Mistakes to Avoid When Starting a Business

[imamusma]

Business is basically based on skills. And to be successful in business, you have to go through a long-term process. Because it is not possible to achieve success in business immediately. In addition, there are some challenges in business. There are many who start a business just by looking at others or seeing the success of others without any plan or skills. And when someone starts a business without skills, patience and planning, he fails, loses money or gets impatient and gives up.

It is very misguided for someone to start a business just by looking at others and feeling motivated by them. The most important thing in building your own business is experience. You can start a business without experience, but you must have a mentor who consistently guides and directs you in running it.
Patience is the key to success in building a business, but it must always be accompanied by the ability to spot opportunities and read market competition. In addition, what must always be maintained in business is good relationships with everyone.

[Mate2237]

I must commend you for these tips that you have shared with us concerning starting up a business and running it successful. Starting a business is not the ultimate when it comes to business. What is the most important factor to consider when starting a business is management of the business. For your business to stand the test of time then you must employ a good management system because, you can't remove the place of management in business with anything else.



Having a good book keeping skill is one thing that every business owner should endeavor to have and maintain if they wants to see their business grow and stand. Every money going out and coming in should be documented in the record book. This is important because it will help the business owner to know how the money is been spent and what the money is been used for. Every business should have a record book.

[Cheema02]

Business is basically based on skills. And to be successful in business, you have to go through a long-term process. Because it is not possible to achieve success in business immediately. In addition, there are some challenges in business. There are many who start a business just by looking at others or seeing the success of others without any plan or skills. And when someone starts a business without skills, patience and planning, he fails, loses money or gets impatient and gives up.

It’s true that society often gives a more advantage to those individuals who born in rich families. The individuals who born in rich families have better education, have strong network and have financial support so its easy to avail high level opportunities and easily get the jobs and fame and easily able to stand their own business because of factors that mentioned before. On the other hand if a individual born in poor family then its more difficult for him to get high opportunities and secure job for him because he don't have high network and financial support so if he want success then he need a lot of hard work to secure a job and avail opportunities  because he start with start and step by step reach to success on the other end for a rich individual its easier to avail success than poor individual.

[jaberwock]

It is very misguided for someone to start a business just by looking at others and feeling motivated by them. The most important thing in building your own business is experience. You can start a business without experience, but you must have a mentor who consistently guides and directs you in running it.
Patience is the key to success in building a business, but it must always be accompanied by the ability to spot opportunities and read market competition. In addition, what must always be maintained in business is good relationships with everyone.

Experience is definitely important, there are no people who started a business with zero experience on their own field, and then got great. Don't get me wrong, you could start a spaceship company without ever knowing about spaceships, but you can know leadership and business management, or you can start the best social media company but know coding.

So you have to have experience at something, and doesn't mean you can't be young, you can be young and good at what you do and you can still do it. Most of the time this works a lot more for shops, not online jobs, if you have a shop and you worked at a shop similar before and you saw some missing piece then you can do better. We had a company with my wife, well my entire family, and it didn't work, but I learned so if I do it again, I would do better, that is experience.

[Rockstarguy]

Everything you have written here are all good for someone who's starting a business to emulate. There's only one thing I would like to add to all you have listed above. Something I learnt from my lecturer in the university. He said when starting a business that we should be careful not to spend too much money on things we can get for free. In his word he said don't borrow what you can beg, and don't buy what you can borrow. This helped me when I was starting my business.

Not everyone have the opportunity to beg for money in business and for those who have good friends and relatives,  this has been very helpful to them in their business,  instead to go borrow money thar comes with so much interest they collect from people and after sometime they pay up the money.  I agree with you on this, if anyone can getting opportunity to beg for money in their business,  especially for someone who knows what they are doing.

[7juju]

Everything you have written here are all good for someone who's starting a business to emulate. There's only one thing I would like to add to all you have listed above. Something I learnt from my lecturer in the university. He said when starting a business that we should be careful not to spend too much money on things we can get for free. In his word he said don't borrow what you can beg, and don't buy what you can borrow. This helped me when I was starting my business.

Not everyone have the opportunity to beg for money in business and for those who have good friends and relatives,  this has been very helpful to them in their business,  instead to go borrow money thar comes with so much interest they collect from people and after sometime they pay up the money.  I agree with you on this, if anyone can getting opportunity to beg for money in their business,  especially for someone who knows what they are doing.

It wasn't really about money I was talking about, I was talking about material things that will help you operate your business smoothly. Let's say you needed a refrigerator or a generator set for your business, you don't go and buy a new one when you have a friend or relative that have the one you can get freely by just asking. That money you would have used to buy a new one can be channel into getting more goods for your business. Sometimes getting these materials things from friends and relatives are more easier than getting cash from them.

