There are 21 strategies will help you to start-up your business.
- **What?-** What are the 21 strategies for the start-up of your business?
- **Why?-** Why do you need these 21 strategies?
- **How?-** How to implement these strategies?
**Poor mindset:**
**1.** **अपनी** **भाषा** **में** **कबीरा** **दिए** **समझाय****;** काम करो बस उतनाजीतनेय में सैलरी मिल जाए I
**2. Private company** **में** **वही** **कुछ** **कर** **दिखाता** **है****;** **जोमेहनती** **गधे** **से** **company** **का** **जीजा** **बन** **जाता** **है** **I**
**Golden statement:**
**छोटी** **सोच** **और** **पाओं** **की** **मोच** **आगे** **बढ़ने** **नहींदेती** **I**
Following are the 21 strategies for start-up business:
**#1 Freelancing**
**Poor mindset:**
**सोमवार** **के** **दिन** **बस** **शरीर** **ही** **दफ्तर** **जाता** **है** **आत्मातो** **घर** **रह** **जाती** **है****,**
**यही** **वो** **मानसिकता** **है** **कि** **रघुपति** **राघव** **राजा** **राम****,****जितनी** **तनखव्वाह** **उतना** **काम** **I**
Freelancing is all about:
- अपनी मर्जी की जगह
- अपनी मर्ज़ी का समय
- अपनी मर्ज़ी का काम
- अपनी मर्ज़ी का दाम
- दुनिया लेगी सुबह शाम , पूरे सम्मान से आपका नाम
You should take into consideration the following 3 points about freelancing:
1. What excites you?
2. What is your skillset?
3. What is market demand?
If you have these 3 combinations, the money will come automatically to you.
**Golden statement:**
**Build the experience of not getting “work experience” because of no “work experience”.**
During the initial days, you have to gain experience because you don't have experience. But you should keep on approaching people. But when you get a chance, your experience will start adding.
If you notice, banks and investors will offer you a loan when you don’t need money. Also, when you already have a good job, you will get offers of other jobs as well.
So, you get more business when you already have the business. But to reach that level, you have to create an experience.
Before startup, you should start as a freelancer startup then scale up.
Mr. Entrepreneur also started as a solopreneur.
As a freelancer people will ignore you, judge you, and laugh at you but you have to keep going.
**Golden statement:**
**आज** **तुझ** **पर** **हस** **रहे** **हैं****,** **कल** **वही** **लोग** **तेरा** **गुणगान** **करेंगे** **,****करके** **दिखा** **कोई** **कमाल****,** **लोग** **तुमपर** **अभिमान** **करेंगे** **I**
Before starting up generally people do is:
- Fire, ready and aim which is wrong
- Instead, it should be ready, aim, and then fire
You should consider these points about freelancing:
**1. Know why you are freelancing?**
First, you need to identify your goals and be clear about freelancing.
**Golden statement:**
1. **जो** **अपने** **लक्षय** **में** **खो** **गया****,** **समझो** **वही** **व्यक्ति** **सफलहो** **गया** **I**
2. **लक्ष्य** **जितना** **बड़ा** **होगा****,** **उतना** **बड़ा** **बलिदान** **चाहिए****,** **ज़िद्द** **जुन्नून** **और** **निशाय** **का** **स्वाभिमान** **चहिये****.**
You should do introspection as you are freelancing for:
- Work-life satisfaction?
- Flexible schedule?
- Additional family income?
- Grow your career or taper it down?
- Make time for family?
If you do freelancing for relaxation at work, you will not achieve success.
**Poor mindset:**
काम करो या न करो काम की फिक्र जरूर करो फिक्र करो या नाकरो काम का जिक्र जरुर करो I
These are the employees who discuss only work and take their salary.
**Poor mindset:**
**जो** **काम** **करे** **उसकी** **ऊँगली** **करो** **और** **जो** **काम** **ना** **करे** **उसकीचुगली** **करो** **I**
**2. Access your aspiration:**
- You should match your dreams with reality.
