In order to go from Business idea to launch there are a number of steps involved. It can feel overwhelming to try to wrap your head around the steps to take you from your initial flash of inspiration to get your business off the ground.
Here are a few steps to get you started.
Talk It Out
Once you have your business idea, and you feel like it has good potential, talk to other people about it. Speak to trusted allies about your idea. It’s especially important to speak to people who are in your target market.
Ask them questions like:
- Do they feel the idea has potential?
- Do they have any more ideas to help you flesh it out?
- Would they buy this product or service?
If you don’t have anyone who might be in your target market go to people in your extended network. Honest feedback can be an essential first step to turning your idea into a reality.
Assess Your Idea
It’s important to validate your business idea to ensure your business idea has the potential for success. To do this you’ll need to understand your business by creating a business plan. You’ll also need to examine who the potential market for your business is.
Research The Market
Once you’ve developed your core business idea, spoken to important others about the idea, and validated your idea do some market research. Market research is examining the market that you’ll sell your products and services to.
Market research includes asking questions like:
- Who are your competitors?
- How will your offer be similar or different?
- Who are your key customers?
Doing this research will help you know if you need to reshape your idea or reconsider it all together.
Write A Business Plan
A key step in launching your business is creating a business plan. Business plans can be either a one-page or a formal business plan. Business plans allow you to get your business idea crystal clear. Formal business plans also allow you to seek funding from investors and banks and to plan everything out in detail that you’ll need to get your business off the ground.
Build a Sample
Before you take your business big-time it’s important to try out your business idea. This means building a sample. It might mean building a prototype for a physical product. Or it might mean creating a “beta test” for your software or service that allows you to see whether people are willing to pay for it.
Get Funding
Do a start-up cost analysis to see how much money you need to start your business. Once you know how much money you’ll need you can determine how to best fund your business.
Some ideas include:
- Bootstrapping, or creating your business with no outside investment and doing most of the work yourself.
- Bank loans, and other kinds of bank-provided funding, which may require a business plan to acquire.
- Crowdfunding via internet sites that allow you to source funding from many individuals to start your business.
- Investors who are willing to give your business start-up capital, usually for a portion of the ownership of the company.