BUILDING AND SCALING A SOLE PROPRIETORSHIP

Prior to a commencing stage of your self-employment scheme, first of all, it is imperative that you need to figure out beforehand how the business operation and the scale of entrepreneurship of yours will take place. This is because without a proper business plan, there is a higher risk of business debacle you will encounter, since you are not prepared enough to go into a battle field and you do not have a solid business plan to prevail over your future competitors. For this purpose, below here are some of the little guidelines which I hope they can help you make any firm decisions of what you should consider before embarking onto your keen business venture:

a. Set your preferable business industry

You have to decide in advance what sort of business area you are keen to engage yourself in. By principle, several industrialized areas can be categorised as follows:

1. The business sectors which are rarely preyed by competitors. Perhaps, you may start looking for an industry which does not engage a fierce competition where a business has probably not existed yet, or is still regarded as something rare.

2. The business sectors which have long existed in a market. In case if you seem incapable of executing the above first option, you may also identify and look for a business which has already been established by others despite the fact that there are still many people who are reluctant to do so. For example, many women hesitate to open their own boutique stores merely because they fear of competing with others in the fashion industry. Well, it might not be a major issue if you have stood up firmly in selling clothes which possess some unique and distinctive features against your competitors.

b. Specify your business location

You need to ask yourself where will be the location of your business headquarter. Will you plan to run it at home, operating in a small rented office space, or renting a shop? For your reference, location does play a significant role for businesses to succeed. Therefore, this is something which must be taken into account carefully and you must decide what would be the right location for your future planned business.

c. Analyse your target customers

Once you have successfully determined your business spot, then here comes another vital aspect which is how you will attract some future customers. As in if your business is focusing on a service delivery, how will you invite your very first potential clients? Do you intend to promote your business through word of mouth? Or hiring a few advertising agencies? As you can see, there are so many roads to run a preliminary introduction of your chosen business. Since you are the captain of your ship, you have full discretion and absolute authorities to encompass your promotional activities over your business product.

d. Stipulate the total number of your manpower

How many people will you employ? Is it just you on your own or do you intend to hire a handful number of people to help you execute your business? Well, you may begin with a sufficient number of workers for a start. As your business thrives in progress, then, you may consider recruiting additional manpower if necessary.

e. Draft your planned financial statement

It is not uncommon that many businesses were unable to survive or even face severe bankruptcy due to a massive amount of debts. Therefore, it is imperative to reserve a significant amount of capital required to help you fuel your business operation forward so that your business will be unlikely to experience a shortage of liquidity level. In this case, you have to estimate your cash flow figure by drafting a constructive report of your financial statement either monthly or annually so that you can monitor the progress and make any cost reductions whenever necessary.