How do you build up a company properly? First and foremost, it is important to understand which success factors are crucial in the initial phase of a business start-up and how the economic and psychological mechanisms behind it work.
For this reason, in this article we want to look at the most common mistakes made by start-ups and how best to avoid them.
- take advantage of support
Starting a business on your own is a difficult task. There are so many things to think about and decide. Overextending yourself can quickly lead to wrong decisions, which in turn can set you back. Therefore, it is always advisable not to be on your own when starting a business. Help from friends and colleagues can be extremely helpful.
In addition, working on several tasks at the same time takes both time and energy. This often leads to losing focus. Therefore, it is helpful to prioritise tasks effectively and also to delegate them. This way you can concentrate on the important things.
2 Good planning is half the battle
The first step in starting a business is to develop a good business model. This serves as a guide and helps to set the direction of the business over a period of time. The business plan together with the financial and marketing plan helps startups answer the following questions:
What is the goal of the business? Who are the potential customers? What are the company’s mission and values? How can the company measure success?
In other words, a solid business plan determines almost all aspects of a startup.
nextexitfuture helps you find your way by reviewing your business model and, if necessary, using creative methods to think outside the box and develop new ideas. We support you in all essential processes (e.g. business plan preparation, organisational matters) and can also accompany you in the form of coaching.
- focus on goals
In order to build up a business successfully, you need goals that you can tackle step by step. It is important that these goals have certain characteristics: They should be specific, measurable, attractive, realistic and timed (SMART). This helps to understand and identify where you want to go and outlines the specific steps needed to get there.
If you don’t have goals yet, the first step is to sit down and figure out exactly what you want to achieve. Once you have identified your goals, write down the criteria that you can use to make an informed decision about whether you have achieved that goal.
4 Working with KPIs
KPI is an abbreviation for “Key Performance Indicator”. This term refers to certain key performance indicators that reflect the performance of your business. If you spend time and money to improve your business but do not track what works and what does not, there is a high risk that your efforts will be in vain. Therefore, it is important to identify metrics that indicate you are moving in the right direction. The goals you choose will help you determine the right KPIs to look out for.
nextexitfuture can help you set up your KPI and improve operational excellence.
- time management
We all understand the importance of planning and meeting deadlines. It is important to be practical and realistic in doing so. For example, following “Parkinson’s Law” can help. It says that every task takes as long as there is time available. This means that one should determine in advance how much time one wants to take for a certain task.
So the time limit is crucial and the deadline must not be pushed back. Based on these constraints, you and your team members need to decide what priorities should be set.
- best practices
In your organisation, teams, systems and strategy need to be developed and built. Transparency is crucial in this process. This means breaking down silos, communicating effectively, testing and keeping track. Define processes so that everything runs smoothly. It is also necessary to document these processes to avoid misunderstandings.
The employees are the core in your company. Talented and motivated employees can have a significant positive impact on the success of the company.
nextexitfuture can accompany your company into the digital world – we work with innovative methods that allow each company to go its own way.
- know who your ideal customer is.
Often a founder assumes that someone has a need for their product or service. However, the founder usually does not know themselves exactly who their target audience actually is.
So before starting a business, the target market should be clearly defined. This requires a proper investigation of the market. Research and check whether your offers are viable and attractive. When starting a business, both primary and secondary sources are helpful in identifying ideal clients and hiring the right talent to drive your vision.
The survey services of nextexitfuture can help you to segregate your target audience.
- analytics
Talk to your customers – not engaging with your customers and simply guessing what they want from your business is slow suicide. You need to reach out to your customers and document their responses.
Set up detailed analytics – build a system that measures satisfaction and desires of your customers and evaluates them according to certain criteria. If your product has users, track things like daily active users, monthly active users, churn rate, button clicks, etc. It is important to track and understand the usage of your product / service.
- do not neglect any part of the business
Building a business involves many activities such as marketing, sales, operations, delivery, etc. Businesses depend on continuity to function and make decisions. It is important to be active in all areas in parallel, not to think of it as a sequential process. Slowing down can lead to losing the potential customer and thus losing the customer to the competitor.
