So in the last post, Self-Employment: Do You Have What It Takes? I introduced the topic and discussed a bit about what it really takes to be a successful entrepreneur. Now here are 8 traits that many of those who are successfully self-employed share in common… let’s see how you rank. Make sure to leave your comments in the box below and subscribe to my RSS feed to keep up with new posts.
8 Traits of Successful Entrepreneurs:
Sure, self-employment sounds glamorous. You envision working for yourself, ditching the grind of a J.O.B., making oodles of cash, and doing it all in just one day a week! But the reality isn’t quite so glamorous, nor is it achieved in working just one day a week. At least not when you start out at any rate! Unless you’ve had a different experience than me? If so do share! 🙂
The reality is that being self-employed really takes a special kind of person. It takes someone who is dedicated, motivated, and disciplined or is at least is all three of those things the majority of the time.
Pass out flyers at your local mall.
3. Place your biz cards under windshield wipers at your local Walmart.
4. Pass out business ‘buttons’ to everyone you meet.
5. Hand out pens to people you meet.
6. Create simple welcome gifts to give to newcomers with your
Your next freelance copywriting client could be worth $1,000 to you. Or it could be worth $10,000 or more.
It’s up to you.
No, it isn’t the luck of the draw. No, it isn’t about the economy. No it isn’t about competition from other freelancers.
If you think the value of your next freelance assignment is determined by external factors, you’re just making excuses. It is determined by you.
Alpha freelancers have a plan. They know where they are going. They have a goal and a set of waypoints to reach between where they are now, and where they want to get to.
Having a plan, and a goal in mind, means that every action they take is considered and deliberate. They don’t accept assignments that happen to come along. They seek out assignments that will help them achieve their goals.
If you’re a small business or providing a service, then in reality Wal-Mart is the antithesis of what you should be doing. Think about it. Wal-Mart doesn’t stay in business by providing quality services or even by keeping the customer happy.
If you’re a small biz owner struggling to make a profit, you know that competing with the big dogs is usually a no-win situation. Wal-Mart has an obvious advantage over your local ma and pop shops. The huge chain gets drastic discounts from vendors, can afford to sell for little to zero markup and makes their money based purely on volume.
This applies to online businesses as well. If you are selling any merchandise online you are going to have to contend with giants like Amazon and Ebay whether you like it or not.
If you are running a small business, YOU are the business. Even if you’re actually selling a product, what you’re really selling is yourself and your service. So how do you sell yourself? Legally that is? 🙂
First of all, be accessible. Set up your business so that your clients can contact you, personally. Doesn’t have to be a phone number, but email access is great. Have a website, check (and respond to) e-mail, create a Facebook page and a Twitter account.
Given the inherently impersonal nature of the Internet, it is even more important to give your clients legitimate ways to reach you since the likelihood is high that you will never meet face to face. Let your online persona match your business, but also let it match your real-life personality. Skype is also an excellent method of contact, and building out your LinkedIn profile increases your credibility as well.
This is the final piece in this 3 Part series, courtesy of Alex Genadinik. Here is Part 1 and Part 2 if you need to catch up.
Introducing: Guest blogger and fellow Tweep Alex. Alex has a background in software engineering and is currently focused on building semantic systems for the business world. He is the founder of Semantic Valley, a web 3.0 start-up specializing in creating taxonomy and ontology based products. Their alpha-stage demo of a semantic search of shoes can be seen at MilderWilder.com. Say hello on Twitter too! @genadinik
Are Some Things Impossible to Do for Free?
Legal Documents
At some point, a company needs patents, trademarks, copyrights, operating agreements and equity-vesting schedule documents. There are at least two options on how to get these for free.
You can barter. Some lawyers will work for equity, but this is my least favorite method because the documents listed above require an intellectual property lawyer, a general business lawyer, and likely along the way, you will need a few other types of lawyers. Typically, the fewer equity holders you have the better.
