Many people dream of starting their own business. Maybe it’s an idea they’ve had since college, or a chance to break free from the 9 to 5 grind, or a way of making extra money, or to leave a lasting legacy in the community. One of these could be true for you, or your reason might be completely different. There are probably as many reasons for starting a business as there are new businesses.

There are numerous benefits that come from being an entrepreneur. You get to call the shots, you create your own environment, set your own deadlines, and have total flexibility and control over what you do. Eventually down the line, you might get more time to spend with your friends and family.

Whatever your reason for starting up a business, these advantages will have crossed your mind. But you have probably also considered the challenges ahead. Starting a new business is a daunting task, and that’s why countless people give up and don’t pursue their dreams. Just having a great idea isn’t enough – turning that idea into a successful business takes commitment, energy and lots of hard work. However, with the right support it is possible to create and launch a business that will bring you the lifestyle changes you’ve envisioned and success down the line.

If it’s your dream to set up a successful business and have the way of life you’ve always wanted, then this course will take you through the essential steps to get you started and on your way.

Learning Objectives:

By the time you complete this course, you’ll be able to:

Define practical ways to develop an entrepreneurial mindset, so that you don’t sabotage your success before you even
Combine your lifestyle vision and your values to create a business that is true to yourself and keeps you motivated to achieve your dreams.
Clarify the business idea which uses your strengths and talents to the fullest, so you will be positioned to serve those who need you and bring in the income you desire.
Identify who you want to serve in your business and where you can best help, so that your marketing hits the spot every time and converts to sales.
Find a profitable niche that matches your skills, so you only develop products and services which are in demand in your target market.
Select the business model that best fits your financial and lifestyle goals, so that you build the business that’s right for you, rather than what’s hot at the moment.
Design a viable product or service that can be offered to customers right away to kick-start sales in your business and gain valuable testimonials.
Run your legally established business, so that customers are reassured they’re dealing with someone serious and you know you are on the right side of the law.
Get the branding basics in place in your new business, so that you communicate your identity in a powerful way that influences buying.
Set value-based prices and clearly demonstrate the value of your product or service, so that customers will see the match with their needs and sales will flow.
Formulate a marketing plan using online and offline tactics, so you attract enough customers to ensure you achieve your business goals (if not exceed them).
Set the date for your launch and plan what needs to happen, so you make sales as soon as you open your doors.
Use key metrics to track the progress of your business, so you stay on top of your revenue targets and make sure money is coming in regularly.
Set up systems that will increase your efficiency and save you time, so you can stay at the peak of your performance while you’re setting up your business.

This course is broken down into 12 modules to take you step-by-step through the process of setting up a new business.

The modules follow a logical order, so while you can skip around if you want, it’s best to work through them one at a time.

As we go through each module, use your Action Guide to help you complete the Action Steps at the end of each.

Expectations

Before we start the course, take a minute to think about what you want to get out of it.

In the Action Guide, write down three skills you expect to gain.

Now that you’re clear about what you want this course to deliver, we can get started.

Module 1: Develop a Mindset for Success

Setting yourself up in business can have great advantages, but it asks a lot in return. If you want the comfort of a regular paycheck with health benefits and to only work 9-5, then running your own business probably isn’t for you. But if you have an idea that you want to turn into a business, and you’re driven to be your own boss, then it helps to know the mindset you need to cultivate.

In this module, we’ll look at what it takes to be an entrepreneur and how ready you are to kick start your business.

Identify Your Big “Why?”

Why exactly do you want to start a business? Is it because you want to create jobs in the local community, put your kids through college, lead a laptop lifestyle, have the freedom to work when and wherever you want to, bring an invention to market that will change people’s lives?

The big “why” of your goal is the most important driver and the primary reason why you will or will not create a successful business.

As you come across challenges and barriers towards your goals, it is your big “why” that will keep you going. If you have no clear idea why you want to achieve your goal, your motivation and focus will quickly dissipate.

How to Stay Motivated When Starting a Business

There’s no point in pretending that starting a business is all fun and games. People who think that are likely to give up at the first hitch. There will be many hiccups and obstacles along the way, but here are some key factors to motivate you:

Remind yourself of your big “why”.
Set clear, concrete goals to keep you on track.
Surround yourself with people who motivate and inspire you.
Do something you’re passionate about and really good at.

Do You Have an Entrepreneurial Mindset?

A mindset is a fixed set of ideas that we all maintain about a certain subject. It determines how we will react to certain situations. For example, “I’m no good at languages so there’s no point trying to learn French.” With this attitude and state of mind, even if you were to try to learn French, how successful do you think you would be? The answer for most of us would be, very unsuccessful. We would have talked ourselves out of success before we’d even tried. And yet, many people successfully learn a new language. Why is that?

Don’t let your mindset interfere with your success.

If you believe you have nothing valuable to offer to anyone, then your negative mindset is going to prevent you from making a success of your business.

What attitudes or beliefs do you have that could interfere with your success?

Change Your Mindset

The good news is that your current mindset is not a blueprint for life. By taking a close look at your beliefs and asking important questions, you can change your mindset and set yourself up for success.

All successful people acknowledge the importance of having the right mindset in helping them succeed. Great athletes don’t just have physical ability and training – they have the mindset to win. Renowned musicians don’t just have talent and perfect pitch – they have the mindset to share their gift with the world. Pick up any book that tells you how so-and-so made two million dollars in their first year, follow their ‘simple formula for success’ and their strategies, and will you become successful? You might become successful, but many will not because they don’t have the mindset of success.

What is an Entrepreneurial Mindset?

Does this sound like you?

Let’s look at these 10 qualities of successful entrepreneurs:

Positive Thinking: No matter what happens, an entrepreneur can frame it in a positive light.
Learn from Failure and Move On: Entrepreneurs generally don’t achieve success on the first try. But they try and try again. They’re resilient and persistent.
Know the Moment to Give Up: Entrepreneurs also know when to stop pushing for something and wasting time and energy on a project that just isn’t working.
Delegate to Others: They don’t try to do everything themselves but reach out for help and designate tasks to those who are best equipped to do them.
Love Learning: Entrepreneurs have a hunger for knowledge and new ways of thinking and embrace change.
Take Risks: They are risk-takers, but not of random risks taken for no reason at all. The risks are calculated and considered.
Follow-Through: Entrepreneurs are always on the lookout for new opportunities, even when there is not necessarily an immediate result.
Remain Flexible: They are open to continuous change and improvement, and they are ready to adapt or change plans at a moment’s notice.
Set Goals: People with the entrepreneurial mindset set goals as a way to focus on the future and motivate themselves forward.
Keep Good Company: Entrepreneurs surround themselves with other entrepreneurs, positive influencers, and like-minded individuals.

As you went through these qualities of the entrepreneurial mindset, what did you think? Did you feel that some (or many) of them apply to you? Can you see areas where you could change or improve?

There’s a questionnaire in the Action Guide to help you look at this.

Develop Your Entrepreneurial Mindset

Getting out there and acting like an entrepreneur will give you the challenges and learning opportunities that will transform your mindset.

What are some of the activities that you could use to cultivate an entrepreneurial mindset?

For example, you could:

Connect with other entrepreneurs in your neighborhood who have the mindset you want to nurture and find out how they’ve succeeded.
Attend a conference or networking event to learn from like-minded people.
Revisit a dilemma that you have been thinking about and weigh up the risk factors.
Delegate a minor task to someone else so that you can focus on more important things.

What are some new skills you can learn and where can you learn them? Is there a particular risk or challenge your intuition is telling you to take?

Write down 3 actions you can take to help you to develop different aspects of the entrepreneurial mindset.

Key Takeaways:

Your current mindset is not a blueprint for your life. You have the power to change it.
The big “why” of your goal is the most important driver and the primary reason why you will or will not create a successful business.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Complete the checklist in the Action Guide.
Make a list of all the reasons you want to start your business. Keep asking yourself “Why?” Reduce this down so you end up with one big “why”. Post this up somewhere you can see it every day.
Write down 3 actions you can take to help you to develop different aspects of the entrepreneurial mindset.

Module 2: Define Your Driving Vision and Values

Your dreams and desires, along with the changes you want to see happen in your life, will drive your business success. In fact, you may see your business as the key to achieving your vision. But if you don’t pause to clarify this vision from the outset, your chances of achieving it are drastically reduced.

