Considerations Prior to Starting a Business

Can You Sell the Product or Service?

What I mean by this is that can you get on the phone and actually "sell" the product or service in a convincing manner to the target individual(s)?

Nervousness aside (all entrepreneurs are at 1st), a small business owner needs to be able to verbalize in a quick, concise, appealing and intelligent manner as to why someone should give them money for their offering.

Are you willing to prospect?

When starting a business, the entrepreneur is above nothing that is could be construed as both ethical and hard work. This means prospecting for new business. Sales, many times proves to be a big hurdle for the entrepreneur. Though, once you begin prospecting, it's not as hard as they say. Keep your nose to the grindstone and you'll eventually have a name for your company to where you don't have to prospect. Until then, remember that products or services don't sell themselves....neither does mass emailing or spamming potential clients due to laziness.

Where Did You Get the Idea?

If you got the idea for your business from a friend or a relative as a "hot tip," stay clear.

The idea for your business should be yours and should involve a combination of the following:

What can be lucrative, what others are making money doing, being realistic as to what types of businesses can and cannot be monetized as well as engaging in what you enjoy.

Testing Out Your Dedication:

Without complete dedication to a new business venture, the entrepreneur is bound to fail. The following should help test whether you should start a particular business.

A. What Hours Are You Willing to Work?

When getting something off the ground, you will inevitably find yourself putting in up to 20 hour days with little sleep. This is the probably the biggest shellshock that entrepreneurs experience upon leaving the corporate world. In small business ownership, if you don't do it, it simply does not get done and a lack of ability to execute will execute any business.

B. Will You Enjoy the Marriage?

Here, you have to be honest with yourself. Are you going to enjoy the ups and downs of entrepreneurship? Are you possibly doing this for a reason such as you don't like your boss? You have to enjoy what you do...that's the golden rule of careers and it holds just as true regarding a career as one own's boss.

C. What Are You Willing to Learn? To What Extent?

Successful entrepreneurship will consistently challenge you to learn and grow.

Every step of the way, you must consistently set new goals, each one higher than the last and the only way to achieve these set parameters is to set parameters for yourself and do the learning that it takes to always be moving forward. As an entrepreneur, you must learn to never be satisfied with your current position, your current wealth, your current company, your current happiness as well as your current knowledge and ability.

Taking Inventory:

With all the above that was mentioned, you have a lot of thinking and tests to run prior to the commencement of an entrepreneurial venture. However, rest assure that there is a successful entrepreneur in everybody...you just find it along the journey.