These are the things you can chip away at during nap time, while you are breastfeeding your baby, or maybe in those quiet moments of the night after the little ones have gone to bed. If you’ve been having the recurring thought about taking the plunge into the small business world but aren’t committed (yet!) Here are some points to consider before you go all in on your business idea. This is a checklist that allows you to productively procrastinate on your business ideas. It gives you breathing room to hold off a bit longer on stepping into the world of business but still meaning you’re taking imperfect action towards your goals. Winning! If you really haven’t given much thought to your biz name, here are some ideas to get those creative juices flowing:
Using your own name. Things/phrases associated with your product or service (duh!). A beloved pet’s name. Combos of your children’s names/letters of their names. Acronyms (these are V popular so be careful) Words associated with places you love to visit.
In my experience, if you aren’t 100% sold on your product or service, it is always good to go with a more generic name +/- a describing word to make it more specific. For example: Jessie Parker could become Jessie Parker consulting (very unimaginative, but you get the drift). Don’t forget to search the ABN Register to check whether your name has already been taken, too. But just because the name is available to be registered, doesn’t mean it’s always available for use. If your business name is trademarked, you could be infringing on another companies copyright (= not good). You can see whether your potential business name is under trademark using a quick trademark search on IP Australia. Keep in mind, there are different categories for trademarking – so sometimes there won’t be a conflict if you plan to operate in a totally different field. If you are confused, you can give IP Australia a call, they are actually super helpful and will be able to clarify things for you. Hop over to social media and also check the availability of the handle you’re thinking of using. When I was looking to switch over to my personal name for my brand, I found it tricky to find a social media handle for my name, Jessie Parker. My name isn’t terribly unique and so there were so many accounts already using variations of the name This is what helped me decide to go with my website jessieparker.co as it aligned with the social media handles that were available, too. It doesn’t really matter if your social media handle is different to your website/brand name but it will help with consistency and brand recognition across platforms if they match. An easy way to see if there’s a demand for your product or service, is to create a survey and ask your potential customers to complete it. Note: if your family/friends aren’t your ideal customers, avoid using them for accurate research. In your survey ask questions specific to what you are going to be selling and gather important information to help develop your future marketing strategy. Questionnaires are great for:
Validating business ideas Building an email list Getting to know the language your customers are using (a.k.a voice of customer – marketing GOLD)
You can put together your own questionnaire for free using Typeform or Survey Monkey and to improve the chances of getting the right people to complete the questions, offer a prize of a gift voucher to sweeten the deal (also good for collecting email addresses and building your email list). This profile of your ideal customer is referred to as your customer avatar. If you were marketing to only one person and they were your perfect client, what would they be like? There are plenty of worksheets available for free online for you to compile your customer avatar’s features. Again, don’t rely on your family or friends here unless they are in your target audience. Their feedback is likely to be biased and won’t give you the information you need. You can begin compiling these things on Pinterest boards – which can also help with starting to form your brand identity and attract potential followers. If people like your vibe on Pinterest, they may just start following you to see what you’re all about! A business plan helps to flesh out a business idea and gets you thinking about all the ins and outs that you must consider as part of the bigger picture. Things like short and long term business goals, financial plan and funds allocation, marketing strategy including market research. Revisit your business plan each quarter to help tweak goals and stay on track. Use a free business plan template available online and start thinking realistically about how this business of yours would actually look if and when you start putting it out there.