In this module, you’ll identify the vision you hold of your life moving forward, and how your core values fit into this vision and influence the business you’re creating.

Uncover Your Personal Vision

What is a vision? It’s your ideal picture of the future you want to create for yourself and others. It is unique to you. It ties into the big “why” as your vision depicts that big “why” coming to fruition.

Most likely, your personal vision and your business vision will be closely linked. This is usually the case for entrepreneurs. But if you’re just starting out, then it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to articulate your business vision at this stage.

Here’s a quote from Steven Covey’s “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”:

“How different our lives are when we really know what is deeply important to us, and, keeping that picture in mind, we manage ourselves each day to be and to do what really matters most.”

The way to get to the point of clarity with your personal vision is to have a written vision statement.

Let’s look at a couple of examples:

“To have fun in my journey through life and learn from my mistakes.” Sir Richard Branson, Founder of the Virgin Group

“To be a teacher. And to be known for inspiring my students to be more than they thought they could be.” Oprah Winfrey, Founder of OWN

You’ll notice that neither of these vision statements mention business, though they were written by incredibly successful business people. Their personal vision is their big “why.”

Here are some guidelines to help you write yours.

A vision statement:

Sets out high-level goals.
Inspires you.
Motivates you.
Contains feelings and emotions.
Is written in the present tense.

What Are Your Values?

Values are a part of us too. They highlight what we stand for – things like honesty, integrity, openness – and represent our unique, individual essence.

Values guide our behavior, providing us with a personal code of conduct. When we honor our core values consistently, we experience fulfillment.

Here’s an exercise to help you define your core values. At the end of this exercise, you want to have written down between 5 and 8 values that are key to your existence.

Write down the personal values you feel you must honor at all costs.

Group these values under related themes. For example,

Values like accountability, responsibility and timeliness are similar in that they all relate to integrity.
Values like learning, growth, and development are similar as they relate to openness.

If you still have a sizeable list of values, you need to whittle your list down to the most important ones. These are the values that you’d stand up for no matter what. Ask yourself this question:

What values are essential to my life?

When you have 5-8 values written down, rank them in the order of importance.

Then, step back and ask yourself:

Do you feel these values are consistent with who you are?
Are they personal to you?
Do you see any values that feel inconsistent with your identity (as if they belong to someone else, like an authority figure or society) and not you?
Check your priority ranking. Do you feel like your values are in the proper order of importance?

Put Your Values into Action

It’s fairly easy to see how the values of the individual who heads a small business or start-up will have an impact on that business.

Once you know what’s most important to you personally, you can use those values to help guide you in choosing your company’s most important values.

How Will Your Personal Values Help You Create Your Business?

Let’s take an example:

If you care for the planet and what it’s becoming, it’s likely that environmental issues are close to your heart. This will have an effect on how you want to manage the carbon footprint of your business. You’ll want to avoid bringing in raw materials by plane from the other side of the world and you’ll try to source these materials locally.

Looking at values will help you design how you want your business to look and to operate.

Ask yourself, from the position of your key values:

How do I want my customers/employees/partners to be treated?
How do I need to run my business so I stay true to my values?
Where in my business do I need to pay particular attention to aligning my values?

Key Takeaways:

Your vision is the ideal picture of the future you want to create for yourself and others.
Once you know your personal values, you can use those values to help guide you in choosing your company’s most important values.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Brainstorm some notes for a vision statement for the life you want to lead and put them in your Action Guide. Come back to them later and draft your vision statement
Complete the values exercise in your Action Guide.
Ask yourself, from the position of your key values:

How do I want my customers/employees/partners to be treated?
How do I need to run my business so I stay true to my values?
Where in my business do I need to pay particular attention to aligning my values?

Module 3: Pick the Right Business for You

You’re building up a clearer picture of yourself and how you will influence your business from the top down. It’s important that your business reflects you and is built the way you want it to be.

In this module, you’ll add your strengths to your vision and your values from the last module. Then, you’ll move on to clarify your business idea and the revenue you want to be bringing into the business.

Focus on Your Strengths and Talents

What are you really good at? What do you find really easy to do? Does your particular expertise in a certain area match up with your interests? If so, you have already found the perfect niche.

We’re going to look at the mechanics of setting up a business later in the course. For now, you should focus on identifying the strengths you already have when it comes to business practices.

In your Action Guide, you’ll find a checklist and questions to take you through the key tasks a business owner has to cover. Check each one based on:

Whether you are good at this element and love doing it.
Whether you hate doing it (even if you are good at it).
Something you might be prepared to do if necessary or you’d do one of the activities as ‘down time’ (for example, some business owners like to do photocopying once in a while as it’s a mindless task and it gives their brains a rest).

This will give you a good overview of your current strengths as a business owner.

Clarify Your Business Idea

It’s rare that someone suddenly decides to start a business without having any idea about what they want to do.

You may have done some research, or worked on a prototype, or already tried out a consultancy process. You may have even held a dream of your business from childhood.

You may not be clear about the details, but it’s likely you can identify the type of activity you want to make a business from.

For example:

I want to help business owners work more efficiently.
I want to sell beauty products.
I want to introduce healthy cooking into my neighborhood.

It’s time to write down your business idea. Spend a few minutes committing your idea to paper in as much detail as you can. Ideally, this idea will be associated with your strengths and talents and what you can bring to your customers.

If you’re struggling, look at the things you love doing and find easy to do. For example, you might find it easy using time-saving systems for planning and organizing, but there are many business owners who don’t, and need help from someone like you.

Decide on Your Revenue Targets

You’ll be developing your business idea as we go further into the course, so keep it close to you to refer to. We will go on to examine its profitability later.

But before doing that, you need to determine the revenue you want from your business. That way you can match your lifestyle goals to your potential income.

With a revenue target, you decide how much you want your business to earn in a certain period of time. You can then determine how many ‘units’ you expect to sell, and price each individual product or service package accordingly.

Let’s go through a process for calculating an exact monthly figure.

Here’s the step-by-step process to follow:

Make a list of all your business and personal expenses. Remember to include things like ‘phone and internet costs, heating, loan repayments, restaurant outings etc. Review the list to ensure you have noted everything.
Reduce your outgoings where you can by cutting out anything you aren’t using like a gym membership or an insurance policy which isn’t relevant any more.
Add up your list to get to a monthly figure (any annual expenses need to be divided by 12).
Multiply your monthly figure by 1.3. This gives you a 30% margin to pay tax and make a profit on top of covering your outgoings.

If the monthly figure you come up with is much bigger than you thought, don’t be too alarmed. Decrease your expenses where you can so you aren’t wasting money. And follow the course to find ways for achieving this figure.

Key Takeaways:

Match up your strengths and talents with your business idea for maximum chance of success.
With a revenue target, you decide how much you want your business to earn in a certain period of time. It guides you to sales and is a check on progress.

Action Steps:

Complete the table in the Action Guide. When you have completed the exercise, go back over your list and circle any element that you believe you, as the business owner, absolutely must They may not be tasks you’re already knowledgeable or skilled at so answer these questions:

How can you fill any gaps in your business knowledge/experience?
Where could you learn the skills you don’t currently have?
What things you hate doing could you delegate/outsource to someone else?
1. Quick win: Write down your business idea in your Action Guide adding as much detail as you have right now.
2. Follow the step-by-step process to identifying your monthly financial goals in the Action Guide.

Module 4: Identify Your Target Customer and Your Niche

In the last module, you identified the things you are good at and find satisfying. You also wrote down your business idea in as much detail as you could. In this module, you’ll investigate how profitable this business idea could be and identify your ideal client, so that you can assess whether what you’re offering is in demand.

Is My Idea Profitable?

Now, let’s look at whether you can make a living running a business based on the idea you’ve already identified.

The questions you need to ask are:

Is there an existing demand for products and services in your chosen business area? If so, then you know that people are already buying similar products and services, and there is a market for them.
Can you add value to the existing market? This will put you ahead of your competition and help you make sales.
Can you provide a solution in a way that has never been seen before? You may have something completely unique to offer to the world.

You will find out the answers to these questions by doing some research. Then, you can determine whether you have a chance for financial success with your idea.

It doesn’t matter if you offer physical products or virtual services, or want to sell them online or offline. Research is crucial no matter what the business project.

