10 things to do before starting a business

Although about 13 thousand new products enter the market every year, only 40% of them remain on the market in 5 years. In order for a new business to “shoot”, it is not enough to come up with a product and determine the price for it. It is also important to prepare the soil well.

In addition to a good business idea, a quality product and the best price, there are a lot of important things that are very easy to overlook, especially if you are new to the business world.Here are 10 tips from successful entrepreneurs to help you get started smartly. 

1. Find a smart accountant or outsource your bookkeeping Conducting competent calculations, legislative and tax base – you yourself will have to understand this information for years. 

A professional in his field will quickly give order to your papers, so the money spent on accounting services will certainly not be wasted. 

2. Know your target market To make sure you’re bringing people what they want, not you, conduct a focus group survey of the target audience for the product or service. This can be done independently and without attracting serious funds. Such a mini-study will give an idea about your client, and also save a lot of money wasted on subsequent experiments.

3. Get Legal Advice Proactive legal support can be the best way to secure long-term success for your business. After all, if you call a lawyer after you have encountered a 

problem , it may be too late to do something. And this, in turn, can have a critical impact on the business in both the short and long term. 

4. Think ahead for the future of your business When starting a business, it is important to see how the business will develop after the date of its launch. That is, you need to plan how you are going to make a profit for at least two to three years. Determine the worst and best business scenarios based on sales and revenue forecasts. It is also very important to have such a plan in order to convince the people you need that it is safe to work with you.

5. Connect with other entrepreneurs Before you open your business, and even after that, it is incredibly important to have a number of sorts of mentors, that is, professionals who have already eaten a dozen elephants in this business and will willingly share their secrets. Advice, mentoring and communication are an essential part of starting a new project. Of course, you won’t be able to learn everything all at once, but a good sensei in this area will certainly help. 

6. Create a decent website Often, a novice entrepreneur does not pay attention to the planning of maintaining a website and other platforms. As a rule, a simple site is launched at the beginning, and then you have to make a massive and time-consuming transition to other platforms and hosting. But if you start doing everything right from the very beginning, you can achieve success much earlier.

7. Save enough money It happens that start-up entrepreneurs do not have enough money to work for them for a while to become profitable. Therefore, successful businessmen recommend having an annual reserve for operating expenses in the bank on the day of the grand opening of your company. It also implies that you also have a solid business plan and a strategic growth plan in place from day one.

8. Know Your Tax Liability You must clearly know all the taxes and fees that are required of you, and also be very organized in terms of their payment. Calculate how much money will be spent on timely payment of tax payments. Also find out what taxes exist in another business, in other cities, regions and countries. Delays can very quickly turn into penalties, which will lead to new expenses.

9. Think about an exit strategy It is important that in addition to faith and perseverance, you have another exit strategy . Regardless of whether the main business idea works, you must be sure that you can sell the business and not lose all the capital in the process. Knowing that you have an exit option that won’t be very painful, it will be easy enough to keep moving forward at full speed. 

10. Ask yourself “why?” Seems like a simple question, but there will inevitably come a time when things don’t go as planned, hope for improvement will increasingly diminish, and you’ll need to remind yourself why you’re in this business. For an entrepreneur, development and growth are processes that never fully end. Therefore, it is very important to formulate a mission. This approach allows you to constantly keep the focus on the goal of the project, as well as keep in mind personal expectations from the business.For business success, it is important to have a good idea, perseverance and knowledge. And these 10 tips will increase your chances of long-term success when starting a new business.