- You should assess aspirations and your today’s action.
**Golden statement:**
**सपना** **एक** **देखोगे** **मुश्किलें** **हज़ार** **आएंगी** **लेकिन** **वो** **मंज़ार** **खूबसूरत** **होगा** **जबक़ामयाबी** **शोर** **मचाएगी** **I**
**3. Took exit or laid off?**
- Have you quit your job for a startup or you are being laid off by an office such as Covid 19 situation?
- Are you searching for freelancing only because you are not getting a job?
You need to define a purpose and take some time out to sort out your things. You should do small tests.
**Poor mindset:**
**ये** **सच** **है** **कि** **कड़ी** **मेहनत** **ने** **कभी** **किसी** **की** **जान** **नहीं** **ली** **है** **परमुझे** **लगता** **है** **कि** **खतरा** **क्यों** **उठाया** **जाए****?**
You should take this risk. You should identify your key strengths as to how sharp are your skills. The greater are your skills the higher price you can ask for yourself.
**Golden statement:**
**ये** **हुनर** **जब** **आ** **जाए** **तो** **आपका** **जमाना** **है** **पायों** **कहाँपाओं** **छूने** **हैं** **कहाँ** **सर** **झुकाना** **है**
**ज्ञान** **प्राप्ति** **के** **लिए** **किसके** **पास** **जाना** **है** **I**
So, you should take learning from where that helps in achieving your goal.
**Example:**
- Once an elephant said to his child that “ I am very disappointed in you because the child of an eagle started flying even he is 4 years younger than you while you are not able to fly.”
- The child said, “ O.K papa, I will try."
So, you should not copy the others and work on your skillset.
If you are new to freelancing you have to choose the model of:
- Price badhaoà Customer ghataao
- Price badhaooà Customer badhao
You should know the earning potential of your time.
You should make a list of your skills and divide them into two sides. On one side you have to write the skills that you love most and use daily.
On the other hand, you have to write the skills that you have but you don't use them daily you should not miss them because generally, the skills that are sued daily are on top of the mind.
You should find the achievement that you did in a fast and efficient manner and see:
- Did it save your money?
- Did it help you in getting new customers?
- Did it create a new market for you?
- Did you get any awards?
- Did you achieve anything?
All these points will give you an indication of your skillset. Your top skills will create a reputation that will drive your marketing message. Your negotiation leverage will increase and your pricing will also change.
Your skill set can be the following :
- Editing brochure
- Press release
- Ad copy
- Project management
- Transcribing
You can become a super-specialist of your subject such as a heart specialist who becomes popular in the whole city.
**Golden statement:**
**जुनून** **का** **नतीजा** **जरूर** **निकलेगा** **हुनर** **के** **समुन्दर** **से** **ही** **नूरनिकलेगा** **I**
So, you should identify your trait such as:
- Communication skills
- Good leader
- Problem solver
- Curious
- Positive & calm
This will build your reputation and distinguish you from others because reputation is the new currency.
**4. Finally, you should do your SWOT analysis to know:**
- **Strengths:**
- What are you doing now?
- What can you do?
- In which thing you are excellent?
- Where can you utilize your full potential?
- **Weaknesses:**
- Where are you losing?
- What are the issues you cant handle?
- Where is the client's feedback for improvement?
- **Opportunities:**
- What are other freelancers doing?
- What are other startups doing?
- What is the scenario of the market?
- What is the extra work they provide you outside your skillset?
- What is the opportunity with competitors but you are missing?
- **Threats :**
- What are your competitors doing?
- What are other freelancers doing?
- What is their skill set?