Research the Existing Market

When you research what’s already selling, then this means you are researching your competitors.

Here are some places to start your research online:

1. Google and YouTube

Put your business project into the search engine, and you’ll probably find pages upon pages of results. Ignore the first ones as they are paid advertisements (you can usually see ‘Ad’ written next to them) so you can’t be sure that they are truly part of the most popular results.

Spend some time looking at the websites and videos on the first page to see what’s being offered.

2. Amazon

Type your business project into Amazon and see how many products and books are listed. Several thousand listings show that many people are buying in that market. Too few listings and there may not be a viable market. Too many listings and the competition will be fierce.

Make some notes from your research – this is valuable information and you want to hang on to it.

We’ll return to competitors in a later module. But remember what you’ve discovered is a snapshot and gives you a guide only to start you off. You’ll refine this data as you start selling and build up your own figures.

Define Your Target Customer

The next step is to identify your target customers. These are the people who want and need what you have to offer. They are the people you would like to have as customers. They are probably already purchasing similar products or services from someone else.

Before you can find them and market to them, you need to define this specific audience. Do you have any idea who would be the best fit for your business idea?

A few examples of businesses with clearly defined target customers would be:

A shopping network that targets working moms over 30
A careers counsellor who targets men facing redundancy in the chemicals industry
An online app store that targets teens who see themselves as ‘alternative’
A camping goods supply store that targets people in holiday areas
A kitchen designer who targets upper middle-class cooking aficionados

Create Your Target Customer Profile

You come to your definition of an ideal customer by researching demographics such as age, gender, location, family situation, as well as psychographics, such as what books they read, what dreams they have for the future.

Demographics help you recognize who your audience is.
Psychographics tell you about their behavior and their “why”.

Major Challenges

Important psychographic data to collect includes your target customers’ major challenges. These will be the things that worry them, that keep them awake at night, the questions that go around and around in their heads and the problems they regularly face. Once you know this, you can offer solutions to those challenges.

There are many ways to find out this information. Go to where your ideal customers ‘hang out’ on social media. Join groups on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and so on (whatever is most relevant to your niche). You probably belong to some groups already.

Then ask questions:

Online surveys – Use Survey Monkey or Wufoo to create a survey and ask your target customers to complete them.
Blog questions – If you have a blog, ask questions like ‘What would help you overcome this problem?’ or ‘What solution are you looking for?’
Online groups, Q&A sites and chatrooms – Look at what people are discussing and the questions they’re asking.
Social media – Check out the trending topics on the major social media platforms relevant to your market.

Once you’ve gathered this information together, build a profile of one person who embodies your ideal customer.

We’ve put together a 21-point questionnaire to help you come up with your profile.

Get Specific About Your Market

A common concern for people starting a business is being too specific about their ideal customer. They think that they’ll miss out on business and should be thinking more widely. In fact, the opposite is often true. You may attract more people because you’re specialized in what you provide and to whom. Don’t be afraid to get specific.

This concept is often called ‘niche marketing.’

This is a marketing approach for products or services that appeal to a narrowly defined market. It makes sense. After all, if you were in the business of selling retirement plans for the over-50s, you wouldn’t want to market to people in their 20s, would you?

Let’s use the examples we came up with in an earlier module to illustrate this approach. The original ideas are rather vague but through research, they can be refined down to be more specific.

Original business idea: I want to help business owners work more efficiently.

Specific niche: I want to help work-from-home moms save time in their business by introducing planning systems.

Original business idea: I want to sell beauty products.

Specific niche: I want to sell cruelty-free makeup to women over 50 who want to take care of their skin.

Original business idea: I want to introduce healthy cooking into my town.

Specific niche: I want to provide vegan street food to students in my neighborhood.

Do you get the idea? What we’re talking about is narrowing your business focus and getting it to a point where you have a ready market wanting to buy.

Now that you have a clearer idea of your target customer, and you’ve researched the competition, take your business idea and see if you need to ‘niche’ down to a more specific audience.

Key Takeaways:

Research is crucial to determine if you have a chance for financial success with your business idea.
Define the specific audience, your ideal customer, who wants and needs what you have to offer.
Once you’re clear on your customer profile, you can start finding where they hang out and plan to market to them there.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Identify your customer profile by using the questionnaire in the Action Guide.
Research your business idea on Google, YouTube and Amazon. Do the results give you the proof you need that your project could be profitable?
Revisit your business idea and see if you need to ‘niche’ down to a more specific audience.

Module 5: Decide What to Offer and How

The way you run your business will be influenced by the lifestyle you’re aiming for. The sales success of the product or service your new business proposes will be influenced by the value you can demonstrate to potential customers. Bring these two together and you have a happy entrepreneur and satisfied customers.

In this module you’ll go step-by-step to create the business that’s right for you, and choose your first product or service to launch.

Choose Your Business Model

A business model is the way a company sells products and services to its customers. Different types of business models suit different types of businesses.

The growth of digital products and ecommerce have moved business a long way away from the brick-and-mortar stores of the past. Of course, these still exist and they need manufacturers and distributors behind them to make them work. But there are many other models available to the start-up entrepreneur.

Let’s look at three basic ones:

Product/Service –The business makes and sells its own products and services. These can be packaged and distributed either online through ecommerce or in a traditional brick-and-mortar store. This is probably the most common approach. Here are some examples:

A marketing consultant who sells a consulting engagement for a monthly retainer fee.
A private health coach and trainer who works one-on-one with local clients, but also sells an online course with group health coaching.
An aromatherapy expert who has a local store selling oils and diffusers, and also has an ecommerce store online.
1. Reseller – Resellers buy other people’s products and sell them to make a profit based on the price difference. You can make a business out of this as do many eBay and Amazon sellers.
2. Person-to-Person Exchanges – The business essentially brings buyer and seller together and takes a transaction fee. Dating sites are an example of this. This can be very lucrative. Airbnb is an example of this which has a huge revenue.

How to Choose Your Business Model

When you’re choosing the best type of business for you, you need to consider your big “why.” Running your own business can have some drawbacks, depending on your business model. For example, if you want the freedom to travel and work from anywhere, then having a store that has to be opened every day isn’t going to be for you. In that case, you could consider an ecommerce site that can make sales without you needing to be there in person.

On the other hand, if you prefer working face-to-face with clients, then you’d be better off avoiding online courses and programs and instead offer in-person coaching services.

To select your main business model, take your business idea and think about your lifestyle vision and your values. Then, look at the most common options described here and decide on the model you’ll use as your starting point.

Define Your Unique Value Proposition (UVP)

You’re a lot closer to launching your business now that you’ve decided how you’ll operate your business.

Next you need to be sure about the value you can offer to your potential customers. You do that by getting clear on your unique value proposition (UVP).

This should concisely tell your prospects:

How your product or service can solve problems – What do you do that’s different?
What they can expect if they purchase your product or service – What do you do that’s extra?
The advantages of doing business with your company over your competitors – How do you differentiate your offering from the others out there?

It’s essential as a new business to differentiate your offering from the competition with at least one element of value.

If you’re not sure what this could be, there are many things you can add. Some don’t cost you any money but others will have on-costs. For example, if you decide to speed up delivery, then you may need to employ extra staff to deal with this or pay for a premium delivery service.

Here are some examples of ‘extras’:

Offer a home delivery service on the weekend.
Give an unconditional money back guarantee.
Offer easy-pay plans to make buying easier.
Increase your quality standards.
Give out of hours contact details.

Your UVP is the primary reason a prospect should buy from you. Therefore, whatever extra element you can add on improves the value of your offering.

Here are some examples of UVPs from well-known brands:

MailChimp (email provider) “Build your brand. Sell more stuff. Send better email.”
Netflix (TV and video streaming service) “Watch Anywhere. Cancel Anytime.”
Vimeo (video sharing platform) “Where videos come first.”

Assess the Competition

As you focus on defining your Unique Value Proposition and deciding how you’ll differentiate yourself, it’s essential to know what’s already on the market.

You conducted some research in an earlier module about the competition for your business idea. You made some notes, which you can add to as you take the research deeper to discover what’s selling, to whom, and at what price. Above all, you want to find out what value the customer feels he or she is getting.

A mix of online and offline competitor research will help you compile this important information.

