Tag Archives: small business ideas

The Real Barriers to Starting a Successful Small Business

I’ve lost count of the number of people I know or have met who have a major talent that they could “bottle up and sell.” 90 percent of the time they are also very unhappy in their current jobs.

Business Woman
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“Why not start your own side or small business?” I ask.

Here are the most common answers I receive:

– I don’t have the money to invest
– My job takes up too much of my time / too tired
– I don’t know how or where to start

But I have a theory.

The real reasons behind why most people don’t start up a small business are:

– lack of motivation
– lack of inspiration
– lack of knowledge (self-education)

Somewhere along the way you got the idea that the only way you could ever make money is to work for another person. Maybe it was your family pushing you toward a particular “way” of living life. Maybe it was college indoctrination where you and your peers are taught to compete for the best jobs. Maybe it’s just a limiting belief that you have about your skills, talents and ability to make or manage money.

But the truth is that anyone can start a successful small business — even if it’s just something you do on the side for the time being. It’s about offering value to the world — when you do that consistently and reliably they give you value in return.

Here’s what you really need to get started:
– the Knowledge/Know-how (self-educating yourself on the type of business you’d like to run, marketing, communication, how to use technology like social media to your advantage)

Inspiration (the idea, the innovation, the thing that gives you butterflies when you think about it)

Motivation (a push in the right direction)

K.I.M. for short. Keep it moving.

So this start up a small business website is mainly targeted at resolving those three barriers to starting a successful small business.

You have the basic steps outlined, conveniently to the left (see that nice little menu over there?) — that list alone can help you start forming your business plan. But you also need help with motivation, inspiration and self-education to start your own successful small business.

So subscribe to our posts below or sign up for the email list for updates, advice and tips.

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About the Author:

Louise Gaillard is a prolific writer, marketing consultant and author writing about small business, marketing and social media success.

3 Totally Doable Small Business Ideas

A lot of people hesitate to start a business because they think they need to invest a whole lot of money and time to get it going. Not so, thanks mostly to the Internet and social media, there are plenty of options for starting a business with a minimal investment. Here are 3 totally doable small business ideas to get your creative juices flowing.

Get Crafty

In the past, the only people who benefited from your creative crafts were your mom and maybe your cat, but now thanks to sites like Etsy, Zazzle and Cafepress you can get “crafty” and make some money in the process. You can sell your creations on a highly trafficked site that gets a lot of attention from the public. A lot of online craft sellers promote their creations on Twitter and other social media sites… and yes, they sometimes make a nice bit of change doing it.

So get crafty and have some fun making some really cute jewelry, home décor, clothes and other items from scratch.

Your investment: the costs associated with the site, which usually include a small listing fee and a percentage of each sale, so yea, basically not much at all. Oh and the investment of your time spending your weekends making beautiful crafts (as if that’s some type of chore! Have some fun with it).

Time for Your Close-Up – Start a YouTube Business

You may be surprised to learn how many people make a nice living from YouTube. With this totally doable small business idea you make money by posting videos that provide information, tips, advice, funny content and other things that people really want to see online. So how do you make money? Google has a program called Adsense where you can run ads besides your videos and make cold hard cash every time someone clicks to your page.

Your investment: the cost of a really good camera (a web camera works) and 1+ hour per day recording videos for posting.

Start a Flourishing Business – $5 at a Time

Another totally doable small business idea for entrepreneurs young and older who are just getting started out is to start a Fiverr business. If you’re not familiar, it’s a site where people can post what are called “gigs” – a service like writing, translation or design – for $5 per gig. You can also sell products on the website, it’s totally awesome and easy to use. There are plenty of resourceful people who have built thriving “Fiverr” based businesses earning a living on the site.

Your investment: none (besides the $1 fee for each completed gig) and your time investment providing the service.

So as you can see despite popular belief, there are ways to start a business without having to invest your life savings or work yourself into the ground. Have some fun with it and remember that when you do what you love, people can tell and they will buy from you. Get started today!



Starting up a small business, even if it's just on the side, is no longer an option -- it's a necessity. Why? Because everyone needs an additional source of income in our new economy. Click here to sign up for educational and motivational posts to keep you on track.

How to Find Your Talent – Your Calling

What is your calling in life? How do you find your talent — the one thing that you have a knack for that could make you a lot of money if you set up a proper system to sell it?

But to be clear, when I ask the question, “what is your calling?” I’m not just asking what you’re good at. Everyone has skills in one area or another, but just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean that it’s your calling. You might be good at copying papers, but do you really want to copy papers for a living?

When I ask “what is your calling” I’m asking what do you LOVE to do. That’s what it comes down to — you have to love what you do first and foremost. You can always learn and refine your skills as time goes on.

So what do you love doing? How can you make money from it? Here are a few suggestions for brainstorming and coming up with a good idea:

  1. Take a trip back to your childhood. In elementary school I wrote a little book in one of those small white hard covered books where you can draw a picture on the cover) and also won 2nd place in a statewide poetry content. It wasn’t until 15+ years later that I realized I loved to write and could make a living from it. Think back to what you loved to do when you were a child but may have stopped doing because someone told you you had to be a “grown up” now.
  2. Ask yourself, what would you do even if you weren’t getting paid for it? What are you passionate about? What makes your heart flutter when you even think about doing it?
  3. What do you do on your free time that you really enjoy? Golf? Tennis? Are you the grill master on weekends? Do you love to snowboard? Reading? Start off with your hobbies, activities that you’re knowledgeable about, and then think of innovative products, services that you can sell to other people who have the same interests. Maybe even an online store selling the best stuff or an informational blog on the subject that earns money from clicks.

Start off with these ideas to find your talent. You might have to try a few things until something takes off. If you have to keep working in the meanwhile, no problem; do that, and use your nights and weekends to work on your new business idea.

Whatever you do, don’t give up! Keep pushing forward until you find your calling and can finally say that you love what you do for a living.

 



Starting up a small business, even if it's just on the side, is no longer an option -- it's a necessity. Why? Because everyone needs an additional source of income in our new economy. Click here to sign up for educational and motivational posts to keep you on track.