**Golden statement:**
1. **सफलता** **एक** **चुनौती** **है** **इसे** **स्वीकार** **करो** **देखो** **क्याकमी** **रह** **गई** **और** **सुधार** **करो** **I**
2. **किसी** **किसी** **के** **किस्से** **में** **आता** **है** **मौका** **नसीब** **वालों** **केहिस्से** **में** **आता** **है** **I**
Therefore, you should identify the opportunity and reduce threats. You should diversify as the famous quote “don’t put all eggs in the same basket.”
**5. Always strive to improve as a freelancer**
Also, you should build an extra skillset. For example, if you are a content writer, you can be a graphic designer also. The Internet provides you immense options for improving.
You can join an online course because the more you know, the more valuable you become. You can increase your prices with extra knowledge.
**Golden statement:**
**जान** **लेना** **प्रकर्ति** **है** **मान** **लेना** **संस्कृति** **है** **और** **सुधार** **लेना** **प्रगति** **है** **I**
**#2 How to set up your office?**
Don't spend too much on the office setup because it's not about where you work it's about how well you work.
But some people feel that working from home means isolation and he should go office and meet people.
**Golden statement:**
**अपने** **होसलो** **के** **दम** **पर** **हम** **अपनी** **प्रतिभा** **दिखा** **देंगे****.** **भले** **हीकोई** **मंच** **न** **डे** **पर** **अपना** **मंच** **हम** **खुद** **बना** **देंगे** **I**
Try to work from home but still if you have to make an office you should keep in mind:
- Is there the right renting space?
- Can you afford it?
- Can you work at night?
- What is the minimum deposit?
- What is the service or lease rent?
**You should consider these points for your office set up:**
- Make office in such a manner that there is space to keep the monitor at least 20 inches away from the eyes.
- Use a comfortable chair where you can sit for 8-9 hours.
- Keep a smartphone with you.
- If you are not a tech-savvy person you should keep a freelancer with you during the initial time.
- Get the best internet service deal.
- You can sit and work but when you feel tired you can move around because it is very important to give a 2 minutes break to your body.
- Don’t ignore the warning sign of your body such as joint stiffness, cramps, pain, blurred vision, etc. while working for long hours.
- So, you should invest in yourself because your learning is the engine of your earning.
**#3 Priority management**
**Poor management:**
**बने** **रहो** **पगला** **काम** **करेगा** **अगला** **बने** **रहो** **cool** **सैलरीमिलेगी** **full I**
You should change this thought kind of through the process.
Nobody is too busy it's all about priority.
You should do the following things:
- Split your project into micro-tasks
- Group similar tasks together
- Do your self-review daily about:
- What went well?
- What went wrong?
- What can be improved?
- Save time for training also
- Set priority for 3 things not on time-based but task-based
**Golden statement:**
**काम** **करते** **रहने** **को** **काम** **करना** **नहीं** **कहते** **काम** **खत्मकरने** **को** **काम** **करना** **कहते** **हैं** **I**
- Schedule your breaks
- Plan your day and start your day with the hardest task
- Turn off WiFi first to avoid WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram messages
- Create and connect your deadlines
- Keep a tracker of your time and maintain a digital environment
- Check the ideal and actual time
- Maintain the sheet of how long do you work
- Describe your morning work time
- Maintain your project work, marketing, and administrative time
- Describe when you socialize with people
- Describe your afternoon work time
- Check your exercise time, dinner time, and bedtime
Therefore, you should work towards the betterment of your schedules because the entrepreneurial journey is quite hectic.
**Golden statement:**
**Develop a passion for learning. If you do you will never cease to grow.**
You should have an addiction to learning. If you emphasise 1000 days on extraordinary learning, you will become a super-specialist.
**#4 Contract and paperwork**
**Golden statement:**
- **Until a contract is signed, nothing is real.**
- **कई** **बार** **शतरंज** **का** **आना** **भी** **जरूरी** **आता** **है** **कई** **बारदुसरा** **मोहरा** **चल** **रहा** **आता** **है** **और** **हम** **यारी** **दोस्तीनिभाने** **में** **लगे** **होते** **हैं** **I**
- **It is almost impossible to unsign the contract, so do all the thinking before you sign the contract.**
So you should make a proper contract.
