The least expensive ingredient to start a business is the idea. Let’s put it in perspective. We all know somebody who has had a brilliant idea for a product or service but done nothing about it.
Ideas are cheap and plentiful. If you think your idea is valuable, find out how much somebody would pay for it. Until you actually start doing something, it is just an idea. The people who succeed in business are the ones that do things.
Are you like the majority of people who don’t do things and complain that there is just not enough time. Do you say you would love to write a book, take up painting, learn to play the piano, or learn to speak another language?
Do you spend your evenings in front of the TV, go to the movies, play golf or other sports and complain there are not enough hours in the day?
If you want to start a business, start it when you are doing your normal job. If necessary get up an hour earlier in the morning or go to bed an hour later in the evening. Use that time to work on your business from home. Give up your TV and pastimes and you will find you have many more hours a day to develop your business.
Once you do that and start devoting some time to your new business you will soon learn whether or not you have interest and excitement in what you’re doing. Or you will discover that it’s just a passing phase.
If it doesn’t work out, you just keep on going to work at your day job and all you’ve lost is a bit of time. Starting a business is more about “want power” rather than “will power.”
The ideal situation when you start a business is for it to have no debts. This means that you don’t need to introduce outside capital and therefore investors into your business. You actually don’t need an expensive infrastructure.
The majority of new businesses are service businesses, such as consultants, software companies, marketing companies, training companies, graphic designers and so on. If you are intending to start a business like that, avoid outside funding. The secret is to take on as little outside cash as possible.
As soon as you take on outside cash you give up control. When you are just starting a business, you have little or no leverage. And that is not the best environment to enter into a financial agreement.