5 Keys To Creating Any Profitable Business In Less Than 30 Days
Post written by Daniel Richard. Follow me on Twitter.
Some of my friends have been asking me the following question, and since it’s been asked once too often, I think the answer itself deserves a post on the blog.
“How do you get 5 businesses up in a single month?”
Good question, and I’ve compiled a list of the top 5 answers that would probably help you get started.
1. Start with little. Alright, I don’t own all 5 of them. The first was a flop (“No one’s ever made their first jump.” ~ Matrix), I co-founded the 2nd (a wholesale BBQ in Singapore, now winner of The Green Book Award: Best Food — Gold — 2009/2010), while the other 3 were built to expand my parent’s already existing business. I don’t earn anything from the latter 3, while the I’m only making a tenth from the first 2. Yes, it’s passive. So all is good.
Perhaps one of the huge myths of starting any business is the need for huge capital. Allow me to be fully transparent to all of you. I’ve started in Jan 2010 with S$200 ($140.7954 U.S. dollars); and that included whatever meal expenses I had for the month. Starting with very little got me to really focus on getting only the essentials, and ignoring everything else that aren’t gonna help in anyway. That meant that I can’t hire anyone, neither would I get to travel often (traveling anywhere, even just to meet friends anywhere beyond the neighborhood, is draining on both the daily expenses and energy), nor could I buy the biggest systems or even outsource anything with the hope of spicing up the business.
Most of the tools, you would already have. Like a desktop computer (I’m using a netbook), Internet access, and you may have the advantage by already knowing how to run a self-hosted blog and coming up with a pleasant looking design. All those tools are enough to get things moving.
2. Work hard. Contrary to what some of my friends think, I don’t exactly sit around at home doing nothing. Great pals Sid Savara and Oscar Del Ben agree on the fact that time is only on our side when we make full use of it. That is to schedule, get things done, and analyze what can be done better by simplifying. Businesses aren’t built fast by being totally disorganized—this phrase may not apply to everyone. You would be able to build any online business easily by working on them in phases.
3. Eliminate. Tim mentioned about the 80/20 rule, that’s based on theory that 20% of the things we do will contribute to 80% of our results. True that. What I’ve done was to eliminate the following things:
- Eliminate guesswork. Instead, survey friends and customers on what they actually want from your business. And actually find solutions for that.
- Eliminate paperwork. Part of Leo’s ebook titled: “The Simple Guide To A Minimalist Life” spoke about going paperless. I find that principle being tremendously helpful, especially when you’re going to build your business on the web—you’ll have one less thing to worry about.
- Eliminate customization. We all can be flexible, but you have to govern your business with a system. If you would take a quick peek at all 6 of the stuff that I’ve built up in this 1 month (the one that failed not included); Singapore Otah, Praisewall, The Mannequin Shop, The Hanger Shop Singapore, The Hair Wig Shop, and a sneak preview of #6 (which I’m still working on at the moment): AGrowthMedia, all the layouts are exactly the same, except for the change of colors and images, and without unnecessary features.
Henry Ford made a famous quote that went “You can have any color you want as long as it’s black”. I’m just using that principle and applying it to every web project now.
- Eliminate requests. I may have turned down a whole lot of requests — and peeved almost everyone — in that 1 month alone. It is very tempting to fill our plates with requests upon requests. But, in most cases, “no” is the best answer.
I still go out with my friends. Only limited to places nearby, like a dinner outing is alright. Any requests that may drain out enormous amount of time and energy will hear a default answer as mentioned in the last paragraph.
4. Focus on starting small. Yes, I started “very small”, and spent the part of the S$200 on getting my own web hosting in Singapore, along with the few domains. I didn’t focus on building “the next big thing” or creating a behemoth in just 1 month. Guy Kawasaki, author and venture capitalist, mentioned in the early chapters of his book Art of the Start that we should have our focus on is getting things started. As mentioned earlier about working in phases, the very first thing I had done was to have the products ready for sale. Then tweak up along the way as cashflow is coming in.
Another benefit for starting small is the ability to find out quickly how well your product and services are doing before getting your attention to building it up and making the site and buying experience better.
5. Believe. It’s not that “I believe I can make it” mumbo jumbo that I’m talking about. Instead, it is believing that you can get the first stage up, then moving on to your next step, and building up your momentum along as you go, that’s what will make it count.
“The successful warrior is the average man with laser-like focus.” ~ Bruce Lee
