Starting a Business When You’re Broke
For those who are broke, there’s an undeniable appeal to breaking the shackles of a 9-5 life and starting their own business.
The freedom of being your own boss and not looking up to others, for instance, is all the drive that most need to risk their savings on a business that might not even work out.
Before you start a business, however, it’s important that you understand if it’s truly the right thing to do.
Despite what you may believe, owning a business isn’t guaranteed to make you rich—in fact, 96% of businesses will fail in the first ten years.
If you’re starting a business on a whim to make more money, this can be depressing news—and it should be.
For those looking to start a business when they’re broke, it’s important to make sure that everything you need is in line before you attempt to open a business.
Why Do You Want to Start a Business?
If you’re looking to start a business simply for the money, you’re probably going to be disappointed.
Not only is a business not guaranteed to make you rich, but much of the success that you’re going to have depends on your ability.
If you don’t have a specific plan in mind, your business isn’t going to succeed.
And if you’re just starting it to make money, chances are that you haven’t really thought it through.
In fact, if you’re poor, it’s likely that you don’t understand the basic fundamentals that go into making a business a success.
Without this knowledge, you’re never going to succeed as a businessman.
The good news is that you can train your mind to think more like a successful entrepreneur—but you need to realize that this takes time.
Quitting your job on a dime to start a business is a risk that often turns out in the negative. If you’re really looking for long-term success, follow my tips so that you can develop a mindset that will work for you.
Developing the Right Mindset to Start a Business
I cannot overstate the importance of your mindset when you become an entrepreneur.
The habits that you’ve developed that have kept you poor simply won’t cut it for you anymore.
In fact, if you don’t change the way you think and the way you act, your business is already doomed to failure.
Part of being an entrepreneur is having a shrewd, intelligent outlook on the world. You’re going to need to be able to assess risks and solve problems in real time in order to protect your investments.
Which means that you’re going to need to start making investments!
You’re going to have to axe old, wasteful spending habits. Instead, you’re going to need to invest your time and your money into making your business a success.
The investments you need to make will depend on your situation, but some can apply to all—such as marketing.
If you’re broke, however, this can be almost impossible to do.
You can’t invest money that you don’t have.
If you’re able to secure a loan, great. Make sure that you’re investing it wisely so that you can actually pay it back—otherwise you could find yourself in serious debt.
But chances are that if you don’t have the money to start a business, your bad spending practices will likely keep you from getting a loan the size you need.
What do you do then?
You can try to keep your business open without advertising and other investments, but unless you’ve got serious connections within your community, this likely won’t turn you a big profit.
You could look into social media advertising as a cheap alternative, but if you’re not computer and marketing savvy, you may not be maximizing the leads you could be getting.
So what’s the most important thing you can do if you’re looking to start a business while broke?
Start it on the side.
Starting Your Business on the Side
Part of being a successful entrepreneur is being responsible.
This means that if you don’t have the money to start a business, you shouldn’t try yet.
Though it can be tempting to quit your job and take a risk, if you don’t have the right infrastructure in place, you’re going to be worse off than you were before.
For this reason, you need to have a little patience as you slowly lay the foundations for your business on the side.
Let’s say, for example, that you’re looking to open a copywriting business.
You currently work for a newspaper as a reporter, and you know that you can’t simply quit your job. Though you want to start your own business, you realize that it’s a complex issue.
Because of this, you keep your job, retain your income, and slowly build your business over the course of a few months. You make the right connections, take on a few small orders, and do what you can to put your name out there while building a quality portfolio.
What you’ll notice is that as the months go by, your income will begin to increase. You’ll eventually be at the level that you have to choose between your job and your business—and when it comes to this point, if you’ve been saving and investing wisely, you should be able to finally take the leap to starting your business.
By following this practice, you’ll be able to test the waters a bit before jumping into your business. This will allow you to get a better sense of its long-term viability as well as see if it’s something that you really want to do.
Not to mention that you’ve gotten started on the right foot because of your extra time and effort you spent building the business on the side.
In this way, you can incrementally build your business while keeping your income and developing a winning mindset.
By doing so, you’ll have all the ingredients for long-term success.
