One year of my Start-up… Bunch of learnings in life

After completion of this one year, there are lots of new learnings which I want to share here, hope it may helpful for new entrepreneurs.

• Start with minimum investments (We started with Rs. 150,000 only, around $2200)

• Never try to start a business from home, as professional environment is necessary

• Try to find out some shared space to start working in minimum investment

• Co-owing service staff i.e. office boy is a good idea, also save your basic monthly expenditures.

• Focus to get new projects; work yourself as sales staff at initial level. Treat yourself as a fresher and start working from scratch. We decided to offer our services in web & mobile development, designing, so I decided to take every single person, every shops, showrooms, restaurants, hotels, companies etc. as my prospect. Being a sales person I never hesitate to speak to anyone regarding my services.

• Speak with your contacts regarding your services

• Precise your sales pitch so that in short you can tell a lot & prospect can understand easily.

• Don’t try to sell your services, offer them a resolution of their problem.

• Showcase your achievements & present some good case studies.

• Use professional services for your recruitments (It will really save your time, cost, effort & finally give you a big peace of mind also)

• As a start-up choose candidate wisely (not in terms of long stay commitment, as you can’t bid to any one for their stay with you in your company), especially in terms of handling your projects.

• A smart & knowledgable candidate will help you to manage your project wisely & you definitely have enough time for operations.

• Management is a big point for a company, focused on operation part.

• Make your company sales centric & hire some really good sales persons. Don’t think that even just after 2 to 3 project lined up you will be able to manage sale & operations simultaneously alone (Never Possible & you end up with no deal, no show in just after few projects).

• Try to make your staff happy, as your staffs are your family now in start-ups. You might sitting adjacent to all your staff, never pinch regularly or concentrate on their works whole day, leave them free and try to realize them that you are not their BOSS; you are also an employee as similar to them.

• Hire a tele caller should also be your priority (if you are in market to sell or promote something)

• If you are a technology company, Always prefer to have a tech guy during visit to your clients/prospects. It always gives a good impression on client & also resolves all technical queries immediately, which increase your chances to win project.

• Join as much events as you can join.

• Never think twice in free promotional activities on social media or any other mode.

• Try to do some budgeting also for initial level of marketing i.e. AdWords, SEO etc.

• Focus on your web presence i.e. Website & update time to time

• Primary focus always is on earning not on funding.

• Try to nourish yourself by multiple business involvement or try to start working on multiple projects /business ideas in same time, for stability. 

Please provide your valuable feedback.