For example:

Use search engines like Google to see what your closest competition is not doing very well. Look closely at where there might be a gap for you to add value.
Check out review and recommendation sites. For example, on Amazon look at the one and two-star customer reviews. They’ll tell you what’s letting the product or service down in the eyes of the customer. Five star reviews are the ones you’re aiming for, so what makes this product five stars according to buyers? There might also be specific sites that relate to your business (g. TripAdvisor will be useful if you’re in the travel or restaurant business).
Read consumer magazines which rank products and services based on feedback from testers. For example, Consumer Reports in the U.S. and Which in the U.K.
Play the mystery shopper. Get out in your area and visit stores, ring up suppliers, follow-up testimonials from past customers. Find out why purchasers are happy and unhappy with a competitor’s product or service.

From your research you’ll have identified the pros and cons of similar products or services which are already selling.

Your Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

It’s a crucial step to identify your UVP. But you’re not ready to market yet. Don’t be tempted to go for a big launch with a product or service that you think people want, with fingers crossed behind your back.

Take a tip from Lean Startup Methodology. This has as its premise that every startup is a grand experiment that attempts to answer a question. The question is not “Can this product/service be created?”

Instead, the questions are:

“Should this product/service be created?”
“Can we build a sustainable business around this set of products and services?”

The way it works is to:

Trial a product or service (“Good is good enough” for a trial basis).
Get feedback and listen to it.
Make adjustments based on the feedback.
When satisfied, market the product or service widely.

The trial product for a new business is sometimes called a minimum viable product (MVP) which is the most pared down version of a product or service that can still be put on sale as it has just enough to offer to early customers.

It has three key characteristics:

It has sufficient value to be offered for sale and to find customers even in its initial form.
It delivers on its promise and retains early adopters.
It provides a feedback loop to guide future development.

Through the feedback loop, you then work towards improvements before you market it on a grander scale. This will be the first of many products or services you offer in the lifetime of your business, so it’s good to have a clear starting point. And, to begin with a good chance of selling something that people actually want.

Based on the information you’ve put together so far in this course on your target customer, your business niche, and your marketplace research, answer these questions:

What product or service do you propose to sell? What is the most pared down version that will still be a valuable purchase?
How did you check out that idea? Did you do enough research?
Who is it for? Is it right for your target customers?
What will it solve for them? What is its UVP?
How will you sell it to customers? (E.g. membership site, store, ecommerce, trade fairs, farmers’ markets, etc.)

Test Your MVP

To be as certain as you can that your idea will be a success, test it out with a small segment of your target market.

Remember in another module you made notes on where your ideal customers hang out?

This is where to go now to find potential testers. Of course, if you already have a few customers or know of suitable people to approach to test your MVP, then do that too.

Make it clear that you’re offering something valuable in exchange for getting honest feedback.

For example, you could offer:

A discount on the price, like 50% off.
A free tasting sample.
A demonstration.
A free product (they just pay shipping and handling).

Here’s are some more detailed examples:

An app developer who advertises for a group to beta-test a new app for free.
A start-up restaurant which gives away free samples in the neighborhood before deciding what should go on the menu.
A business coach who offers a new online course at half price.

Your MVP is going to depend on your product or service, so get creative. Make sure you have a way to collect feedback (e.g. on a Facebook group page you set up, or on an email list).

This trial is a great way to test whether your idea appeals to your target audience, and to collect positive comments. You’ll get priceless feedback so that you can make changes that will maximize sales later. At that point, you will already have established customers, and your product will have helped people solve real problems.

Key Takeaways:

Your choice of business model will be influenced by your big “why,” your values, and your personal vision.
Get totally clear on the value your offering promises.
To be absolutely certain that your idea will be a success, test it out with a small segment of your market first. Get feedback and then make adjustments.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Select your business model. Think about your lifestyle vision and your values. Then look at the most common options described here and decide on the one you’ll use as your starting point.
Define your UVP using the questions in your Action Guide.
Design your MVP using the questions in your Action Guide.

Module 6: Set Up the Essentials for Running your Business

You’ve covered many of the foundations for setting up your business so far in this course, including your niche, your ideal customer, and your MVP. Those elements are pretty much within your own control and waiting for you to decide what you do.

But there are some essentials that you don’t have control over, and those are the legal and administrative requirements that operate in your country regarding running a business. That’s what we’ll cover in this module.

Cover the Essentials

There are a lot of things you can do when you set up a business that you have complete control over. But there are certain things you have to do to stay legal, organized, and effective.

We’ve divided this section up into the most common areas that you’ll need to address as a new business. However, each country and each type of business may have its own regulations. Be sure to do some additional research based on your own situation.

Legal Entity

You need to have a legal entity for your company. What this is will depend on where you run your business from, but you must make sure that you are operating within the law, both in your state and your country.

When you’re starting out, you don’t need a complicated legal structure, so opt for the simplest form available until you have proved the success of your business.

You’ll want to choose a business name that reflects your brand identity and conveys the types of goods and services you offer.

Once you settle on a name you like, you need to protect it. This might involve legal registration.

Taxes

You need to make sure you know the tax laws in your country. These include not just taxes you need to pay but taxes you need to charge, like sales tax. You may need tax ID numbers before you can start trading.

Insurance

As a business person, you have insurance liabilities.

If you have a business premises, then it will need to be insured. The same applies if you are employing staff.

If you’re a service-based business like a coach or consultant, you will need to insure yourself against professional negligence. Ask your professional association as they often have special deals with insurance providers for their members.

Partners

You may go into business in partnership with one or more people.

If your product is a physical one and you don’t make it yourself, you’ll need to find a third-party manufacturer to make it for you. You could be sourcing your supplies from all over the world and entering into contracts with other businesses.

Partnerships can go through difficulties, so it’s wise to draw up a partnership agreement from the start, which would help if disputes arise. You will need legal advice for this.

Protecting Your Product or Service

If you’re an inventor, it would be in your best interest to patent your invention. Patents are a form of intellectual property protection.

If you decide to sell a license to someone to use your product or service, you need legal advice from a licensing or copyrighting expert.

Premises

If you’re a manufacturer or an artisan, you’ll need somewhere to produce your goods. If you’re involved in food production, there may be all sorts of health and safety regulations that govern your premises.

You might need a warehouse to stock your goods and a shipping service.

If you’re planning on running your business from home, you may have to pay business rates for the part of your home that you use for business purposes, depending on whether or not you use that part for domestic purposes as well. There may be zoning laws which restrict what you can do.

If you propose to make any changes to your house for business purposes, such as building an extension, or if you’re likely to cause disturbance to your neighbors, it will probably be necessary to get planning permission. Contact the planning department of your city hall for more details.

Terms and Conditions

Terms & Conditions, or Terms of Service, are a set of rules and guidelines that a user must agree to in order to use your website or mobile app. It acts as a legal contract between you, (the company) who has the website or mobile app, and the user who accesses your website and mobile app.

You may also need Terms and Conditions for the sale of goods and services. They should cover key issues such as orders, delivery, pricing, payment, risk, warranties, defects, liability, and confidentiality.

Privacy Policy

A privacy policy is a statement that shows some or all of the ways a business gathers, uses, stores, discloses, and manages a customer or client’s data. It fulfills a legal requirement to protect a customer or client’s privacy.

There is a growing public concern over privacy and how companies use the personal data of its citizens. Strict regulations have been introduced for anyone who works with or sells to people in Europe through The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). You need to check to ensure that your business is compliant with the legislation, as penalties for breaches of the law could be high.

As a company, you need to develop a privacy policy, as you need to have a link to it on your blog, website, or any pages on the Internet. There are free privacy policy generators available online but you might want to get it checked out by a legal advisor.

Disclaimer

A legal disclaimer is a statement intended to protect the services, information, and property, (both physical and intellectual) of your business or organization. It limits the legal liability of the entity presenting the disclaimer and also protects the entity’s legal rights in its work. A disclaimer is typically a short paragraph. If you are not sure whether you have drafted a solid disclaimer, consult with an attorney.

Finance

Keep clear and regular financial records and find an accountant or bookkeeper who can help you with tax declarations and so on.

Start keeping all your receipts that pertain to your business, as your accountant/bookkeeper or you will need these for your annual accounts. You can obtain tax relief on certain expenses, which will reduce your tax bill.

