Getting to Your First Million

Getting to Your First Million

There is nothing easy about setting up a business. But the work required to grow it into a money-making enterprise is even harder. Developing a business plan, raising capital, recruiting the right people, making the right partnerships and alliances, getting the product or service to market?these are things that demand a great deal of energy, intelligence, and poise. However, now that you have your business you must stretch these qualities so that the company you put together can be grown into an operation that will make you wealthy.

Whether you have started a company because of a particular passion or you have done so out of the sheer desire to make money, doing these five things will make it successful:

• ?Figuring out the problem you?re trying to solve
• Keeping abreast of trends daily to identify where the hot markets will be tomorrow
• Continuing to satisfy customer needs even after meteoric growth
• Organizing your research
• Nailing the basics

There is an excellent article on Inc.com that explains how doing these things can turn your company into one that sells hundreds of millions of dollars in products or services.

The first item on the list?figuring out the problem you?re trying to solve?was especially resonate with me. Believing that the aim of business is to sell a particular product or service is a mistake common to many entrepreneurs. As an entrepreneur, you?re not trying to sell anything; you?re trying to help a client solve a problem. Your aim should be to figure out what exactly he needs to improve his business and to help him get it. The fact that you might have a competency or a gadget that can help him is incidental. The thing that?s going to make him a loyal customer and you the recipient of his money is helping him think through the variety of ways your product or service can enhance, improve, and develop his business. Once you?ve done that, you?ve established a relationship, and probably guaranteed sales for whatever you offer in the future.

This is one of the many habits you need to adopt in order to get your business from a state of breaking even to one of seven figure profits. ?The others are discussed here.

Much is said about the amount of passion it takes to grow a business. But the amount of passion you feel will amount to nothing if you do not acquire the concrete insight needed to master the needs of the market and your individual clients.