Things I Learned Opening My First Business

Disclaimer

Here on Selfmadesns.com I’m only giving you my life experiences. So, you may learn and benefit from my mistakes along the way. As well as learn from all of the good decisions I made. What may work for me in some different experiences is not always what you should be doing on your own. Always do your own research or speak with a professional on the subject. Better yet do both guys. It will be way more beneficial for you at the end of the day. If you want more information on our terms, please visit our terms and conditions page along with the privacy policy page as well.

Finding the Path

You know when you’re in high school and they make you login on a computer for a test. I remember one of them test being like a career finding test. You answer questions about what you like to do, things that interest you, and what kind of work you like to do. There were a lot more questions. Anyway, at the end of the test they gave you a list of careers that would be the best fit for you. I remember my number 1 career was a retail buyer. I didn’t know what that was at the time, but I felt like I could do once I looked it up. My next one was entrepreneurship, and that one sparked me.

Next day we had a project we have to do. We had to pick one of the careers that best suited us. We were also able to work with a classmate if we wanted to. I did choose to work with a classmate because we were friends. You know anytime you get a chance in school to work with a friend you’re mostly going to take it. Anyway, I came up with the idea to open up a strip mall. Because we had so many ideas for which kind of business to open. We just opened them all!

The Path

After the project I just wanted to get start on my strip mall project in real life. With my summer job that year I saved up most of my money to start my first business. I wanted to start a clothing business. And I was going to start with t-shirts. So, I made some designs on Custom Ink and took those designs to a t-shirt printing shop. I got a bunch of shirts made before the start of school that year. So far, my plan was going as planned. Where I made my first mistake was not knowing anything about promoting. I listen to some online videos talk about getting rich selling thing on the web. And I decided to get my shirt online. I ended up sending the link to my shirts to my Facebook friends. All I got back was how good the website looked. I didn’t make one sell.

So, I kind of lost hope and stop caring really because I had other stuff going on. But because I had so many shirts left, I would wear them all the time. And I would get compliments on them all the time. I would just say thanks, when I should have been thinking like a salesman. I still think about sales I missed out on till this day. After some time working and going to school, I want to get back to my entrepreneurship. This time I was going to do it different. I went online and found websites who wholesale. I got a bunch of different shirts to sell. This time I told myself I would focus on my local folks. What do you know my friends I was making sells. I was even selling out! It got so good I was able to sell to stores. With all that Success I never looked back.

What I Learned

Marketing

What I learn in that whole process was business is not just opening up shop. You really need to do a lot more after you’re open. I wish I would have done some market research beforehand. Just walking around a high school with clothes to sell, and never thought to sell to anyone or wear the shirts to school. I could have been promoting my shirts the whole time. People did like my designs so; I don’t think it would have been hard. Plus, I was I was well liked, I could have used that to my avenge as well.

Promoting

Another thing I learned was that promoting online is really good but, word of mouth is just as important. When I was promoting online, I got good feedback but, no sells. It wasn’t until I focused on my local community when I started seeing success.

Networking

I didn’t know the power of networking. I made some real good relationship with my first business. Had made a great relationship with my vendors to the point I was getting great deals, not paying all up front, and was able to get excusive clothes before others. I was able to sell to store because they kids were telling them about my clothes. I was able to build a relationship with store owners and learn a lot from them.

Bonus – Business Tips

 These are business tips for beginners my friends. I’m back with even more for you guys. More gems to take your business to that level you want to see it at. I even want to see you get there my friends, that’s why we are both here today. Because we both care about the future of our businesses. I don’t know about you guys, but I want to jump right into this bonus part! So, let’s do this!

#1

  Let’s kick this off with the importance of starting and engaging in conversation with your audience. See this is such a gem for so many reasons. Just think my friends if you invent something the goal will always be to improve on that invention. And by starting a conversation with your audience, they will let you know how to improve it. All you have to do is ask how. Imagine you have a first look party. And you ask everyone what they think about your invention. All that feedback is just data to improve your invention. Apply this to your business and sit back and collect the data. It’s only going to help you improve your business.

#2

  This kind of jumpstarts this next gem. That’s to be in touch with cultures local markets. This simply put is just understanding the culture your business is targeting. Fashion is such a great place to come for examples. So, for example, if you’re not in touch with what people are wearing you will miss out on money. Not everyone like outdated clothes. Most people are always looking for what’s new. And it’s your job to be in touch with the culture so you know what to sell.

#3

  Next, test the water with new strategies and ideas. I like this one because it’s easy to get comfortable when you’re see success. So, don’t settle for what you have because it working.  There’s always new level to reach. You may have one successful business but what if you had two or three? That’s all new success. So try that idea in the back of your head it might just be your next big deal.

#4

  New gem, style your business brand message to target people’s emotions. When people feel emotionally attached to something, there attached. That’s why when you see the Nike ads on tv with the kids making the game winning shot after the start went down, and he came off the bench and put the team on their back we want the same thing. So, play on those emotions of love, happiness, caring and watch it work. Tapping into customers emotions help you connect with them personally.

  There you have it some more gems for the business and future business owners out there. The customer is so important to your business. If you don’t take nothing away from this post, please take that. Please come back to visit because I’m going to be putting out a lot of content this week and next.

Summary

What I want you guys to take from this is. Do worry about failing your first time. Don’t look at it as a failure. Rather than sit back and take away from all the thing you learned and apply it to your next time. Now I’m not saying you should get it right on your 2ND try. But the more times you fail the more you should learn on your way to success. So hopefully this post can motivate some of you guys to go out there and start. Or to keep trying as well. Thanks for your time and the visit. Please come again and tell your friends about the blog please. Let me know if this post was helpful in the comments. Good luck out there!