One of the biggest barriers to entry into the world of starting your own business is the fear of letting go of the almighty dollar. As is with myself, nobody wants to put their family, mortgage, cars and general lifestyle at risk to start something that may fail. This is fair. This is also the underlying foundation of how I think about every business opportunity: other than my own time (which is for another day), will the new idea stress my pocket? When the answer is “No”, I get excited. Over the years and through a number of failed ventures, I’ve learned a few tricks. Mind you, each failed venture has cost me little. Say a couple hundred bones. Some would say the failure of the business is in part due to my lack of personal funding. On the contrary, I’ve found that a little funding is enough to see if there is interest. There is a lot to a business that can be done for very cheap. Here’s some ideas:
Do what you do best
If you are the major contributor, you don’t necessarily have to pay yourself. Stick to things you love and know how to do well. This in part goes to an earlier and somewhat related post. Without heart, your business will never beat.
The age of the Internet brings the age of FREE
I mean seriously, Google gives small businesses just about everything you need to power your new business. Between Google Calendar, Docs, GMail, Sites, Apps, Talk, Voice; they give you absolutely everything you need to start. Yes, this means they basically control all the communication your business will make. Understandably a hard pill to swallow. Get over it. Their privacy policy should cover just about any legitimate concern you actually have about that. This is one company, yes, but there are plenty others out there. Here’s a good blog post on a few that could be of use to you.
Stretch promos as far as possible
This is where it gets fun. What I’m talking about here is professional help. For example, lawyers are expensive. When you’re a tight wad starting a business, the last thing you want to do is dish out $200/hour on some legal advice (although good legal advice is worth every penny, I must say). Using this as an example, it’s easy to find lawyers with free 30-60 minute consultations. One thing to try is going to more than one lawyer, soaking up as much free consultation time as possible. Taking from the last and building into the next. Sure, it’s a lot of time, but it’s a lot of free time (well… assuming your time is free when you’re working on your business). Furthermore, lawyers are just people trying to make a buck like anyone else. Instead of a consultation, ask them to review a legal document for you. Sell it like it’s their interview. Have an NDA, privacy statement or any other legal document that you’d like a good review on? Throw the idea out there. Worst case, it’s a 10 minute call lost. Best case, you saved your new business about a K. Of course, this isn’t just legal advise, this stuff is all over. Think free and it will become you.
Spend smart when you do
Think hard about the stuff you do spend money on. And when I say hard, I mean really hard. It’s the only way to forcefully squeeze every penny out of your dollar. Let me use an example I recently found myself in: buying servers. There was no way around this, it’s a critical step to a recent business of mine. Now, I could have sowered the earth, hunting for old dilapidated servers that some company was getting rid of. Thing is, with power, maintenance and local management, I’m only saving on the initial cost. So as I got to thinking, I came up with this little diddy:
I’ll skip the gory details (comment if you’re interested and I’ll update), but the idea is that I could take a number of my options and score each with respect to their specifications, age and price (and anything else for that matter). Trusting in my equation, I can trust the score where the option with the lowest score wins. Turns out I went the VPS route with Linode in this case. The point is: take the time to step back and take your time to find the best use of your money. Assumptions can be expensive, so don’t pretend like you know everything.
Although I probably could go on, I’m going to stop here. The point is: you can do a lot on a budget. It’s up to you to be creative and through when thinking about everything, though. Not all of us have the luxury to throw money against a wall to see what sticks and starts to grow more money. We have to be nimble, mindful, logical and intelligent about what we’re doing, what we’re spending and how we will get from point a to point b safely and securely. When it comes to money in a business, particularly when there isn’t a lot to start with, there is little room for error. It’s up to you to make sure you can get enough of a margin to let yourself goof up because it will happen.
Have fun!