- Most Business Failures Are Due Lack Of Business Specific Knowledge.
- D&B traced business failures to the inability of owners to critically think about their business in areas like accounting/planning/marketing/human resources.
- My personal observations as a business mentor are that business owners go under & lose their businesses — not because they weren’t talented or smart enough — they simply try to re-invent the wheel rather than rely on proven, tested business methods that work.
- IMPLICATION: learn basic business knowledge and do industry research while critically thinking (vetting) your business model concept before writing a business plan.
- Most Founders Are Not Young Or College Dropouts.
- The age of the average tech founder is 39.
- A 60-year-old entrepreneur is 3 times more likely to build a successful startup compared to a 30-year-old founder.
- About 95% of entrepreneurs have at least a bachelor’s degree.
- Having a lot of work experience, a good professional network, and personal savings increase your chances of success a great deal.
- IMPLICATION: if you are a young, inexperienced founder, it is extremely important to involve a co-founder or mentor with at least one startup behind their back to make your life much easier.
- Most Early-Stage Startups Have To Bootstrap.
- About 77% of the startups surveyed most popular method of financing is personal funds.
- Investor funding is hard to access for early-stage projects, especially those headed by inexperienced founders.
- IMPLICATION: if you are a first-time founder you shouldn’t plan for an outside investment until you reach the growth stages of your project.
- Don’t Keep Your Good Idea A Secret
- It’s a natural instinct as an early-stage startup founder to try to protect your idea because you are afraid companies with more resources would steal it. While this makes sense in theory, it rarely works out like that in practice.
- Many ideas sound great, and the only way to find out which ones would work out and which ones wouldn’t is to validate them in practice.
- While corporations have access to a lot of resources, they are much more rigid compared to small companies because of their size and the red tape in them. It is much easier for big companies to buy the startups they see value in.
- IMPLICATION: it very unlikely an established business would steal your early-stage idea. It is easier to find partners, customers, or other stakeholders that can add value to your business when you share your idea openly. However, once your business starts growing it is impossible to keep your business a secret and other companies may try to imitate your business model by offering similar products and services.
Be sure to view the free micro-video “Roadmap For Starting Your Business“.
If you are planning to start a business or are thinking about scaling an existing one, be sure to read the ebook “Customer Centric Business Planning: A Guide to Optimizing Your Business for Maximum Success”. It is an essential book for business owners, managers, and entrepreneurs looking to leverage real-time insight to start and improve their business operations. Learn how proper customer centric business planning can assess risk and opportunity, and create an actionable roadmap for success.
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