Getting Paid

You may need to have a business bank account as a legal requirement when you set up. It’s advisable anyway to keep your business and personal finances separate. With this you can take payments by check and pay bills that way too.

For taking online payments, you will need to set up a payment system which is linked to your bank account.

Your aim is to make it as easy as possible for customers to pay you. In addition to more traditional means, people increasingly use their smart ‘phones to make payments so will be looking to use their ‘digital wallet’ when paying you. For small businesses, it is quite simple and affordable to set this up. There are many providers like Apple Pay, Android Pay, Authorize in addition to the well-known PayPal. Your existing bank may also offer digital wallet capabilities.

In choosing the right one for you, look at the charges and check that it can handle global currencies too.

Raising finance

If you decide that you need to raise money to get your business off the ground, then you may need to seek out venture capital. You will need to create a business plan and decide how much of your business you are willing to give up in exchange for venture capital investment in your company.

Many governments also offer grants to new businesses.

Crowdfunding has become a popular way for small businesses to raise money. You will have to determine what you want to give the people who pledge money to your campaign. It could be as simple as the product or service itself. Although not required, it makes it easier to obtain funding when the funders get something in return.

Where to Get Advice

Entrepreneurs like you have become important to global economies, so most countries have part of their government website dedicated to helping business startups. There’s also probably a small business adviser in your area with whom you can discuss your plans.

Here are a few websites to help:

There are also Chambers of Commerce and Junior Chambers of Commerce throughout the world and other business associations to help you.

Key Takeaways:

Always check the legal requirements for setting up a business before you open your doors.
Get financial systems in place from the start.

Action Steps:

Complete the checklist in the Action Guide, adding any items specific to your country.

Module 7: Start Branding Your Business Now

Now that you’ve got your business set up or on its way, you need to decide how you will present yourself and your offering to potential customers.

In this module, we’ll look at the important basics of branding and how to build your business brand.

What is a Brand?

When people think of a brand, they often think of the logo. But that’s only one aspect of branding a business.

Once you’ve built an awareness of your brand, then the brand is what customers think of when they hear the brand name. It’s everything the public knows, or thinks it knows, about the products or services of the company. Think about global names like Apple or Coca Cola and the brands associated with those names.

Your brand is the personality of your business. It embodies your personal and business values and communicates your uniqueness to potential or existing customers. It sets you apart from the competition.

It takes your UVP a step further. An effective UVP communicates the problems your product or service solves. It is an integral part of the brand.

Before we go into branding further, let’s return to the UVP from a previous module and get you writing a succinct UVP that can be used as a marketing message in your branding.

Write it into your Action Guide.

Elements of an Effective Brand

Your brand is communicated through everything your company does, from the visual brand identity to the products and services it offers. It will be an integral part of your marketing.

In order to build your brand, all elements need to be used consistently across all the platforms you use.

There are some common factors in all brands.

They are:

Clear
Consistent
Memorable
Unique
Comforting
Credible
Timeless

Brand Identity

The ‘identity system,’ as it’s known in branding, is basically the visuals you use for your business like graphic imagery, a color system, fonts, and yes, a logo.

These visual elements are used in:

Marketing materials including flyers, websites, banners.
Digital apps
Packaging
Signage
Headers on emails, newsletters, blogs, eBooks.
Clothing worn by your team, if applicable.
Letterheads, invoices and any stationery or office supplies you use.

In other words, these visual elements should be included in everything your company does. They communicate your brand immediately. Think about the Nike ‘swoosh’ or McDonald’s golden arches.

OK, just now your business isn’t as well-known as Nike or McDonald’s. But you have a business that is legally established, some very useful research, a lot of enthusiasm and an MVP – that’s your business as it stands today.

And you can begin to define your brand from this starting point.

Brand your MVP

Look back at the information in this module.

You need to bring everything together and apply it to your MVP.

Answer these questions:

What do you want the branding of your MVP to communicate? (e.g. reliability, results, credibility, )
What do you want the brand identity of your MVP to be? Visuals, infographics, logo, colors?
Where will you use this identity? Website, blogs, social media, email headers, flyers, packaging, etc.?

Branding isn’t set in stone forever. The choices you make today are a starting point. You’ll refine them over time and as you find what really works for your business. Look at the history of the Nike logo and you’ll see it’s gone through many iterations.

Also, as you test your MVP, you’ll get feedback that will affect your branding decisions as well as the MVP itself. What’s important now is to get started with your basic branding.

Key Takeaways:

Your brand must be consistent across all the platforms you use.
Your UVP is an integral part of your brand.
You won’t get your branding right at the beginning. Keep working at it as you grow your business.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Write a succinct UVP that can be used as a marketing message in your branding.
Brand your MVP:

What do you want the branding of your MVP to communicate? e.g. Reliability, results, credibility etc.
What do you want the brand identity of your MVP to be? Visuals, infographics, logo, colors?
Where will you use this identity? Website, blogs, social media, email headers, flyers etc?

Module 8: Pick the Right Price

Of all the difficulties small business owners and providers face, one of the most challenging is setting their prices. What should you charge for your products or services? This is not an easy question to answer, but in this module, you’re going to learn a variety of methods that will help you not only pick a price, but pick the right one.

Why it’s Important to Get the Price Right

If you undercharge for your products or services, then you’ll be losing revenue. Alternatively, if you charge too much, you could be losing potential customers and new sales. How do you get it right?

Having a pricing strategy will help you sell your products or services in the short-term and also increase your profitability over the long-term. The key is to understand the fundamentals of pricing and what value you offer to your target market.

Value vs. Price

We often use the words ‘value’ and ‘price’ interchangeably, but they actually mean two very different things.

Value is what a product or service is worth to the customer. Only the end-user can decide whether something is valuable to them or not. For example, you may sell hooks for $5, which is practically nothing in terms of price. But if the buyer uses that hook to hang up their highly prized college diploma on the wall so all their neighbors can see it and admire their achievement, then the value to the buyer is much more than $5.

In a previous module you defined your UVP, so you have an idea of how you can add value to your product or service with the extras you provide.

Popular Pricing Strategies

There are several pricing models commonly used to determine price.

Cost-Plus Pricing

With cost-plus pricing, you work out all your costs, then add in a percentage for the amount of profit you want.

‘Costs’ means everything that goes into producing the product or service. It includes raw materials, labor, and overheads like rent, insurance, heating, employee benefits, and so on.

There are two kinds of costs to consider: fixed and variable costs.

Fixed costs stay the same no matter how much or how little you sell (e.g. Office rent or employee salaries).
Variable costs change and most rise as your sales increas For example, raw materials (you need more of the raw materials to meet rising demand), extra labor (you have to hire additional workers), and shipping.

In pricing your products, you need to take into account that variable costs will change and make allowances for that.

Value-Based Pricing

We’ve talked a lot about value in this course. Here’s a recap:

By being clear on the value of what you are offering, you are helping the customer to see which product or service is best for them.
This helps them to buy what best fits their needs.
What you’re aiming for is to find the right fit between what you have to offer and what the customer really wants.

This is why you have to determine the value first and highlight what’s unique about your product. Then you can fix your price.

Competitor-Based Pricing

In this pricing model, you analyze your competitors and market conditions and set prices accordingly. This method can be effective because you’re charging the “going rate” for a product or service. If customers are currently buying something from a competitor for X amount of money, this indicates that this price is something they’re willing to pay.

When you decide on the price using this strategy you can choose to:

Undercut, but make sure that any pricing covers your costs + profit; if not you won’t stay in business for long.
Offer your product or service at a slightly higher price, but remember to emphasize the value.

Service-Based Pricing

When charging for services, like coaching or consulting, you have two options: hourly/daily rate (price for a fixed period of time) or project rate (price per project).

Service providers often like hourly rates because you’re guaranteed that your labor costs will be covered by the buyer. For buyers, it’s harder to budget for.
Buyers often like project rates. The price is for the whole project and there are no surprises. Service providers need to ensure their project contains everything they need to and how long it will take.

Choose Your Pricing Strategy

The nature of your business will usually dictate the type of pricing strategy you adopt. For example, a smartphone store won’t use hourly based pricing but an app developer might.

Here’s a way to get yourself thinking about pricing. Think of something you have bought in the last month or so. From a pricing perspective, ask yourself:

Why did you buy it?
Was it good value?
Are you loyal to the brand?
What differentiates them in terms of their pricing from others?
What can you learn from this for your own business?

