I missed a post last week! Kind of bummed about that, but I have a good reason why.
We had our first My English Matters workshop last weekend! It was so much fun, I don’t know where to start. We had 20 participants – we had targeted 10 people, but ended up with double that! Amazing.
My phone was buzzing all week – especially the last two days as people were registering and asking about our workshop, personal coaching, online classes and training. If you are not yet a subscriber, head on over to our website, My English Matters and check out our content. It’s a place for us to teach Malaysians how to communicate in English more confidently.
Now in this week’s post, I’m going to be addressing a question that many aspiring entrepreneurs have – What will I sell in my online business?
If you are an online wantrepreneur – that’s a person who wants to be an entrepreneur but hasn’t started anything yet – and you don’t know what the heck to sell, this post is for you. And you’ve come to the right person to help you with that because I was like that too just over a year ago.
Let me share a little of my story. I’ve always aspired to be an entrepreneur and to have my own business, ever since I was a kid. I’ve had a lot of ideas – starting a stationery company (I wanted to call it “Scabs” – don’t ask why), having a cafe, a bakery, selling handmade soaps and skin products, starting a line of minimalist bags (I don’t have a lot of bags, but when I do go shopping for bags, it’s soo hard to find something I love that’s simple, sturdy and meets my taste of minimalist and non-flashy)… and the list goes on.
So when I left my 9 to 5 job in 2014 so that I could become a freelancer and be at home with my children, that itch to start a business started to grow. I had seriously considered of starting a small business selling handmade soaps and skin products, and after a few months of doing the due diligence, I realised it wasn’t the business I wanted to go after.
I think I’ll write about the importance of undergoing due diligence in another post for you. You should definitely do that before you invest in any sort of business endeavour.
If you don’t know what a due diligence is…
Due diligence is an investigation or audit of a potential investment or product to confirm all facts, such as reviewing all financial records, plus anything else deemed material. It refers to the care a reasonable person should take before entering into an agreement or a financial transaction with another party. – Investopedia
Anyways, I had no idea what to sell – but I wanted to sell something. I started to search for entrepreneurial advice online – I think I googled “successful women entrepreneurs” or something. All of this googling and clicking links led me to Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income and his podcast interview with Kimra Luna. Their interview was really inspiring and got me all fired up.
I had read all these articles about business, marketing and entrepreneurship and I was convinced that I wanted to teach these skills to other women. But the problem was I didn’t have a business. I wasn’t an entrepreneur. I was a wantrepreneur. If I wanted to teach women about entrepreneurship, I had to be an entrepreneur as well. I needed to be successful at it too.
So one night, I was having dinner with my beloved husband and telling him about my first-world dilemma. “What am I good at? What can I teach others? What is it that people want that I have knowledge in?”
And he answered, rather nonchalantly, “English.”
That was when it struck me. “Yes! You are right!” Okay, somewhere along those lines. It was more than a year ago, but you get the gist. Living in Malaysia, so many Malaysians struggle with English as their second language. English comes naturally to me so I had taken it for granted.
So the next day, I told my plan about starting an online platform teaching English to two of my sisters and they were on board. My older sister, Azimah, had just left her job teaching English but she missed teaching and was considering doing classes independently. My younger sister, Aisya, was a freelancer and ready to start something exciting. That’s how My English Matters was born.
Now I’m telling you all of this because if you’re like me, you want to be an entrepreneur, but you don’t know where to start or what to sell, you can start with how I started.
#1 – List down all the potential business ideas you have. Don’t forget to ask others, too.
This is where you can go a little crazy. List down every single business idea that’s been on your mind. It could be dumb, it could be crazy, impossible or just plain boring. Whatever it is, write it down. If you have a particular talent, skill, knowledge or expertise, write those down too. Ask your closest friends or family members what skill/knowledge you have that people would be willing to pay you to teach them. You’ll be surprised with the answers that they’ll give you.
#2 – Start crossing out the ideas that just don’t make sense.
Now start crossing out the ideas that you think you wouldn’t want to do. It could be too costly, time-consuming or something you just wouldn’t enjoy doing on a daily basis. Leave out only the few ideas that are exciting to you and have the potential to reap benefits. This exercise could take days as you’re crossing out the ideas that you don’t want on your list. Take your time.
Some questions you can ask yourself as you select and cross out your ideas:
- Will I enjoy doing/selling this?
- Does this idea excite me?
- Would this business fit with my values and principles?
- What knowledge/skill/investment is needed to go ahead with this?
- Will having this sort of business fit in with my current and ideal lifestyle?
#3 – Do your research.
Now that you’re left with only one to three business ideas, it’s time for you to do your research. You’ll need to figure out the investment in time and money that is required for this particular business. Begin your research on your first choice – the one that you’re most excited about. How much money is required for you to start this business? How much time? What skills do you need?
I think that knowing how much money is required is the most important question you need to answer. Some businesses require bigger capital, some require little to none. Do you need to acquire a loan? If you do, you’ll need to figure out how much you need and how long it would take to pay off the loan. You’ll need to know what kind of work you’ll do every month to generate revenue and gain a profit. This is the due diligence part.
It would be great to open up an Excel spreadsheet to calculate all the costs involved for your business. If you’re planning to sell physical products, find out how much it would cost to produce – this includes labour, materials, shipping and time to produce too. The price that you’re selling the product must be more than the cost and time spent in creating it. Now in the Excel sheet, you’ll need to make a forecast for the next 12 months. Put in all your costs and how many units you’ll need to sell to make a profit.
Doing this exercise is so important because you’ll get to see a picture of what you’ll be doing over the next 12 months. Be truthful with yourself. Can you sell that much every month? Will you need to do paid advertising to meet your target? Perhaps you’ll need to hire staff for it. If yes, those will be considered as cost as well. Once you’ve taken a look at the kind of work you’ll need to do every month, ask yourself – is it worth it? Will you enjoy it? Or will you hate it?
If your answer is you’ll hate it – then move on. Quit before you start. Because a business that you hate will not last. It’s got to be something you’ll love, but it’s got to be profitable too. Go to your next idea and do your due diligence with that. Keep on doing this exercise until you find the perfect business idea for you.
Once you find the right one, you’ll know. It’s the business idea that makes sense to you, it fits with your values and the lifestyle you want, it will generate an income for you (meaning the costs are lower than the revenue), there’s a demand for it and it will serve others.
So there you have it. 3 steps to finding the right business idea. I hope you find it helpful. Share with me in the comments what your business ideas are and what’s your next step. I’ll see you next week.