12 Critical Questions to Ask Yourself Before Starting a Business
12 Critical Questions to Ask Yourself Before Starting a Business
All great businesses start with a great idea. But what’s next? Is that enough to get you going and to create an enterprise that will eventually make a million bucks? Probably not if you haven’t thought it through!There are many questions to ask yourself before you decide to start a business. Will it work? I am fit for this type of profession or would I fail? Do I need other people to help me with the process? Can I make the sacrifices needed to start this journey?
The questions can be endless, so to help we’ve simplified it for you by picking the most important questions you should ask yourself before starting a business.
[Tweet “Are you ready to start your own #business? Answer these 12 questions to find out! #entrepreneur”]Questions About Self-Competence:
One of the first things you need to ask yourself if you have what it takes to become an entrepreneur. Starting and running a business is certainly not everyone’s cup of tea. Realizing this sooner than later will save you huge losses in time, money or efforts. So ask yourself:
[checklist]- Am I Self-Motivated? If you are the type that always needs your boss or supervisor to order you around about work and get you going, you’re not going to like entrepreneurship at all. A self-motivated person knows how to motivate himself and take action without supervision.
- Do I have patience and perseverance? Entrepreneurship will really teach you a thing or two about these two qualities. You need to expect plenty of tough times during the initial stages and know that they will require patience to help you get through. You can’t be a quitter during this phase… because there are going to be lots of these “phases”.
- Do I have the energy required? Entrepreneurship and the startup phase of a business are exhausting. If that constant energy and enthusiasm (and skipping day naps) just isn’t in you, you’ll end up looking for another profession.
- Do I have an open-minded outlook? An open mind and creative thinking is what will allow you to come up with solutions for all kinds of inevitable, unexpected problems. Do you possess the analytical and problem solving skills required to work through issues and find solutions? How often have you done it in the past?
- Do I have the required skills/ knowledge about running a business? Some people have it easy because they’ve seen a successfully run business all their life (possibly from their parents or relatives). Others might have the right qualifications and skill-set (accounting, marketing, etc). Ask yourself if you need any specialized skills before you consider starting a new business.
Questions About Your Business Idea:
[checklist]- Does it solve a problem? Clearly, your business venture needs to fill in a needed gap. It needs to solve a problem in order to win the customers. Does it?
- Who is my target audience? The target market needs to be a large enough audience to allow success.
- Who are my competitors? It’s important to know who your competition is in order to evaluate if you can compete! Any product or service that solves the problem of your target market in a different way is going to be the competition. A lot of competition and substitute products might be a clear sign that your idea needs to be positioned in a unique fashion in order to be successful.
- Who can I partner with for support? You might need to network your way through to a handful of useful people in your given industry. Do you have partners? Mentors? Potential clients?
Question About Execution:
[checklist]- What are my Marketing and Sales plans? How do you plan to market your brand? Which specific tools and techniques can be used to promote your product/service? Make sure you have a Unique Selling Proposition to be able to convince your prospects.
- What are my business goals? Have you set your business goals? What are you really trying to achieve and why? This will require you to set time-specific targets.
- What about capital and finance? Where will you get the required amount? What if you need more? You might have to do another job simultaneously as a back-up or for funds. If you’re looking into a business loan, you’ll have to come up with a well-executed business plan.
Answering these questions isn’t — and certainly shouldn’t be – a piece of cake. It will take an immense amount of time to think through your intended business venture. If you find that as you move through each of these questions that your answers are solid and get you even more motivated, then odds are you’re ready to take on the challenge of entrepreneurship and start your own business!
[author image=”https://smarthustle.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Rochelle-Ceira.jpg” ]Rochelle Ceira loves blogging a lot and in her leisure time she updates insightful posts on latest trends, education, marketing, etc. Besides blogging, she also offers dissertation help online to graduates.[/author]Smart Hustle Resources