s also a tool that I continue to use to this day, using the People Reading tool to help me have better conversations with people who don’t have a DiSC profile that I can compare mine with. By planning out conversations, I have found that things go much smoother and we both walk away feeling better, rather than irritated. From my perspective, that’s priceless.
If you want to know if DiSC can help you, let’s talk!
Every company wants to do its best to extend its sales from year-to-year. This much is obvious. However, some business owners just don’t understand why they aren’t seeing any difference in their profits. If you are looking to expand your sales record, you need to be more creative with your strategies.
Upsell and Cross-sell
Upselling and cross-selling can help you generate a steady flow of income with better planning and advertising. When you upsell, you are giving customers the chance to buy a newer version of your product that makes it even more convenient to use. Apple does this frequently with their smartphones. Never get too comfortable with your current product. Always innovate.
Cross-selling is a little different, but also helpful. When people buy your products, you may want to make some additional suggestions to help their product. For example, if someone is buying a new phone, they may want a phone case or screen protector. Look for these opportunities to sell multiple things at the same time to the same customer.
A lead is a customer that has shown interest in your product but just hasn’t committed to the purchase. As a company owner, generating new leads at all times is a great way to keep your audience engaged and excited.
You should let customers reach you through the channels they’re most comfortable with to make sure you retain leads. This makes it easy for customers to buy your product. Having more options is always a better thing for the customer, making it more likely you will see the profits roll in. New leads also give you something to work toward, which is always nice.
Since phones have become the main way people view content and advertisements, making engaging and hilarious content has become a priority for most businesses. Fun advertisements are less likely to annoy the viewer and may change the way they see your company.
But not all advertisements have to be funny. Some of them can be intriguing or enticing in a different way. Add a little mystery to your advertisement. Make it musical. If you don’t have a good hook, it is likely your advertisements will not get through to your intended audience very easily.
These three different strategies are great ways to expand your sales next year. Some of these solutions are based in marketing, others are advertising, and some are just common sense. With these and other strategies, you will find additional success.