[Cheema02]

Business is basically based on skills. And to be successful in business, you have to go through a long-term process. Because it is not possible to achieve success in business immediately. In addition, there are some challenges in business. There are many who start a business just by looking at others or seeing the success of others without any plan or skills. And when someone starts a business without skills, patience and planning, he fails, loses money or gets impatient and gives up.

It is very misguided for someone to start a business just by looking at others and feeling motivated by them. The most important thing in building your own business is experience. You can start a business without experience, but you must have a mentor who consistently guides and directs you in running it.
Patience is the key to success in building a business, but it must always be accompanied by the ability to spot opportunities and read market competition. In addition, what must always be maintained in business is good relationships with everyone.

Yes, you are right business depends on strong skills and patience. Many people starts business without having accurate knowledge about it and have not solid skills and lake the idea of strategies of business and except the imidiate profit and success but in reality business works with patterns and has cycle so its take time to run a business and some time we faces lose in business so we should mentally prepare about loss and slow success and have patience. A successful business requires planning, strategy, and the ability to handle challenges that will comes with high skills and have the ability to handle challenges. so the learning point is that if we want success in business we should have skills and patience.

[Distinctin]

Never expect instant profits, and never assume those profits that are still not on your hands yet, that's what I learned from my past experience being a businessman. Know that any business is a total risk, and you can't guarantee that it will immediately boom and bring profits. Instead, just enjoy your business and take the process no matter how it looks a loss when you are still at the beginning. Eventually, people will start to recognize your business and slowly making small but consistent profits, until it increases day by day, and that marks that your business is already working.

[Jody.Drummer]

Good points, and yes, they're all accurate. Another mistake is not starting a business just because you see others succeed, as this can lead to underpreparedness. These people often only see the positive side of success, when behind it lies the struggle of failure. Those who aren't prepared for failure will be shocked and confused about how to handle it. However, those who have considered this before starting a business can overcome it and develop solutions, allowing them to face it more calmly.
This first point, in my opinion, is the one most commonly felt by anyone who wants to start a business. Sometimes they're already afraid before jumping in, making them reluctant to move forward, even though failure is perfectly normal.

[puloweh555]

Business is basically based on skills. And to be successful in business, you have to go through a long-term process. Because it is not possible to achieve success in business immediately. In addition, there are some challenges in business. There are many who start a business just by looking at others or seeing the success of others without any plan or skills. And when someone starts a business without skills, patience and planning, he fails, loses money or gets impatient and gives up.

Skills and opportunities, this combination will make us successful in business. I agree with you when starting a business don't just look at other people's success but rather look holistically. Their success certainly didn't come instantly they achieved it through tenacity and strong determination and of course they also went through the ups and downs of business.

So we need to realize that running a business isn't easy, but we have to try to know the results. It's possible that successful people have gone through ups and downs more than ten times. It's certainly painful but the results they achieve are better than those who don't try.

Furthermore we must also realize that we can't stop the changing times, but we have the ability to adapt to them. Because challenges and change will always be encountered depending on how you respond and deal with them.

[Dunamisx]

Starting a business is very difficult to achieve and maintaining also is another challenge that we must ensure we put things in place for the sustainable growth of what we do, we have a number of businesses that started well but fade along the line and could not afford to exist any longer, because of some internal errors from those operating it, it takes a sound and determined person to run a business successfully to growth level.

[BlackBaron]

Never expect instant profits, and never assume those profits that are still not on your hands yet, that's what I learned from my past experience being a businessman. Know that any business is a total risk, and you can't guarantee that it will immediately boom and bring profits. Instead, just enjoy your business and take the process no matter how it looks a loss when you are still at the beginning. Eventually, people will start to recognize your business and slowly making small but consistent profits, until it increases day by day, and that marks that your business is already working.

Every business venture will have its own risks, but the difference lies in the level of risk. I agree with you that you should never expect instant profits, because if you don't get them, you'll become frustrated and ultimately become pessimistic about your endeavors.

Even people who start their first business start by burning money, meaning they spend more money on promotions and other things. They don't even realize a profit, but they have a clear budget plan and take risks. I myself once opened a small business, and in the beginning, I spent money before I even started.

[Pearl_20]

From everything you listed here is very correct, there's no business that has lasted for some period of time without proper planning. You can't wake up one morning and just decides to go into any business, you've to know what's your niche and also have pre knowledge or possibly have a proper training about it. It's also good to seek guidance from people who has been there before you, their mistakes and how they scaled through, that way it makes things easier.

An entrepreneur is a risk taker which is very true,  but it should be a calculated risk. For a new business you've to gather every information you need so you don't loose money all the time. And another thing is the location of your business,  once you've decided the line of business the next thing is to look for a good space or location for that depending on what you're into.

