Are You Making Any of These Deadly Small Business Mistakes?

These traps/mistakes are common to many entrepreneurs and small business owners:

1. Getting Wedded To an Idea And Sticking with It Too Long
Don’t marry a single idea. Remember, ideas are the currency of entrepreneurs. Play with many ideas and see which ones bring money and success.

2. No Marketing Plan
A marketing plan creates the kind of attention you need to get in front of the right types of people, companies, etc. It is what attracts people to you! There may be as many as 25 ways to market your business at no or low cost. A good marketing plan implemented effectively, efficiently, elegantly and consistently, will eliminate the need for “cold call!”

3. Not Knowing Your Customers
Changes in your customers’ preferences and your competitors’ products and services can leave you in the dust unless you get to know your customers well, what their buying patterns are, and how you can be a resource for them even if you don’t have the right products or services for them now!

4. Ignoring Your Cash Position
The world doesn’t respond to even superior products in the timeframe that you think they should. You’ll need a plenty of cash to sustain yourself in the meantime.

5. Confusing Likelihood With Reality
The successful entrepreneur lives in a world of likelihood but spends money in the world of reality.

6. No Sales PlanWithout a sales plan, there’s no serious way to gage the financial growth and progress of your business. You need a realistic map for where the sale will come from, how they’ll come and from whom.

7. Being A Lone Ranger
You might be the key to everything BUT you cannot DO everything and grow at the same time. Even modest success can overwhelm you unless you hire the right staff and delegate responsibility.

8. No Mastermind
Get an advisory board or a mentor! Sound crazy for a small operation? It’s not! The board can be family members that you trust, or friends. Ask them to be your board of directors and review your business plans and results with them. Having someone to bounce ideas off and get an objective opinion is critical.

9. Giving Up
Some of the most successful entrepreneurs failed several times before doing extremely well. So, is you’re failing, fail. And fail fast. And learn. And try again, with this new wisdom. Do NOT give up. Yet, do not suffer, either.