Don't Start a business Like I Started

When I suffered a serious back injury in 1995 I wasn't able to continue working in my trade of 30+ years. I exhausted my disability benefits and was re-injured 2 days after I attempted to return to work.

I started my small Internet business in 1996 in desperation, when no one was selling anything on the Internet. I had no clue how difficult it would be. I worked day and night for months before I made single a sale. Sound familiar?

I had everything to lose and in the process, I lost almost everything.

It's SO much easier starting a small business today, at least from my point of view. There is a lot of great information that just wasn't available when I started. More importantly, now people are actually buying products and services on the Internet.

Keep Your Day Job

The nature of a job is to pay you less than you earn for the company. That's because they spent the time and effort to develop the job for you. A job provides cash flow, training, and security but most of us will never get rich working for someone else.

Having a regular job is a HUGE blessing when you want to start your own small business. Earning a living income will most likely require more time than you expect so keep your regular job until you replace most of the income it provides.

Desperately NEEDING quick income actually works against you. Quitting your job doesn't speed up the learning curve; in fact it gives you tunnel vision often distracting you from discovering real purpose of business.

"Satisfy an identified desire in a market you can reach."

Immigrant Mentality

Often when someone arrives in the US the first thing they do is obtain a job, any job just to get the money flow started.
Immigrants are often willing to work harder and longer than we are because they come here with faith in a vision the passion
to pursue it.

I once worked with a young man from Cambodia. Whenever anyone wanted to go home after eight hours he would offer to do whatever work needed to be done in order to help out. Most days he worked at least 16 hours and we all thought he was crazy.

Later I learned that after his family was killed in Cambodia he built a kiln to make charcoal at 12 years of age. He got up before dawn every day to gather enough wood to fire the kiln then he would walk over 6 miles to fish for ten hours or more. The fishing earned him enough to eat and selling the charcoal helped him earn enough to get to the US. It took him over 7 years just to get here.

A 16-hour day seemed like a short day from his point of view. This is working for a purpose, and this is often what's required when building a small business.

Now it's fifteen years later, he owns his own small business, a house that's paid for, provides high paying jobs for others and gives back to his community on a regular basis purely out of gratitude.

The Old Fashion Way

Real success rarely comes easily, We EARN success in the process of following our passion. No one is born knowing how to build a business.

In fact, most of us start out with a job mentality, expecting a day's pay right after a day's work. In order to develop a business most of the work and much of the money is required up front before we ever receive a dime. This requires a long view and a passion for the process itself.

Like launching a rocket into space, the idea is to develop success before running out of fuel. The higher you go the less fuel it takes but most people quit before getting off the ground.

Success in business isn't really about the money. The fastest path to success is rarely the most direct path. Often it's what's you have to give that gets you what you want.

Adapt A Franchise Mentality

Franchise businesses are expensive because someone else did much of the groundwork for you. If you can't afford a franchise you will need to do most of that groundwork yourself.

Invest in your success, if you don't put much into it you'll have little to lose if you quit. Because of the amount of investment required, franchise owners are more likely to put in the effort required to succeed.

Learn your business, invest in your success, if you don't quit you WILL be successful - eventually.

Tom Hua