Adventures of a Business Noob

 I had the pleasant opportunity to meet John Dimmer in one of my entrepreneurship classes. He is an Angel Investor located in Washington State, and loves to give talks on funding your business start-ups. He helped walk the class through the process of funding your business. The biggest surprise to me is when he said he wants owners to have skin in the game. What does that mean? Well, as an Angel Investor like John, he wants to know that the founder (you) is dedicated to this business and willing to put forth your own capital before asking for investors to put in money first.  And he isnt wrong. The first funding that business professors will tell you, comes from your wallet. Thats right, you start the funding. After that, funding can find its way into your business through various sources. As John pointed out in his speech, funding can come from friends and family, crowdsourcing (like KickStarter says my Professor), loans, and Angel Investors to start. Thats what John Dimmer i...

 As I adventure into my business journey, learning the ins and outs of what a business needs to start up, I find myself facing another challenge. Most people who have already established their business typically discuss the challenges they have after everything is already set up. You are seeing the result of weeks long contemplation and experience as you enter a shop, but not the challenges that they had to face starting up. In my class we talked about funnels, pipelines, and other marketing and sales tactics. Those are all really good terms to learn and fantastic when managing your sales, but how do we get there? Cant have sales unless you have products, and cant sell products until you figure out how you want to sell them. These are the small details of starting up a business that tend to escape your mind. You have an idea, you know what the product is, but now you must think about how much you should sell it, and what exactly you can sell. In my last example, we talked about a 3...

Starting a business can be fun, and it can be stressful. You can meet great people, and you can also meet some not great people. In my experience, I have met some business individuals that have built a strong community of helping each other out, but the reality is that there are plenty of people that would capitalize on your success if given the chance. They could sell trade secrets, undermine your business from within, or even commit crime against you. This is the reality of business, and something I always remind myself of. When it comes to starting up a business, you don't always have to be the first person, you just have to do it better then everyone else. You might have a great idea, something no one else is doing and there is a strong demand in the market for it, but it means nothing if someone else does it better. Your great idea could lead to success if executed correctly, but if done poorly, it could also allow others to capitalize on your idea. There are plenty of busines...

There's an old saying out there that tells you to follow your passion. Follow your passion and you'll become successful! Following your passion leads to happiness!  Lets be real, following your passion can be terrible advice when it comes to business. We would all love to start a business in something we are passionate about, and some businesses do start that way, but if passion is the motor behind your business vehicle...good luck. It will eventually break down. Instead of saying "Follow your passion!, we should be telling each other "Follow your skill!" Skills are invaluable. With enough skill, you can shape, grow, and dominate a business market. Skills allow us to become experts in whatever marketable field we find ourselves in. A great example of this from an individual named Erik Hanberg, who used his 20 years of experience in nonprofit management to create a business around advising nonprofits. In his media interview by cityCURRENT, "From Boardroom to ...

My professor directed our entrepreneurship class to watch a free documentary called "Startup.com". Given no context to the video, we left the classroom confused and unsure of the purpose of watching this short documentary. As I watched the free film on YouTube, it became clear to me why he had recommended this video. In short, it was about the "start up" of a business "startup". It showed the beginning, the middle, and the unfortunate end to a company that had so much enthusiasm and promise at the start. A few lessons could be gleamed from watching this short documentary, lessons that I believe are vital for starting your business. The biggest lessons I learned from this film: 1. Take the losses as gracefully and humbly as you take a win 2. Growth and money should be second and third on priority list, user/consumer benefit is number one 3. Communication and business roles are important when sharing knowledge and creating trust  The video talks about a comp...

 Just as an idea is important to start a business, I soon found out that self awareness is just as important. Sure, I can create 1000 ideas to start a business, and 999 of those business ideas might fail, but it might not be for the reason we expect. As you start to flesh out your business ideas, take a moment to self reflect on your own strengths and weaknesses. Does your strengths vibe with you business idea? Does your weaknesses cause issues later down the line? Knowing who you are as a person can help your business in the long run. Some of the strengths that I found through self reflection were a mix of education and personality based. Strengths: Professional Communication Design understanding Organized Motivated Good Analyzer Good with finances Friendly Dedicated Good Researcher Fast Learner Now that I had recognized my own strengths, I moved on to my weaknesses. Weaknesses: Impatient at times Not charismatic Terrible Presenter Rough Communicator (I expand on this later) Terri...