Now you have some more of the information you need to make decisions about your own pricing policy.

Ask yourself:

What are the pros and cons of each of the pricing strategies for my business?
Which of these models will most help me price my product or service? Why?
How will this pricing strategy enable me to meet my revenue targets?
How will I monitor the effectiveness of my pricing strategy?

Finally – what will I price my MVP at? Remember: this may be a discounted price in exchange for feedback.

Pricing is an ongoing process. What works today may not work in 6 months’ time. You’ll need to revisit your pricing regularly.

Key Takeaways:

Pricing your products and services is one of the biggest decisions with a great deal of impact on your business.
Be careful not to lose revenue by under-charging for your products or services.
Pricing is ongoing. Once you set prices, continue monitoring and experimenting with adjustments.

Action Steps:

Think of something you have bought in the last month or so. From a pricing perspective, ask yourself:

Why did you buy it?
Was it good value?
Are you loyal to the brand?
What differentiates them in terms of their pricing from others?
What can you learn from this?
1. Use the space in the Action Guide to consider the pros and cons of each pricing strategy for your MVP.
2. Answer the questions in the Action Guide to price your MVP.

Module 9: Set Up Your Marketing

The ultimate goal of your business is to make a profit. Without any profits, you don’t have a viable business. In order to make a profit you need to make sales, and sales won’t happen unless you market. Marketing is essential to running a successful business, but there are so many different ways to market that you can easily get paralyzed with options. The key is to know what options are out there, and then decide which ones are the best fit for your business.

In this module, you’ll examine the current marketing methods available to you and set up your marketing plan using both online and offline tactics.

Keep Marketing Costs Down

When you’re just starting your business, you probably won’t have much of a budget to dedicate to marketing. The tactics in this section, both online and offline, can be implemented no matter what business you’re running and, more importantly, at a reasonable cost.

With all your marketing efforts, remember what we said about branding in an earlier module: your brand message must be consistent.

Digital Marketing

Digital marketing is an umbrella term for all of your online marketing tactics. It enables you to meet your potential customers where they are on their computers, tablets, smartphones, and other mobile devices.

The way people shop and buy has changed a lot in the Internet age, meaning offline marketing, while still important, isn’t as effective as it used to be.

Businesses need to use digital marketing channels if they don’t want to miss out. Fortunately, if you have any online presence, you’re probably already using some forms of digital marketing.

Your website itself is actually a form of digital marketing. Here are some others:

Blogging
Email marketing
Social media channels (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, etc.)
Digital apps

Digital marketing is increasingly important for all businesses, not just online ones.
The six key benefits of digital marketing are:

It allows engagement with customers in real-time (e.g. using Twitter).
It enables global reach.
Brands can further develop themselves and build relationships with clients.
Messages can be accessed over multiple channels (including PCs, tablets, mobiles).
It is cheaper than traditional marketing.
It creates a level playing field for companies to compete, no matter what size or budget.

Create Your Marketing Presence Online

For most businesses, a website is the obvious place to start their digital marketing.

Even if you primarily use social media and other places for attracting customers, it’s good to have a “home on the web.”

Certainly, you don’t need to spend hours getting a complex, multi-page website up and running. One page is enough to tell people who you are and what you do.

To get started creating your website:

Choose and buy a domain name from GoDaddy, Namecheap or similar.
Find a hosting platform like HostGator or Bluehost.
Choose a template design consistent with your branding.
Add engaging content (e.g. testimonials from former customers if you have them to show site visitors that your business is worth trying).

Once you get your website up and running, you should include its URL everywhere you appear online, including social media profiles.

Blogging

As a new business, you may prefer to start with a blog instead of a website. As part of your content marketing, blogging is a great low-cost way of getting your expertise out there and helping potential customers solve their problems with useful information.

You may already have a blog. If not, set up a blog using a free platform such as Blogger or WordPress. Or, add a blog page to your website (if you have one). Add content regularly to build your brand.

Email Marketing

Building an email list of interested potential customers gives you a solid database to market to.

To start with email marketing, you need an email provider and a sign-up form on your website or blog (or a specially designated opt-in page). Once you’ve built a list, send your subscribers regular content that is helpful and that showcases your expertise.

Free email marketing platforms include:

MailChimp is free for up to 2,000 subscribers.
Mad Mimi is free for 100 contacts.

Some popular paid email marketing platforms are:

Social Media

Nowadays, all businesses need to cultivate a presence on social media. This is great opportunity to engage with your customers and your target market on a daily basis.

Create profiles for your business on the major social media sites appropriate to your audience, (e.g. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest etc.). Post content regularly to engage your followers, (once a day is a good place to start). Use image, video, and audio formats, as well as text. Make sure your profile states clearly what service or product you offer and how to contact you or place an order.

Digital Apps

If you think that mobile apps are solely for big-name brands like Walmart and Bank of America, you might be missing out on a whole world of opportunity. More and more small and midsize businesses are following the mobile trend, understanding that an effective mobile strategy involves more than just a mobile-friendly website.

Many small businesses you interact with in your everyday life have their own dedicated mobile apps — be it the corner coffee shop or the beauty spa downtown. These companies are ahead of the game when it comes to taking their marketing to the next level.

You can spend a fortune getting an app developed, and this may not be for you yet. But with sites like Mobile Roadie, Zoho Creator and others it’s becoming easier to develop your own mobile app at a fraction of the cost of hiring a professional app developer.

Offline Marketing

As important as online marketing is, don’t restrict yourself to only online tactics. You create stronger relationships faster with people you meet in person.

Here are some ideas to get you started with offline marketing:

Events and Meetups related to the services you offer – Look for conferences, exhibitions, trade shows, talks,
Business Groups – E.g. your local chamber of commerce or professional group.
Public Speaking – Find events where you can speak or host your own events.
Demonstrations and Educational Events – For example, an open house or outdoor demo at a park.
Local Media – E.g. newspapers, radio, and TV stations.

If there aren’t many events in your area, try creating your own. Your event doesn’t have to be huge – it just needs to attract the right people and give them something valuable.

Invest in Marketing

Of course, there are many opportunities to pay big bucks for marketing. You can employ a marketing consultant who will do everything under your guidance, but for someone just starting their own business on a tight budget, the investment is probably not worth it.

However, there might be some costs appropriate to your business that warrant investment. For example, if you have a brick-and-mortar business you may want flyers, banners, and posters printed for your store’s grand opening. You also might want to purchase advertising space in newspapers and on local radio and TV.

You can try online advertising networks like Google AdWords, and social media ads on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Whatever you choose, decide on your budget and stick to it. Then, closely monitor the return on investment after the launch.

Get Recommendations

Money can’t buy word of mouth recommendations. There’s nothing more powerful than a friend telling another friend how much they love your business. Studies have shown that word of mouth is more influential than even the best paid advertising.

The buying journey isn’t a straightforward path anymore, as consumers have access to a wide range of information online to consult before buying. They can visit stores before buying online and research online before purchasing in a store.

The Consumer Trends Report 2017 found that 94% of consumers review product ratings online before purchasing an item. People are looking on social media for recommendations, and sites like Amazon to read comments from past customers about you and your products. Positive entries are worth their weight in gold.

Good customer service means you’ll get good reviews, so it’s vital to keep on top of this from the very beginning.

Think about what you could do to generate good reviews, testimonials, and recommendations which will get people talking about you positively.

Outline Your Marketing Plan

Now that you’ve considered a variety of marketing possibilities, you need to create a plan to move forward with your first marketing efforts.

This is where a solid marketing plan comes into play. Your marketing plan lays out how your business will achieve its goals, and hopefully even exceed them. It will help you benchmark your success or failure.

There are some key benefits to creating a marketing plan:

You’ll be clearer on your products, services, audience, and ways to reach that audience.
It will help you decide where to spend your money.
Other people will have a better idea of your marketing approach.
It helps you understand what you need to do, how, and when to best reach your potential customers.

A marketing plan is a work in progress. You will come back and revisit it often, so don’t waste time trying to get every detail perfect right now. Remember, ‘good enough’ is good enough when you’re just getting started.

Here’s a template of a simple 10-point marketing plan that you can use for your own business.

