Mistakes can allow you to learn. But you don’t have to make every mistake on your own to learn. You can also learn from the business mistakes made by others.
Not every entrepreneur manages to be successful in his or her first venture. And we believe they don’t even have to be. This famous quote from the co-founder of LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman, just fits here: “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” if you have a business idea, then you should be ready to experiment with it right away; before anyone else would jump in and start getting the benefits.
With your first venture, you should be ready to experiment and learn. This will obviously result in making mistakes. But our point here is you should be making some new mistakes rather than making the same old ones that are made by every entrepreneur. As a first-timer, you won’t have an idea about these business mistakes. But don’t worry; we are bringing in the list of some common mistakes of the first time founders. Go through them and make sure not to repeat them.
Business mistakes of the first time founders:
These 20 business mistakes of entrepreneurship would help you in learning from the mistakes that the first time founders actually made.
1. Underestimation of the market risk:
The new entrepreneurs are usually so excited to start their business that they don’t evaluate the market risk in the first place. What goes wrong here is that despite a good setup, a new idea, the business doesn’t find enough customers to serve, and the result is a lack of profits to survive in the market, even for the first few months?
Sometimes, the competition in the market is extremely high, and because of the inadequate analysis of the market, the business doesn’t survive for long.
Here we don’t want to portray that you should not be focusing on your idea or the establishment of the business, but the point is that the external factors such as market forces do matter, and you must keep them in consideration when starting your own business.
2. Lack of research:
Apart from market research, you should be spending some of your time in researching about the product, the other variants available, new features in the one that you are launching, etc. With all this research, you’ll be in a better position to figure out the other important strategies of your business. If you are going to ignore this aspect, then you’ll be making the same mistake that the first founders have already made, and the result was the failure of the business.
3. Don’t let everyone interfere with your business:
You, as a new entrepreneur, could be eager to seek help from anyone who is able to help, which, on the one hand, is nice. But on the other hand, you don’t have to be extra nice in this situation. Most of the entrepreneurs fail because they start seeking advice from every one, without differentiating if the people giving their piece of advice are competent enough to do so.
We don’t believe that someone would suggest you to something wrong, but the suggestion from the people out of your industry might not be relevant for yours’. Additionally, taking advice from different people would actually create more confusion on your part, and you won’t be able to make a good decision.
4. However, don’t overrule the constructive feedback:
Constructive feedback is necessary for every individual, whether it is the individual life or a business start-up. Some people don’t understand this factor and try to control everything with their own capabilities. Relying on yourself is good, but having a mentor on your side is even better. We can find a lot of established business owners highlighting the role of mentors in their lives and the lives of the businesses. Here is one of the quotes focusing on it:
“It’s necessary to find a mentor who can invest time to know your personal capabilities and business model.” -Nigel Davies, Founder of Claromentis
5. Grow at your own pace:
Another prominent business mistake that you can do here is to grow at a very rapid rate. Doing this so risky, and most of the new entrepreneurs don’t actually realize this. You need to have a secure base before you can even consider expanding your business. A weak business base can actually turn everything down, and you need to make sure that you avoid this founder’s mistake.
“Never tell yourself that you need to be the biggest brand in the whole world. Start by working on what you need at the present moment and then what you need to do tomorrow.” Jas Bagniewski, Co-Founder of Eve Slee.
6. Lack of Prioritization:
As a start-up, you are most likely to have limited resources, so you need to make sure that you use your resources in the best possible manner. You could be looking for technological up-gradation and putting some effort into marketing, but you can’t do both. So, it is important to create a priority list that will help you in making timely decisions and the right decisions. This will ensure that you are avoiding one of the biggest mistakes of entrepreneurship.
7. Lack of honesty:
Whether it is with the customers, employees, your partners, or yourself, lack of honesty, transparency in the dealing is going to create problems for your new business, and they actually do. In most cases, entrepreneurs think that giving a dishonest piece of information to customers or employees won’t matter, or they won’t even know about it. You are wrong.
You have to maintain an environment where everything is transparent and credible so that you can develop the same culture and expect others to reciprocate it for you.
8. Ignoring users or your customers:
Even if you have developed an outclass product or service that is immensely needed by the users, even then, you need to make sure that you are giving the right value to the customers. Sometimes, the only needed thing is treating the customers in a more polite way and investing in the training of the employees to deal with the customers.
But if you’ll ignore it as a non-needed thing at the start-up stage as most of the start-ups actually do, then you won’t be able to create a success story out of your business.
