Tag Archives: Business plan

Find Your Business Idea Without Reinventing the Wheel

Business_idea_listEntrepreneurs love to take an idea and customize it to the needs of a potential customer. That’s what starting a business is all about, isn’t it? Sure, you can add your own creativity to any concept and market it as a unique selling proposition (USP), but that doesn’t mean you have to reinvent the wheel.

In fact, customizing a concept isn’t a choice; it’s a necessity if you want your business to be successful. All you have to do is find an unserved need in the market, look at its potential to offer something different and fill that gap.

For example, have you ever been charged a late fee for returning a past due rental video? You probably grumbled about paying the late fee, but you paid it anyway. Well, when a video store charged Reed Hastings a $40 fee for the “Apollo 13” DVD because it was six weeks late, he didn’t get mad, he got inspired.

Hastings wondered, “How come movie rentals don’t work like a health club, where, whether you use it a lot or a little, you get charged the same?” It was from this thought that Hastings created Netflix, a flat rate DVD rental-by-mail service. From its start in 1999, Netflix has grown into a big business with revenues topping $1.3 billion.

Finding Your Business Idea Is Only the First Step

How do you go about finding the right idea to start a small business? Begin by listing what you are good at, what you like, what things bother you? What would make your life easier?

Get a piece of paper, make a list and write down the answers to those questions to help inspire your ideas. So it might look like this:

Things I am I good at:

•    Solving problems correctly and effectively

•    Calming people down when they are upset

•    Expressing emotions in ways that build healthy relationships

•    Reading between the lines to understand someone’s real feelings

Things I like to do:

•    Immersing myself in a good story when reading novels

•    Spending quality time with my family and loved ones

•    Playing computer games on my PC

Things that bother me:

•    Finding poor spelling and grammatical mistakes in published books

•    Picking up my dry cleaning

•    Being stuck in traffic jams

Things that would make life easier:

•    Having a personal chef to prepare my dinner

•    Creating a chic capsule wardrobe on a budget

•    Finding a dry cleaner that delivers

Of course, your list will be unique to your talents and pet peeves, but you should start to see themes and ideas emerging. In the above list, for example, opening a call center that provides customer service is one option, starting a fiction editing service is another.

Once you’ve created your list of potential business ideas, focus on the ones that are feasible and weed out the ones that don’t appeal to you. If you are passionate about something, but don’t have the knowledge to turn it into a business, keep it on the list. It’s easier to figure out how to acquire the skills and knowledge to start a service than pursuing something you’re not passionate about.

Settle on the idea that has the most promise and do some market research. If the idea looks promising, move it to the business plan stage.

Source: PressPort: Why Starting a Business Doesn’t Mean Reinventing the Wheel

6 Steps To Finding Your First Business Idea

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Execute Your Idea and Make It Happen



In addition to being risk takers, entrepreneurs share another common trait: a strong desire to implement their business ideas. Their motivation is based on the reality that business ownership can only happen when you put your ideas into practice.

“Execution is what creates the separation,” explains Publicis New York Strategist Keith Stoeckeler in his article, A Great Idea is Nothing Without Proper Execution, which he posted on Ihaveanidea.org. “It shows the drive and passion that exists to make the idea happen and bring it to market,” Stoeckeler adds.

Some entrepreneurs are very good at coming up with big ideas, but fall short when it comes to execution. Why is it such a challenge for them to execute their ideas? Scott Belsky, author of Making Ideas Happen, argues that most entrepreneurs suffer from idea-to-idea syndrome, jumping from one big idea to the next while executing none.

According to Belsky, developing your organizational habits and leadership capability goes a long way towards honing the skills you need to make your ideas happen. That’s why he founded Behance, a firm in New York City that operates a networking Website for creative professionals, and 99U.com, Behance’s research and education unit that takes its name from Thomas Edison’s famous quote: “Genius is 1 percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration.”

Frans Johansson is an entrepreneur and thought leader. In this 99U.com video presentation, he illustrates how relentless trial-and-error – coming up with an idea, executing it on a small-scale, and then refining it – is the distinguishing characteristic of the greatest artists, scientists, and entrepreneurs.

Three guidelines when creating a business plan (from a Tufts University senior).

I recently read a post from Tufts University student and RightofWei blogger Arthur Wei, who shares his Top 3 Thought Provoking News of the Week. One of his news items entitled, Your Idea Isn’t Worth Anything, refers to an Inc.com article that lists 10 questions to ask to determine if your idea is worthwhile.