Your Marketing Plan

What’s the reason for my business’s existence?
What sets my business apart from the rest?
Who is my ideal customer?
What’s most important to my ideal customer when they are buying what I’m selling?
What do I want to accomplish in the next 12 months?
What top 3 actions are going to get me there?
How much will each product/service contribute to my revenue/profitability?
What will trigger my ideal customer to think of me?
What strategies will I use to reach my goals?
How much money will I need to get it done? How will I find the budget?

A final point about marketing: Don’t try to do it all.

Start off with just a handful of tactics you can begin implementing right now. For example, if you already have a social media profile, polish it up and use it to find customers.

If you want to do something completely new, like set up a podcast or YouTube channel, you may want to save these for later. Get a few tactics going first, and then gradually add new ones. Monitor closely to see which work and which don’t.

Key Takeaways:

Find ways to generate good reviews, testimonials and recommendations online to get people talking about you and your product/service positively.
Your marketing plan will help you benchmark your success or failure.
Start with a handful of appropriate marketing tactics you can implement right now.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Brainstorm ways you could generate word of mouth advertising.
Go through each of the tactics listed in the module. Ask yourself:

What strategies would be the most useful for my business?
What can I implement now?
What will be effective later on?
1. Use the template in the Action Guide to write your marketing plan.

Module 10: Your Launch Starts Here

You’ve reached this point in the course, so there’s a good chance you’ve decided you want to bring your product or service to market. You’ve defined your niche, your target market, and your MVP. But you may not be quite ready to launch your product yet.

Follow the steps in this module, and you’ll be ready to launch amid excitement and enthusiasm about your new product or service.

Plan Your Launch

You made some choices about marketing strategies in an earlier module. You can certainly use these for the launch.

But you need a plan.

The plan helps you keep on track with your marketing efforts. It will also help keep your stress at bay. If you stick to the plan, you’ll feel in control and be more efficient.

Set the date for your launch and work backwards from there. This way, you have something specific to work towards and the plan will take you there.

Get help with the launch if you can. Then, use project management software like Trello, Asana, or Basecamp to coordinate tasks between you and your team. If you’re doing this on your own, pace yourself and don’t overload with too many tasks.

Think of your launch in three phases:

Pre-launch
Launch
Post -launch

Phase One: Pre–Launch

The purpose of this phase is to tell people about your product or service and get them interested and eager, so that the minute it goes on sale, they buy.

The pre-launch period usually lasts one to two months. Beyond two months, it’s likely to lose momentum and fizzle out before the product launch. Allow yourself this time period and plan the launch date with this in mind. Once you have some launch experience under your belt, you can adjust the timing.

There are quite a few things you can do to ‘build the buzz’ and create excitement during this phase:

Develop an online launch strategy

1. Create a special launch page.

This can be on your website, if you have one, or a blog page or a dedicated “coming soon” page set up using LeadPages, Click funnels, Thrive Themes, Beaver Builder, OptimizePress, or similar. It offers information about the product and may include free informational downloads, a chance to sign up for your list or connect on social media.

Update the page frequently throughout the course of the pre-launch.

2. Tell people about the launch.

Existing customers are the easiest to sell to. Use your email list if you have one or flyers, direct response, or social media to let them know about the launch.
Attract prospects to buy your product/service and become new loyal customers. Refer to your target market and ask yourself where you’re most likely to find these people both online and off, and how you will reach out to them.
If you have some early adopters from any trial phase of your MVP, recruit them as your ambassadors to spread the word about your launch. Give them guidance and everything they need to say and do before, during, and after the launch.

3. Create a Press and Media Plan

You want to build the buzz in the press and media too. Reach out to inform local media about the launch of your product or service.

Traditional ways include:

Publishing press releases which can be distributed offline to local media outlets and also published online in PR directories.
Advertising with local news stations, radio stations, newspapers, trade journals, or magazines.
Appearing at local events and trade conferences and spreading the word. If these are paid for, just remember to stick to your marketing budget.

4. Use social media

When it comes to launch marketing, social media offers an effective and inexpensive solution. That’s why it’s such a popular choice with new businesses. If you’ve already started creating a following on social media, it’s a logical place to build some buzz.

You can do this by creating curiosity across your platforms. Don’t reveal too much at once but just enough so people stay engaged.

Here are a few ways to do this:

Create challenges and competitions with a promise of a suitable incentive
Post photos and videos showcasing what’s going on behind the scenes
Giveaways, g. a chapter of the book, a module from the course, a t-shirt with your logo, or a free sample
Put a countdown timer on your webpages to build anticipation and get people geared up for the launch. This can be a simple, easy-to-install plug-in such as The Countdown Pro or POWr.

Practical tips before the launch

Check your ordering system and that you’ve got enough stock to meet demand.
Test the purchasing system yourself early on and check for problems or out of date plug ins, especially if you’re using an ecommerce system for digital products. Everything must work seamlessly on launch day.
Set up your sales page. This is like your launch page but now it’s designed to sell. You can write your own sales copy or use a template that has already been proven to convert well. For example, LeadPages offers templates ranked by conversion.
Make sure you insert a link in the blog or launch page you’ve been using that goes to this sales page, or redirect the whole page to this page if you’re selling online.

Phase Two – Launch

The launch means finally opening your doors for business, be they physical or virtual doors.

It’s an exciting time, but stick to the plan you made to ensure all goes smoothly.

Keep on marketing in the early days of the launch to boost sales. For example, you might want to give an initial discount, like 50% off, during the first three days, or a bonus free offer. Don’t keep this special offer going for too long though, or it will reduce the urgency to buy.

Collect and use customer feedback in your marketing.

Phase Three – Post-Launch

If all goes according to plan, sales will continue long after launch day.

Your product or service is up and selling, but you can’t sit back and take it easy just yet:

Keep looking for opportunities to promote to new potential customers.
Follow up with your customers so you leverage this first sale for more sales in the future. The customer is now a highly-qualified buyer.
Watch your metrics carefully and see if there’s a correlation between sales and some event or source of traffic.

Put Together Your Plan to Launch Your MVP

We’ve gone through the theory; it’s time to put it into practice.

Think about your MVP and answer these questions:

How ready are you to launch your MVP?
What else needs to happen to get it and you ready for launch?
How will you achieve that?

Choose a launch date. Yes, really!

Give some thought to your process and then complete the launch plan grid in your Action Guide.

Key Takeaways:

Plan your launch carefully one to two months in advance of launch day.
Build the buzz in the press and media to alert people to your upcoming launch.
Use social media as an effective and inexpensive solution to launch marketing costs.

Action Steps:

Quick win: Think about your MVP and answer these questions in the action guide:

How ready are you to launch your MVP?
What else needs to happen to get it and you ready for launch?
How will you achieve that?

Complete the launch plan grid with your planned activities in your Action Guide.

Module 11: Track Your Progress

Now that you’ve got your business up and running and your first launch under your belt, you need to monitor progress and evaluate success. You want to be sure you’re moving forward and achieving your goals.

You can judge this by a gut feeling and by listening to your customers. But to get a more objective and concrete view, it’s important to use metrics to track progress so you can analyze how you’re advancing.

In this module, you’ll learn about the key metrics you need to measure and how to use that data to improve your business.

Know Your Key Metrics

You may be so focused on getting your business to the next level, chasing funding and finding the right talent, that you’re ignoring developing metrics to monitor your success.

But without strategic planning, you’re lost. You can’t plan effectively for the future if you have no frame of reference for where you are now.

Here are the seven key metrics to use as starting points for a new business:

Sales

1. Revenue Run Rate (RRR)

This measures how sales are developing over time. It helps you see how likely you are to hit your forecasts, captures directional trends, picks up patterns (e.g. seasonality), and can tease out potential problems with your pricing strategy.

Calculation:

Take your sales revenue from this month. For quarterly data, multiply by four; for annual data, multiply by 12.

Check this against your sales targets and your marketing plan.

2. Average Revenue Per User (ARPU)

Your ARPU is a measure of a customer’s average spend with you. A rising level means you’re getting more sales from each customer.

Calculation:

Divide the total revenue by the number of customers either in a monthly or annual time period.

That’s just a starting point. An average can’t tell you anything about the quality of your sales. Some customers are more valuable than others. You need to get really granular and look at how sales break down by channel and customer type so you can tease out trends and devote resources to optimizing your income.