A startup should contact a company named “ Legal Leo “They make a contract for all the start-up companies.
You should follow these things:
- In the contract, you should do try to take the down payment from your customer first.
- You should outsource your accounting or bookkeeping.
- You should automate your invoice reminders.
- Build financial forecasting for your startup.
- You should charge a fee for late payments.
- You should invest in accounting software.
- Also, you should save money for taxes and savings.
- Even if you work free for someone, make a contract for that also.
- You should plan a late payment in the contract.
- You should plan various types of payment options and maintain a cash reserve as well.
- Also, make a budget.
**Golden statement:**
**The budget is telling your money where it goes instead of wondering where it went.**
The budget will give you a direction.
You should collect your checkbook, bank statement, and credit card statement for the last 12 months and check where have you spend.
Make a checklist of your family vacations, rent, medical bill, etc, and see how much you can earn per month to cover your expenses.
**Example:**
- Your expense is Rs. 30,000 per month.
- You should do the business of at least Rs. 50, 000 per month to cover your expenses.
Freelancing doesn’t bring the same amount each month. You might earn more or less. So, when you earn more, you should save for expenses, taxes, and retirement planning. Also, you should separate your personal and business expenses.
**Golden statement:**
**जब** **कमाई** **और** **खर्चे** **का** **हिसाब** **रखोगे** **तभी** **जीवन** **कोलाजवाब** **रखोगे** **I**
You can contact Starter’s CFO for your accounts and finance and it will help you in:
- Automate accounting process
- Government schemes benefits
- Expansion strategy
- Fundraising
So, they work like a virtual accountant. If you hire an accountant, you might have to pay him a salary of Rs. 20, 000 but this might work for you at Rs. 5-10000. So, they do the work of 2 accountants for you.
So, you should work on paperwork.
Mr. Entrepreneur shares that during the initial days of his business, he faced a loss of Rs. 70 lakhs from a client due to paperwork.
**Golden statement:**
**किसी** **की** **झूठी** **कदमों** **की** **आहट** **मेरा** **भरोसा** **न** **कुचल** **दे** **I**
You do paperwork not because you win the court case rather you do it so that you don’t have to go to court.
So, you must hire a knowledgeable lawyer and accountant for:
- LLP
- Partnership
- Proprietorship
- Private limited
You can contact Legal Leo for:
- Business permits
- Taxes
- Licenses
- Registration
- Necessary paperwork
- Contract drafting
- IPR(Intellectual property rights)
- Money recovery
- Trademark & copyrights
- Online platform for legal sheets where you can get legal sheets at a low price
- Contract advantages & disadvantages
- Legal entity
- Registration of intellectual properties
**#5 Market Segmentation**
**Golden statement:**
1. **Market segmentation makes it easy for marketers to personalise their business campaign**.
2. **Startup success happens when you see through the eyes of the customer**, **not through the perspective of the company.**
Therefore, what you see doesn't matter all that matters is the viewpoint of the customer and you should design your campaign from the customer viewpoint.
You should do the following things to know consumer viewpoint:
- Market survey
- Organise research
- Meet end user
- Understand application
Also, you should know about:
- Who is your customer?
- What are its characteristics?
- Who can be your partners?
- What is the market size?
- What is your competition?
- What complementary assets do you need?
So, you should narrow down your market to satisfy the people because you will know the number of persons.
**Golden statement:**
>**A startup does not by hiring people, building products, or hiring developers. It begins by fulfilling the unmet needs of your customer.**
You should identify the problem that customers could not solve earlier and if you solve this problem, your business will grow automatically.
You should segment the market to know if your customer is well funded, easily assessable.
**Golden statement:**
**Learning is not a product of schooling but a lifelong attempt to acquire it.**
**#6 Customer profiling**
There are 4 types of customers**:**
**1. Blue-chip:**
- Blue-chip gives you a good amount and they are the core of freelance portfolios just like Bluechip stocks.
