Every year the number of people starting their own businesses increases.
The top three demographics for startups are
- Baby Boomers have spent their buy-sell date in big corporations but with skills their former employers still need.
- Moms (or dads) who prefer to spend time at home with the kids and keep working.
- Tech graduates who would rather “compute” than “travel.”
This is all part of a general move toward “hollow” corporations where senior executives and accountants outsource whatever they can. They can reduce fixed costs, overhead, and be more agile on resource projects.
There is also good news for Solopreneurs. Avoiding the daily commute, getting off the corporate grind, keeping more than they earn, taking a vacation or a day on the golf course once in a while. But going solo isn’t entirely a bed of roses. Most of the support structures we rely on when working in a corporation are suddenly gone.
In the past we dealt with strategy, tactics, execution or administration. Now we have all this to worry about, and it’s our nut that we lose when it goes wrong. Few of us are properly trained as pure managers: keeping all those plates spinning isn’t so easy when one person has to do everything, all at the same time. Organizational structures no longer run things. In small businesses, everyone does a little of everything.
Suddenly, IT support isn’t there: all those complicated things we took for granted are now taking up our customer time (or more often our “me” time). Suddenly, we’re not part of the “networks” we used to trust: we’re outsiders. We don’t have others generating income; whether we like it or not, or whether we are good at it or not, we end up “selling”. We can make our lives easier if we can change the way we think: from corporate executive, part of a team, to continue to get along, to being connected to the rest of the world.
The world is full of people just like us, with the same interests, challenges, and support needs. There are thousands of startups providing services to Solopreneurs, adding value and reducing costs. The Internet moves at the speed of light. If we have an insoluble problem today, we will wait a bit, someone will solve it for us, on the Internet. If we can take advantage of what’s happening on the Internet and exploit it to our business advantage, we will replace the benefits of corporate structure that we lose and expand our networks and opportunities in the process.
Here’s a set of basics anyone going solo might want to consider:
1. Get rid of the desktop.
There is nothing more limiting than all that desktop and office productivity software. It’s expensive, complicated, but worst of all, it prevents us from being “connected.” Only by being permanently connected can you make the most of what is happening out there.
2. Seek services, not solutions.
Independent entrepreneurs don’t need accounting systems or order processing, or even the typical CRM and project management tools. They need services to help them with these needs, but they are all available on the Internet for free, or nearly so.
3. Look for added value
Each service must add value to the basic requirement. For example, we all need billing software. If we choose a billing service that connects to merchant processing and/or PayPal, we do not need to maintain accounts receivable records. If we choose a planning or management system, we must find one with “integrated best practices”. We can forget about the training course and just use the software.
4. Forget site marketing – get a blog.
Nobody cares about the words we pay a copywriter for. They want to know what we think. Blogs are free, hosted, configurable and allow us to create our own personality. With a blog, we don’t need sales pitches or introductions; We invite people to visit our blog, where they always get the best from us.
5. “Get connected” with social networks.
Set up profiles with Linked In, Facebook, Community and special interest sites. Join the forums and contribute. Ask questions and answer other people’s. Replace the corporate network with your own international group of kindred souls.
Enter Twitter: microblogging is the fastest way to find out about anything.
6. Enter “Video”.
If a picture is worth a thousand words, a video is worth a million, even if it’s just a video of our slideshow.
7. Post what you know in blogs and articles.
This is your credibility, and it’s permanent, so it pays to get it right.