My favorite approach is to D.I.Y (Do It Yourself). Make sure you only create the documents you really need. A lawyer might write up a 50-page partnership agreement that will take tens of hours and cost tens of thousands of dollars, but it is much easier to work with partners you can trust and be able to write a simple document that covers the basics and allows you to move on and focus on running the actual business.
Office Space
There is some debate in the bootstrapping world about whether to have an office or not. I would say it is much better to not have an office. Don’t make your partners waste time, money and stress tolerance on commuting. Why not use those to work on the actual company?! And when there have to be meetings, just get creative and find what works.
Holding Meetings
Get used to online meetings using Skype video chat, and other remote conferencing software. It will help you avoid trekking down to the local Starbucks and more importantly, open you up to working and collaborating with people anywhere in the world.
Registering Domain Names
This is one area where you have to pay a little. A domain name costs about $10/year. I realize nearly all the good domain names are taken. My advice is that instead of going out and buying a $1,000 domain name, hold out on buying a domain name for your company until you have at least a somewhat clear marketing and branding strategy. Once do you do decide to look for a domain name, here are some good qualities of a name you should look for:
If you’ve been following along, you will see that we’re now on Part 3 in this “Copywriting Rules” series of articles.
Throughout these articles, we’ve gone through several important copywriting rules. To reiterate, these rules were:
* Set out writing to one person.
* Use your prospect’s language.
* Use emotion.
* Time’s ticking, make sure you keep their attention.
* Make the copy visually compelling.
Now we’re going to go through even more rules you should know about in making the best possible piece of sales copy.
Rule #6: Make it easy for people to buy.
Don’t give your readers a reason to say no. Remove as much risk as you possibly can. You can do this in a few ways, with the most obvious being a secure guarantee.
Many copywriters find that the more outrageous and secure the guarantee, the better the conversions. The ironic part, though, is that the longer the guarantee period, the less refunds a company usually gets.
This could be because most people put off putting things back until “later”, whereas they have a sense of urgency with a shorter guarantee period.
Whatever the reason, a strong guarantee makes it hard for your prospect to say no. If you tell them that if they don’t like your product they can get their money back, they have no reason to object. They have absolutely nothing to lose by trying your product out.
On the other hand, if they have to take on a lot of risk, they’re going to be more apprehensive about buying. In this Internet age, a lot of people are nervous about being scammed. If you haven’t yet done business with a prospect, they’re going to be wary – and rightfully so.
Don’t give them any reason to turn you away.
Rule #7: Use scarcity.
Like we mentioned earlier, people are quick to put things off until the elusive “later”. By using scarcity, you will force people into moving NOW.
You probably see this in action all the time. Department stores use sales to get people to buy by a certain time. Infomercials will give you an extra widget if you order “in the next 5 minutes!”. High-end automobile manufacturers only have “x” amount of limited editions for certain cars.
There are several ways in which you can implement scarcity. You can:
* Limit your product or service to “x” amount of people
* Only give special pricing to “x” amount of people
* Have a special deal/coupon for people who order by “x” date
All of these things are designed to make people move quickly, thinking that they’ll “lose out” if they don’t.
It’s important to remember that whatever scarcity tactic you choose to employ, that you make sure to honor and uphold that. Lying one time may get you sales the first time, but it can severely damage your ability to make more sales down the road.
OK, so just to be clear, I’m a huge believer in faith, the power of positive thinking, and that yes, miracles do happen. So I’m not knocking any of those things, or the power that hope can have in a person’s life and their perceptions of the world. That doesn’t mean I’m going to leave my livelihood up to those things. C’mon, a girl’s gotta eat! And shop, and hang with friends, and go see cool movies and… oh sorry… I get a little carried away at times. 🙂
So, hope is great, but it’s definitely not a business strategy. If you are going into business for yourself, you at the very least need a loose ‘business plan’ with a few key goals outlined in order to see any kind of success. After all, if you don’t have a direction or a purpose, what’s the point? You’re essentially just spinning your wheels, slinging mud, and not going anywhere.