- For example, Maruti and Reliance are blue-chip companies.
- They are called “major priority clients" which is a source of regular income for your business.
- So, you should maintain blue-chip clients in your business.
- You should maintain at least 2 blue-chip clients so that one leaves others will help you to survive.
**Golden statement:**
**When you serve your customer better, they will return your investment later.**
**2. Growth investment:**
- You get some business in a large company say Maruti.
- Now you should nurture this growth investment.
- You should meet employees, leaders, and try to make more business from the company.
- You can get business from various departments of the company such as the production department, service department, etc.
- So, initially, you get some work but you nurture the relationship and get more work.
- So, this is a growth investment.
**3. One time project :**
- You will get time project say annual project or 4 months project.
- They can never be your primary source of income rather they should be quick incremental supplement income for your business.
**Golden statement:**
**The time you invest should be in proportion to the income potential.**
- You should consider these 3 pillars in case of a one-time project:
- Cost
- Scope
- Timeline
- You should make a balance in the portfolio in the starting only. You should ensure to prepare the following things in the beginning only:
- Direction
- Deliverable
- Payment procedures
- Dispute policies
**4. ARPU:**
- This model will give you a monthly income.
- For example, Airtel where you pay some amount every month which is ARPO (average revenue per user).
- If you have such clients you will sustain for a longer period.
- You should do the following things:
- **Focused pilot market:** You should do a focused pilot market and after winning your pilot market you should go for expansion.
- **Narrow down market:** You should narrow down your market to make high initial profits. You become king of the initial market and then you have to enter the other markets.
**Golden statement:**
**Ignoring multiple market segments increases the focus on value creation.**
Initially, you don't have to run behind many things. Instead, you should build focus on a particular thing and become a super-specialist.
Why should you do a focused pilot market?
- Dominate small market
- Learn from the mistakes of small markets
- Use limited resources
- Word of mouth
**For Example:**
**1. Keventers**
- Keventers started with a focused market.
- When it becomes popular, it expanded its market through franchisees.
**2. Amazon**
- Amazon focused market was of books.
- First, it won this market, and later on, it introduced the other categories.
- But initially, it focused on revenue, profits, infrastructure, product category, portfolio, the portal through its focused market.
- Later on, it used its logistical and technical infrastructure in other categories such as electronics, grocery, fashion, etc and now it has become a multibillion-dollar company,
**3. Tinder**
- A startup named “Tinder” was started in the year 2012.
- Its focused pilot market was college students.
- It hired them as representatives and asked them to promote the product.
- These students organised parties and allowed people who had the Tinder app on their mobile.
- So, this way Tinder became famous in colleges.
- Later on, it spread in 196 countries and made millions of followers.
**4. LinkedIn**
- LinkedIn focused pilot market was recruiters.
- If the person who will help in getting a job will first be added, the job seekers will automatically follow them.
Also, you should make a user profile of your customer for a focused pilot market.
**Golden statement:**
**If you don’t focus on your end used immensely, your brand will die continuously.**
You should know the following things about your user profile:
- Age
- Gender
- Income
- Fear
- Geographic location
- Newspaper/ websites
- Motivation to buy
- Growth stories
**For Example:**
**1. Ola/Uber**
- Ola /Uber provided ride sharing.
- Generally, these are used by young professionals or college students.
- People with high incomes generally use their car, they don't share the ride.
After the user profile, you have to find the TAM (Total addressable market) which is a revenue opportunity for you.
**TAM = Number of end-user profile X Annual revenue each profile**
**For example:**
- TAM for a K Business can be calculated as:
- TAM = Price ( Rs. 30, 000) X Businessman/Student (Rs 50, 000)
- = Rs. 150, 00,00,000
Also, you should find the customer's persona which is a mini-biography of your customer.