Customer

3. Custom Acquisition Cost (CAC)

Your CAC will show you how much it costs you to attract each customer. It’s a good way to monitor how efficient your sales process is.

Calculation:

Pick a specific time period and then divide your cost of marketing and sales by the number of customers you gained. For example, if you spent 1,000 to get 20 customers, your CAC is 50.

A rising CAC can be a sign of trouble, but not if you’ve introduced a new product or service with much higher margins. Like most metrics, CAC can’t be evaluated in a vacuum; it should be evaluated in conjunction with a number of other metrics.

If the proportion of spend to impact is not improving over time, you need to make some changes.

4. Customer Retention Rate (CRR)

This metric evaluates the percentage of customers who stay with you and the percentage who leave over a given time period. It’s particularly relevant if you offer a subscription model, like a monthly membership program or annual service package.

Calculation:

Subtract the number of new customers from your total customers at the end of a given period, then divide that number by the number of customers you started the period with.

For example, if you started the month with 10 customers, gained five new ones, and lost two, the calculation is 13 total customers at the end of the month. Then minus five (new customers in that period) equals eight, divided by 10 equals 0.8, or 80 percent. That means your retention rate is 80 percent – you kept 80 percent of your customers.

The goal is to keep your retention rate as high as possible.

5. Customer Lifetime Value

A good customer is one whose value to your business will grow over time, both through their purchases and use of additional services, and through the quality referrals they provide. Hence, it isn’t just their purchases that you take into account – you also add in the value of their referrals.

Calculation:

Average annual sale to one customer
Annual 5% growth rate*
Projected life span of one customer in years
Direct revenue

N° of referrals per year
Value per referral
Total value of referrals
Add revenue to referral value = Lifetime value

*The growth rate represents an annual increase in your prices (assuming you do raise prices annually).

Here’s an example of how that would work out if the customer stayed with you for 10 years and spent 5000 each year with you.

Average annual sale to one customer	5000
Annual 5% growth rate	250
Projected life span of one customer in years	10
Direct revenue	62889

N° of referrals per year	2
Value per referral	5000
Total value of referrals	10000
Add revenue to referral value =Lifetime value
Lifetime value	72889

You can see that with valuable referrals this customer isn’t just worth 5000 a year to you but almost a whopping 73,000.

For some people, the assumptions in this table will be conservative; for others they may seem exaggerated. It doesn’t matter what the actual figures are, but note the principal so that you think in terms of lifetime value.

Finance

6. Return on Advertising Spending (ROAS)

Advertising spending is an investment and you want it to generate a return.

Calculation:

Divide the sales generated by your advertising spending.

So if you spent 15,000 on advertising that resulted in 30,000 in sales, your ROAS is 2. You generated 2 for every 1 you spent.

You also want to compare the ROAS if you choose to use a variety of channels at once to see which of those channels were most effective.

When you’re starting out and have a limited advertising budget, it’s best to start small.

7. Margin

The bottom line is everything. Before you spend more, make sure your business is where you – or your investors, if you have them – want it to be.

There are many ways to calculate margin, but generally speaking your revenue must exceed your cost of goods sold and your operating expenses (e.g. rent, salaries, fixed costs, etc.)

If it doesn’t, then it’s not the time to increase your spending.

Keep Track of Sales Progress

Don’t turn your back on the figures. You need to plan regular finance meetings.

These could be meetings just with yourself, but schedule them as if they were with your finance director (which might be you).

Weekly review of sales goals
Monthly planner – once a month go through that month’s sales. Are you on track? If not, why not? What changes do you need to make? Who can help you?
Enter your results into a spreadsheet that records annual revenue and expenditure

Key Takeaways:

Monitor these key metrics on a regular basis to keep your revenue goals on track.
Your revenue must exceed your cost of goods sold and your operating expenses.

Action Steps:

Quick Win: Check what’s in your business bank account right now. Is it what you expect? If not, why not?
Choose any of the above metrics that are relevant to your business. Work out the calculation – is it on track with your marketing plan? If not, investigate to find out what’s happened. Put in place 2 measures to correct it.

Module 12: Moving Forward

We’ve reached the last module of the course, so it’s time to ensure that you take care of yourself while on this exciting adventure of starting your own business.

As you move forward, you need certain systems in place so you can plan effectively, save precious time, and reduce unnecessary stress.

In this module, you’ll learn how to accomplish this, as well as how to determine what your next steps should be.

Plan Your Time

One of the biggest problems when you’re starting your own business is that running your business can become all-consuming. In your desire to focus and get things up and running, you spend more and more time on your business and forget the other aspects of your life, including your big “why.”

It’s understandable, and obviously you’ll need to focus to achieve your vision. But make sure you retain a good work/life balance. This is about making sure that you aren’t 100% focused on one aspect of your life all the time.

Here are a few tips to maintain a good work/life balance:

Set yourself sensible working hours and stick to them.
Put important family and social events in your calendar (and don’t forget them).
Outsource where you can.
Reward yourself when you’ve spent a lot of time and energy on one business project.
Get help in the home with children, shopping, cleaning, etc.
Make sure you’re using your energy efficiently. Are you a morning person? Or do you work better later? Does your energy come in bursts or do you work consistently throughout the day?

As Benjamin Franklin famously said, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”

Planning will give you more control over how you spend your time and how you organize yourself. Feeling in control will help you to feel less stressed and more positive about life, which will make you more effective in your business.

Look at the time available to you, even if that isn’t much, and plan how you will use it to achieve the goals you have identified.

Develop a Planning System

Thanks to online tools and mobile apps, it has never been easier to organize all aspects of your business life.

For example, Evernote, Todoist, and Omnifocus are some great apps to help organize your To Do lists.

You need a planning system, and you have to find what works best for you. Apps are great because you can often chart your progress, which is motivating.

But if an app isn’t for you, then a file on your computer or a paper version is just fine.

Here are some quick tips to help you get started immediately:

Daily planning:

Fix a time period for each regular task – for example, 30 minutes per day to read your emails, 30 minutes for Facebook, etc. This will help avoid wasted hours on menial tasks or procrastination.
Turn off alerts which can distract you from planned tasks.
Structure 90 minute periods of focused work when you need to concentrate on something.

Weekly planning throughout the year:

Get a weekly planning chart that you can put up somewhere you see it all the time, e.g. on your bathroom mirror, or beside your computer.
Note down all the action strategies you have decided to take towards your goals.
Regularly tick off actions achieved and add in new ones.

Save Your Time

Automation is key to saving time. One of the easiest ways to be more time-efficient is to automate your accounting and bill payments with something like Quickbooks. This will not only help you save time every month, but it will also protect you from late payments.

But you can automate other systems too by using:

Appointments schedulers like Timify or You Can Book.
Organize and share documents with Dropbox or Google Docs.
Team and project working using Trello or Asana.

Set Goals

Setting clear goals is a way of planning. When you know where you’re headed, you have a better chance of getting there in an organized way.

Setting SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timely) goals can help you to reach your goals more easily.

Here’s a look at each of these aspects:

Specific – Be clear about what you want to achieve
Measurable – Make sure the goal can be measured, and you can recognize if you’ve achieved your goal
Achievable – Check that your goal is something you have the time, money, and resources to meet
Relevant – Ensure your goal is relevant to the direction you want your business to head in, for example, increasing profit, employing more staff, increasing brand awareness
Timely – Set a realistic deadline for completing the goal

Every business sets goals. For established businesses, goals will be set every 12 months, and then at regular intervals in between.

As you’re just starting out in business, you might not feel you can see that far ahead. You already set some revenue goals in an early module, so you’ve got a head start on the important task of goal-setting.

Other goals you may want to set over a given period are things like:

How many customers you want to take on.
How many MVPs you want to sell.
When you aim to be ready to pass from the MVP to a full product launch.

You’ve covered a lot of ground in this course, and you might not have had time to go into detail with everything.

Make sure you review all the modules thoroughly and set goals on the action sheet to flag up actions that you have yet to complete.

Key Takeaways:

Keep balance in your life.
Use planning systems to stay in
Save time by automating processes.

Action Steps:

Quick win: Identify one planning task you need most help with, for example managing to do lists. Find an app and download it to your smart phone now.
Review the course thoroughly and use the action plan in the Action Guide to record your goals and what needs to happen next