CHAPTER SEVEN | WHAT’S NEXT?
I am going to leave you with some success nuggets I am sure they will make profound impact in your business. You need some of the nuggets right now. Some of them will be needed a few years down the road.
Success is a journey, not a destination. You need to keep working at it for the rest of your life.
Some of these nuggets will come in useful to you in years to come.
Nugget One: Start Now and Start Small
If you want to do business, I have an advice for you. Move your lazy ass and start NOW. Yes. This very moment. Not in the next hour. Not later in the day. Not tomorrow. I mean now.
Success experts agree that one of the secrets to achieving success is to develop a speed of implementation mindset. When you implement your ideas as quickly as possible, you stand a better chance of achieving them. If you do
not implement them immediately, other life issues might get in the way and you end up procrastinating forever.
When you have a dream or an idea about something, you have to get up immediately to do something about it.
Capital is not an issue. If the kind of business you need to do requires money you cannot afford, I suggest you start it in a way that does not require much money or do something else that does not require much capital. When you
start making money with that, you can use it to fund your dream business.
It is good to start small. When you make mistakes, your mistakes will be small. Adequate capital can be a curse.
Capital is important but it is not the only thing.
In this day and age where we have got awesome technology online for free, starting something profitable does not need to cost money.
It is all about the attitude. Not the capital. You need to start today. No matter what. If you don’t start today, when tomorrow comes, you will regret not starting yesterday.
Except you die, the years will still roll by. If you say you are thirty years of age today and you don’t want to go for that five year course because you will be thirty five by the time you finish, I have news for you. You will be thirty five in five years whether you go for that course or not.
The best time to plant an iroko tree was twenty years ago. The next best time is NOW!
Nugget Two: Plough Back
When you start to make money in your small business, please put it back into the business. Don’t be tempted to spend it. No matter what is happening, DO NOT spend it. It does not matter if there is an earthquake. Do not touch it.
It is tempting to spend money. It is easy to spend money.
Do not spend it. If you spend it, do not blame anybody when you fail. Don’t blame the economy. Blame yourself.
You have to build your business no matter what it takes even if you have to go hungry for some days. When you have a business that is bringing in money, use the money to re-invest in the business. Use it for more direct response
advertising. Use it for top notch customer service. Use it for better products. Use it for the business. Not for yourself.
Nugget Three: Don’t Build Another Business…Yet
If you start ten businesses, maybe only one or two would succeed. About six will fail outrightly. Then you will have about two that will just hang in there.
Think about the most successful entrepreneurs out there. They have had more failures than successes. The good thing is that once you succeed in one, it covers up for your failures.
When you find yourself in a profitable business, by all means, stay on course. Don’t start feeling invincible. Don’t start another business yet. If you start another business, you will get distracted and it will affect your initial
business.
When you start to succeed, people will come with other business opportunities. People will come to you with opportunities in oil and gas, real estate, agriculture and others. Some of them will be genuine opportunities while most of them will be dud.
A lot of those opportunities will take you nowhere.
Stop envying what other people are doing in their industry. Stay in your industry and make as much money as you can.
Before you build another business, why don’t you look at other opportunities within your business and within your industry in general.
For instance, if there is a particular tool you use a lot in your business why don’t you start a side business selling that tool?
Maybe you are a motor mechanic, why don’t you start a mini car parts and accessories business. You will still be in the car business that way. Maybe you can create an information tutorial on basic car repairs and sell this information. You are still within your industry.
Here is what I’m saying:
Firstly, don’t be too much in a hurry to start another business.
Secondly, remember how you star ted small. Do not rush into splashing too much cash into the new venture.
Do not take all the money you are making in the first business into the second even if the second business is your dream business. I know we all have our dream businesses but at the end of the day, it is the money you make that matters. Treat the business that makes you the money very well.
Thirdly, learn about the new business you want to go into very well. Learn as much as you can.
Fourthly, hire an ambitious, smart and enthusiastic person to manage the business. You cannot run more than a business on your own.
Nugget Four: Go Online
In the near future, there will be two kinds of businesses. Those going online and those going out of business. - Bill Gates.
There is hardly any successful business out there that does not have an online presence. It is either you are a full online business or you are an offline business with an online presence. Whatever you are doing, you must be on the Internet.
One of the ways of taking your business online is to have a website showcasing what you are doing. Your website can be a lead generation tool where you are building a list of potential customers or depending on what you are selling you can start selling directly to your customers.
You can also use your website as portal for educating people about your products and also to establish yourself as an authority in your industry.
Another way is through Social Media. Have a personal social media page and a business one. Separate them.
Be careful when you are marketing with social media. Do not go around posting your ads on people’s pages. That is very wrong. Build your own audience with quality content and then market to them.
You have to be online. There is no other way around it.
Nugget Five: Learn How To Keep Money
One wise man once told me that it is not about how much money you make but how much money you keep. That is a very important statement. It doesn’t make sense to make all the money in the world and lose it all.
You have to be very vigilant because it is so easy to lose money. Earning money is hard but losing it is easy. You have to be on the alert because people and organizations will try to take money off you.
Do not pay more that you are meant to pay.
Thieves will also try to take money off you. The thieves will always go to where the money is. You have to be on high alert. People will try to steal from you. Sometimes they will succeed but be on high alert so it can be minimal.
You have to be security conscious. Be very careful of who you trust with your money and your information. You don’t know who is talking to whom. Keep most of your information private.
Another group of people that will take money off you is those in need. Now, out of all the groups of people that will take money off you, this is the most difficult to handle.
You see, when you start to make money, people and organizations will come out to ask you for money. They will come with genuine reasons.
What do you do? where do you draw the line?
You cannot keep giving without caution. You will go broke doing it. You have to do it with caution. Here is what I recommend.
Calculate your profits/earnings and then give out a fixed percentage every month. Most religions suggest giving a minimum of 10% to God. I believe 50% is great. 50% after taking care of basic living expenses. Food on your table. Shelter over your head and clothes on your body.
Don’t spend all your business money trying to help. When it finishes, there will still be many unsolved problems in the world. Be very careful.
Finally, do not keep too much cash lying around. Cash is not a good investment.
It makes more sense keeping and growing your money in something more stable. Real estate, gold, treasury bills are some solid ways you can keep your money.
Remember, It is not about how much money you make but how much money you keep…and grow.
Nugget Six: Never Close Your Business To Customers
You can rest, but you cannot allow YOUR BUSINESS to rest. Human beings should rest, businesses should not rest.
It does not make sense to SHUT DOWN YOUR BUSINESS. That is the mindset you should have.
Find a way you will always open so customers can reach you even if for skeletal services.
Nugget Seven: You Need a Push
We all need a push in our lives. Firstly, we need to learn how to push ourselves. We need to learn how to set and achieve new targets. We need to know we cannot rest on our laurels.
Secondly we need to surround ourselves with people that can push us. Select your friends carefully.
You need a push. Now, go out there and WIN. There is no prize for second place.
WIN! WIN!! WIN!!!
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