I’ve talked a lot now about the getting the idea. One thing you have to look at to be successful is how other people became successful.

In generic terms – find someone or some business you really admire (for the right reason – because it interests you AND it made money, not just because it made money). See how they progressed. How the company started. What mistakes they made, what early successes they stumbled across.

After doing this with a few businesses you’ll start to see a pattern.

• Start small
• Work hard
• Look for sympathetic partners – be choosy!
• Don’t outsource core components – learn them yourselves
• Build credibility & reputation
• Be flexible

Those are the same for every successful business I know – big or small!

That should do it for the series on developing a business idea. If you want to chat, feel free to post comments – I’d love the feedback!

Don’t go into business thinking you know exactly what that business is going to do. The fact is that once you start trading and getting feedback from customers and seeing how your sector really operates odds are you will see signs of where you’d best fit.

Don’t ignore signs to change

Go where the market leads you – within reason of course. You may start a greeting card company, and then find that people really want local photos and content. Go with it. Odds are your ideas at the start were formed by little practical experience. Once you start getting orders in, look for patterns. See where you are making money that maybe costs you less (selling cheaper items or selling few big ticket items with great mark up). Focus on those areas.

CFIMITYM

Cash Flow Is More Important Than Your Mother

The best businesses can stand on their own two feet, at a small level, fairly early on. Venture Capitalists will like businesses that got a long way on bootstrapping (read: your money). Don’t go for big investment too early. The longer you go, and prove you can stay afloat, the more your company is worth.

Now, this step may appear to be NOT a start-up step, but something for later on. It is, in a way, but, the thing I want to get across is that from the start you have to be flexible. Don’t stick to your original idea if it is being proven to be flawed.

Following up on my last post – about there being many countries in the world – you should also remember that there are many languages. Just take a look at this:

There are 6,800 known languages spoken in the 200 countries of the world. 2,261 have writing systems (the others are only spoken) and about 300 are represented by on-line dictionaries

So – don’t think that your target market has to be in English. Even if you live in America remember that a huge section of the population speaks a language OTHER than English as either their first or second language.

I think that bears repeating:

In America remember that a huge section of the population speaks a language OTHER than English as either their first or second language.

1 in 15 in America doesn’t speak ANY (or very limited) English.  There are loads of stats I could throw your way, but basically, don’t think you need to do a site in English, even in America.

But, take a gander at these numbers:

Top 10 Languages On The Web

1. English – 479mil
2. Chinese – 384mil
3. Spanish – 137mil
4. Japanese – 96mil
5. French – 79mil
6. Portuguese – 73mil
7. German – 65mil
8. Arabic – 50mil
9. Russian – 45mil
10. Korean – 37mil

I think those are some pretty impressive numbers. And I can tell you from personal experience that the kinds of information that you can find on the web in English is sadly lacking even in the other top 10 languages.

Try looking up affiliate programs in a language other than English. Or Print on Demand. Or anything! Even with these staggering numbers (the top 10 represent 1.4 billion people) remember that those top 10 languages have 4.5 billion speakers! In other words, even in those languages, not even a third of them are online.

I hope you see what I am getting at.

If you string together my last post and this one it becomes – to me – clear. Learn the lessons of online business and development from the English speaking Americans. And apply it to other languages and locations.

Because remember this: your goal is to create a business you love and to make an income and a lifestyle. And, if you are a market leader in your country a larger company from a larger country may come along and snap you up when you get big enough to register on the radar.