Ok - I've been slack on the postings front with this thing but I wanted to have something of actual note to post, so here goes...
A couple of weeks ago I went to see a Business Adviser, Paul, at the East London Small Business Centre. I finally got to have a one-to-one meeting with someone to talk through my business ideas! It was actually quite useful, which was a surprise considering the progress I had made up until then. I'd sent him a breakdown of my idea beforehand and after we talked through my motivations, goals background etc. we got down to the nitty-gritty of what I needed to do to get things moving.
The main thrust was that I really needed to go back and do some proper market-research to ensure I had a viable business idea and to try and get some actual cold, hard figures together - this meant field-research as opposed to desk-research. I was going to need to get out there and start speaking to people, calling my competitors, visiting shops that sold what I was thinking of selling and so on. After the meeting, looking back over the written notes and books that I had gathered, I saw that market-research is one of the fundamental cornerstones of ensuring you have a viable business. So, one-step forward, one-step back...
The other thing that I realised was crucial to what I did next; I realised that I was becoming too invested in what I wanted to sell and was starting to lose the original point of why I was doing this in the first place. I wanted an online shop to give me more freedom and time - what I was selling was really beside the point, just so long as it sold enough to make me a viable living.
So, last Saturday I went to the Business Startup Exhibition in Olympia. This was 'the UK's biggest event for small business' and, boy, was hectic! Everyone from budding entrepreneurs (including me!) right up to major palyers like James Caan from The Dragon's Den was there to ply their trade offer advice and network. I came out with a stack of leaflets and flyers and quite a bit of useful information. I saw and spoke to everyone from obvious snake-oil salesmen to reputable, well-known businessmen.
But the main thing that came out of the day was that I signed with a company called DPBUK that offer a kind of online 'shop-in-box' drop-shipping platform for people who want to work from home with minimum outlay. I'd seen them before when researching drop-shipping in the UK and had done some research previously in various online forums to try and see if they are any good. They appear to have a number of plus points: drop-ship? check. Inexpensive? check. Ready-made website? check. Ability to add upgrades/bespoke elements? check. Ability to add my own products? check. Training and advice on PPC, Adwords, Search Engine Optimisation etc? Check. They also have a lot more good press than their main rival at the show, The Select who charge A LOT more to do pretty much the same thing (and, judging by the amount of negative feedback I've seen, don't do it very well).
Now, don't get me wrong; I'm not expecting to be able to take down Amazon or Play.com anytime soon with this thing (not that I'd want too - waaay too much time and effort, and virtually impossible). But it will be a good testing-ground to try out all the things I've been learning about running an online shop. I'm feeling really positive about this new venture and am really going to give it my best shot.
Now what would make a good domain name...
Step, by step, by step...
It's all in a name...
"The longest journey begins with a single step" - Lao Tsu
Welcome to my new blog - www.stevens-startup.blogspot.com
My previous blog was a journal of my year in Australia. It came to a natural conclusion with my return to the UK and apart from a few more random posts things have been a bit quiet at my end for the last 6 months. I've been focussing on getting my life in the UK back up and running; catching up with family/friends, getting a job, finding somewhere to live etc. and while this stuff was important, I didn't feel as if it was very blog-worthy - especially as many of the readers of my previous blog were all around me during this time anyway.
So, now I have begun a new journey and I feel as if I need to keep a record of things. It has a slightly different function to my previous blog. Friends can read it, strangers can read it - whatever. The primary function is for me to have somewhere to gather my thoughts and process things.
Over the next few days/weeks I'm going to do a series of short entries outlining how and why I've got to my current position but, in the meantime, here are a few observations I have made:
- There is tons of information on the web for people who want to start-up their own business and getting information in .pdf format and on websites, forums etc. is easy-peasy.
- A lot of this information is rubbish and there is a whole layer of stuff you have to get through before you find anything truly useful - if you google 'home business' most of the results on the first page are scams..
- Getting any one-to-one support with an actual person in a live setting in London is currently a major struggle. All the entrepreneur scholarship programs in London have had their funding withdrawn and most of the agencies who used to run these now simply just don't want to know.
- Even though we are apparently heading into a major recession, there are still many people out there who are thinking of starting-up their own business
- Statistically, most of these people will fail (and that's the statistics from when we were in a 'boom' period...).
I'm going to leave things now with a couple of links.
The first is the website for the book that originally inspired me to do all this that I first read about a year ago:
www.fourhourworkweek.com
The second is where I've found the majority of the practical, helpful and downright useful information for people who want to start-up in the UK - I have a stack of stuff printed off from here:
www.businesslink.gov.uk
Oh, and if anyone is wondering what my business is actually going to be...well, it wouldn't be prudent to spill the beans now but the theme for this blog offers a clue ;)