9. Selecting non-passionate co-founders:
Another business mistake that most of the first founders make is a collaboration with the wrong co-founders. The lack of passion in the co-workers can be one of the demotivating factors that can actually restrict you in achieving your objectives.
Whether it is the lack of passion and lack of motivation to contribute to the business, in both situations, you have selected the wrong co-founders.
10. Compromising on your team:
Despite knowing that your team can be the most crucial aspect that you look into closely, most of the entrepreneurs make this business mistake of settling on anyone less than the best or hiring people from their own social circle. There is nothing wrong with hiring people from your own circle, but you should make sure that they are capable enough to bring in the benefit for you start up; otherwise, you are making the same mistake that has been made by the founders of the business already.
11. Leaving the motivational aspect of your team:
Crating a team and keeping them motivated are two different things. As a starter, you are not particularly aware of this, and the result is your team starts leaving or does not perform in the most efficient way. This is because you haven’t made sure that they are motivated and focused on achieving the objectives that you have set for your business. There are multiple ways to keep your employees motivated; you need to select the right one.
12. Ignoring the importance of funding:
Funding is the most important thing that you should not ignore in any case. If you have got the seed funding, that does not mean that this funding is going to be enough for the rest of the year. The nature of the seed funding, your business needs, and what’s covered in it are all some of the important things that a new start-up should have a constant eye on. Don’t make this mistake of entrepreneurship and make sure that you have all the plans already made.
13. Selecting the wrong time to launch:
Not selecting the right time to launch or taking too long in the thinking process and not launching your business is another business mistake that you can make as the founder. In both situations, someone else can actually take advantage of the right opportunity, leaving your business idea, and planning in vain.
14. Having unrealistic expectations:
You could be looking for early profit from your business, but it is not possible as a start-up. For the founders who expect that they would start earning from the first month or so, they have made their entire financial assumptions in the wrong way and are more likely going to have a flop business at the end, due to one reason or the other. So, make sure that your expectations are realistic.
15. Letting the mental and physical fatigue take over you:
You must be ready for working late hours, not getting enough sleep, and not having enough time that you can actually call in your spare time for many more months to come. Although you can call all this normal. But don’t make this business mistake of letting the entire hectic schedule to take control over you completely.
You should make sure that you give some family your time, enjoy some leisure time alone or do what you want to do other than doing something for your new business or thinking about it. You can set up one day in the week for that or maybe a few hours daily. But this time will help you gain your energy back, and you’ll be in a better position to handle things in a more appropriate manner.
16. Putting things under the carpet:
Another problem that the first entrepreneurs can face or the major mistake that they commit is to put things under the carpet, assuming that these things will get right on their own. But this is not the case. You’ll have to realize that you are the person-in-charge, and you’ll have to take control of everything to make things right.
17. Feeling unconfident:
If you have started your business, then you should be confident enough that whatever you do is going to bring in the success or a lessor for you. Most of the founders make this mistake that they keep on thinking too much at the back of their minds, and the result is lack of confidence.
This lack of confidence creates a lot of problems of in its own. So, you can’t expect to run the entire business with such an attitude. You’ll have to accept that failure is the part of success.
18. Staying in an illusion:
One of the biggest mistakes of first-time founders is that they stay in an illusion. They make a good plan and believe that everything would stick you it, and they’ll soon be an own of a good established business. In reality, a good business actually needs hard work, flexibility, and a lot of persistence; you can’t live in your own illusion and get success.
19. Lack of reliance on analytics:
Even when you have launched your business, you should be focusing on the data that your business is generating it for you.it can be the demographics of the customers, supplier information, etc. you’ll have to keep a constant eye on these data sources. As a starter, ignoring this data could be fatal for your business and can give you a big reason for the failure if the business.
20. Starting an idea that you don’t actually care about:
If you are not a person caring about the environment, then starting a green idea won’t drive you. It won’t make you enough enthusiastic to work for long hours with motivation. This is another business mistake that has been found when analyzing the failed business ventures. So, you must be sure that the idea that you are going to rely your business on must be something that you are passionate about.
Conclusion:
Business mistakes of entrepreneurship are a reality. Even successful businesses make mistakes; an example of Nokia is in front of us. But you should not be repeating the mistakes that have already been made. You should learn from their mistakes and make your business a huge hit.
What’s your opinion on it? Share your thoughts with us using the comments section below.