A young man opened a barbing salon in my street, a place where you rarely see young guys,  just families with their little ones and most of the people around are females who are students, and you can literally see him stay there all day without any customers coming in and I remember telling my sis that he just wasted money renting that shop because the site for the business was a mistake plus no power supply, I recently passed there and noticed he has moved out and the shop is up for rent as well. So choosing the site or location for your business very important.

[Sticky Bomb]

You've really outlined some important points here which is worth noting, however I feel there is a very important point missing and that is Not going for business training/Apprenticeship.

To operate a successful business you need some level of initial training on the business rudiments and this isn't just about attending theoretical trainings but learning under someone who is already made in the business right on the job in either a free or paid internship even if you're the one to pay to be accommodated, get to experience the business proper and immerse yourself into the process by asking questions and being very observant.

It is important to serve a master for at least 6 months before you can go start your own and still reference to your master for consultations in the event you kick off full operations. Starting a business without training is taking a faulty car on a long journey

[Royal Cap]

Every business venture will have its own risks, but the difference lies in the level of risk. I agree with you that you should never expect instant profits, because if you don't get them, you'll become frustrated and ultimately become pessimistic about your endeavors.

Even people who start their first business start by burning money, meaning they spend more money on promotions and other things. They don't even realize a profit, but they have a clear budget plan and take risks. I myself once opened a small business, and in the beginning, I spent money before I even started.

I see it a little differently I think that just being patient and not expecting profits is not enough people need to be mentally prepared for an uncertain time at the beginning. Because when you start a business you are not only investing money but also your time, energy and personal responsibility. So it is natural to be disappointed if there is no profit. Not everyone can handle that pressure, In my opinion business survives not only on patience but on the ability to make the right changes at the right time. So just as it is necessary to reduce the expectation of profits, it is also not right to wait blindly.

[iv4n]

In starting a business, alot of factors need to be looked into for one to have a smooth and successful running business.

As you said, a lot of factors need to be considered... With that said, you listed just a "few" of them, and all of them are some basic business advice, but where are the other important things, like balancing all that with your life, or doing that with a low budget?

Every business is unique in some way... therefore, it's hard to find a "universal" guide because there are factors that are different for all of us. But your first advice is smart and connected with everything we do:

👉👉Being afraid to fail
Failure is a key to your success, and jumping into your fear is very positive for your future business. How you pick up after failure and learn from your mistakes is the key to great success.

We make mistakes, we fail here & there, but we learn from all that... and they teach us how to stand up after we fall. That's an important thing, sometimes it's hard to make it from one or two tries... eh, some fail a lot of times before they find what really works for them.

[Donk1]

You have said it all OP, because to me me it's said that in a business you must be strong minded don't n't let the fact that customers are always right  lead your business down the drain, it's easy to say that we learn every day especially from our mistakes. Most times, you don't even have to make a mistake before you learn your lesson. That's why as a businessman or woman you must be sharp ,your mindset must be focused on financial productivity, planning, and new ideas for your business.furthermore  in a business you must have customers but do not let your customers become too close to you to the extent they can buy things for credit and not pay for over a year. And out of the fact that you are friends you would be scared to ask for your money no that's indeed a wrong mindset. That's just it: Before you start a business to me, you must be prepared for every step you take is a step to your financial success......

[rachael9385]

Good points, expanding on the the point you made about not employing the wrong people, this is actually very important because I've witnessed first hand how an empire build by someone crumbled because the business owner employed people based on sentiments and by that I mean, he didn't focus more on the growth of the business, proper scrutiny was conducted because he thought there was no need because he knew them closely. Skills, competence and professionalism are the top requirements

[Creeper0]

There should be two types of plans in a business plan. One is to increase the scope of the business and increase the value. The other is to control the risk or avoid losses.

To increase the scope of the business, you should always rely on creativity and think about the benefits of the buyer. Never take full advantage of the profit and leave it entirely in the business. Take 3/4 of it and invest 1/2 in the business.

To avoid losses, stop lending to buyers or try to reduce it as much as possible. Because the main loss of the business comes from here. Always try to reduce expenses as much as possible.

[Hypnosis00]

Being afraid to fail

Having this means that you don't want to do business. That's why many stays in employment and that's still just fine for them. And from the very start, you're not going to start any business at all because what sets your mind automatically is you're going to fail so, it's not actually a mistake but it's a human nature that gives us that fear to do business and so, if someone thinks that he's going to fail if he starts a business. That's because of fear and I think many businessmen were able to overcome this and with the little fear that remains there, it will make you see what you think of yourself. So, take the risk, and let it go and just do your business.

Being afraid to fail is actually normal, most especially if you are new to that kind of business. However, instead of seeing it as a negative outlook, why not use it as a motivation to keep thriving in your business so that there'll be no place for failure. Although I have to admit that all kinds of business are prone to failure, but that is if you never make the best to make your business works and clicks in the market.

Its normal to have that kind of feeling, but its not normal for any business owner to assume failure first even if he hasn't started working on his business.