Arthur takes the article’s premise one step further by saying, “even if you have a business plan, your idea may not be worth anything.” In his post, Arthur writes:

“I think this was one of the biggest pitfalls for me when I studied entrepreneurship. In class projects I was told to come up with business plans that will generate large amounts of revenue and require lots of investing as practice. However, I’ve become disillusioned that these are the plans I, as an entrepreneur, am limited to create. Seth Godin showed me that I, as a college student, instead should follow these three guidelines when creating a plan:

  1. Watch out for business plans that require heavy investing. You’re a college student with no experience.
  2. Create plans that do not require a lot of outsourcing.
  3. Shy away from plans that market to the mainstream masses. Focus on either the early adopters or the laggards.

Business plans never follow through. Sometimes it’s better to start small and to get big.”

Examine Your Own Skills to Find Business Ideas

A love affair with fashion inspires a Singapore duo to start a dressmaking business.

Jade Swee and Letitia Phay, dress designers

Are you interested in starting your own company but worried about where to find a viable business idea? You don’t have to look far. Your skill set may be all the inspiration you need. If your talent is something that is marketable, it could be an opportunity.

Many people are inspired by a life experience that ignites their passion to pursue entrepreneurship. An example of this is Singapore dress-makers and designers, Letitia Phay and Jade Swee, who decided they were so much in love with the art of making a dress that they started their own label, Time Taken to Make a Dress (TTMD).

The two met when they were both working in the same bridal studio, and decided to strike out on their own to try their hands at creating their own designs.

While Swee has a design background, Phay was solely motivated by her love for the craft of making a dress to join the industry after she graduated from school.

In the following excerpt from the article, Time Taken to Make a Difference, OnlineToday.com writer Francis Kan describes what motivated Swee to pursue the idea that spawned a successful clothing company.

At age 13, Ms. Jade Swee made her first dress using her grandmother’s sewing machine, a simple flora print affair for a younger sister. The act of creating something by hand inspired in her not only a love affair with fashion, but a devotion to quality craftsmanship.

That initial spark was fanned by her grandmother, from whom she learned traditional Peranakan crafts such as making beaded slippers.

More than a decade later, Ms Swee, 29, parlayed that passion and several years of working experience into Time Taken to Make a Dress (TTMD), a dressmaking business she set up with partner Letitia Phay, 28, in 2010.

“I used to follow my grandmother everywhere, observing her cooking and sewing. She taught me how to draft by drawing a dress on a newspaper. That was a very big part of how I got my skill even before fashion school,” she told TODAY.

The pair noticed a disturbing lack of attention being paid to the technical aspects of the business; the roll-your-sleeves up, backroom grind of putting together a garment that many young designers shied away from.

Read the full article on TodayOnline.com.

English: Scene of the set up at an Ottawa &quo...

Clothing Company Business Idea

If you’re wondering how to start a clothing company, there are a couple of key questions you need to answer before you get too far into this business.

To get started, you must first decide whether you plan to design and make your own clothing or source your clothes from other designers or wholesalers.

You also must determine whether you plan to operate entirely online, out of a physical retail store, or a combination of both – known as a “brick and click.”

Planning For How to Start a Clothing Company

Most people want to learn how to start a clothing company because they have a passion for fashion and would like to pursue their passion full-time.

Like any other business, learning how to start a clothing company begins with a business plan.

Visit MySmallBiz.com for more details about the business planning and key activities to get your clothing company started.

Business Ideas to Avoid

bad business ideas

Innovation can be a tempting prospect for a newly-minted businessman: the chance to join the ranks of America’s great inventors, the George Washington Carvers, the Eli Whitneys, the Edisons and the Franklins.

After all, the creation of a new product is the ultimate form of going into business for one’s self. Independence, the thrill of trying to establish a brand-new market or capitalize on unexploited sectors; it’s all very alluring.

Consider, however, the difficulties inherent to formulating not just a new product but the marketing methods, permits, patents, and certifications necessary to make it profitable, legal, and appealing to your intended market. This is the stage at which most business plans take a bullet.

Poor planning, insufficient forethought, an inability to cope with the challenges that inevitably arise in any business venture consign many fledgling ideas to early graves.

Be mindful of your idea’s broader implications, consider carefully the steps you’ll have to take to get it off the ground in a timely, above board manner. Keep in mind the unique difficulties associated with novelty and do your best to be prepared to meet them.

Read full story on Noobpreneur.com

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