You should find out his goals, strengths, motivation, description, and send him a marketing message to him and influence him.
**#7 Decision-making unit**
You should identify the decision-maker.
You should identify the following things about your decision-making unit:
- Needs
- Secondary influencer
- Media publications
- Outside contractors
- Friends & family
- Industry
- Websites / blogs
**Golden statement:**
**जिंसके** **शब्दों** **में** **भाव** **होता** **है** **उनके** **शब्दों** **में** **कुछ** **तोप्रभाव** **होता** **है** **I**
You should identify the veto power means the decision making power of your customer. Also, if you are selling a product to a company you need to identify the veto power of the department such as the purchasing department.
You can ask the following questions from your customers:
- Besides you, who takes the decision?
- Who is the most influential?
- Who can stop you from making a decision?
**For example:**
- In Educational Business to become sub-promotor, the end-user is the customer.
- Decision-makers are parents in some cases.
- He is the buyer and influencers are the successful franchises.
**#8 Market research vs. validation**
You should do market research and not an institution.
**For example:**
- OYO researched that a middle class can pay Rs. 1000- 2000 for a hotel room stay.
- Ola researched that person who finds difficulty in parking and driving but wants a good experience can become their customer.
- All these were outcomes of the research and not intuition**.**
- Urban clap owner, Mr. Abhiraj started his company named Cinema box to provide internet facility in the train, bus, auto, airplane, etc but it failed due to lack of research.
- Later on, he started an Urban clap and it became a multibillion-dollar company.
**Golden statement:**
> **Your business gains leads by meeting the needs of your customers.**
**#9 Product development**
Now you have understood your customer and you are moving from freelancing to business and you have to develop the product.
This is known as MVBP (minimum viable business product).
You have to make a viable product that provides value to the customer. Your product should be sufficient that get feedback as well. This will help in building an improvement cycle.
**Golden statement:**
**सारी** **चीज़ें** **काम** **की** **सबका** **अपना** **मोल** **जो** **सच्चाफायदा** **बाताए** **वो** **सबसे** **अनमोल** **I**
You should also do a measurement of your MVBP as follows:
- Is the customer repeatedly using and paying for your product?
- Is he advocating and giving positive word of mouth about your product?
- Look for trends
- Understand and scale the feature that is repeatedly used by the customer
**Golden statement:**
**The only way to win is to learn faster than anyone else.**
You should ask yourself these questions:
- How to collect data about consumer preferences?
- How to decrease initial investment?
- How to identify and fit bugs?
- How can you faster product in the market faster?
You should collect data about the following things:
- User ratings
- User engagement
- User download
- User retention
- User repurchase
- Percentage of paying user
- Average revenue rate per user
**#10 Build your brand**
You should make your portfolio of your brand.
**Golden statement:**
**A brand is no longer what we tell the customer it is. it is what customers tell each other about you.**
As a freelancer, you should build your brand by:
- Uploading full-page image on the website
- Writing about all skills in the portfolio
- Add testimonials about customer positive feedback about you
- Link all social media channels to your website
- Give personal updates about your work through e-mails
- Represent yourself on social media in such a way so that people view you as an expert in your field
- Keep your portfolio completely professional
**Golden statement:**
**Excellent presentations get sold without hesitation.**
Your business card should stand out differently. You should mention these things in your business card:
- Who are you?
- What do you do?
- Unique value
- Contact details
**#11 Customer acquisition**
You should make a balanced portfolio that consists of:
- Optimal clients
- Steady cash flow
- Income goals
**Golden statement:**
**1. When freelancers are asked their biggest problem in the freelancing business they said “ Finding clients.”**
**2. You don’t get paid for the time you spend, you get paid for the value you create.**
You should do the following things:
**1. Introspection:**
- How will the customer know about my brand?
- How will customers analyse my product?
- How will the customer acquire my product?
- How will the customer pay for my product?
**Golden statement:**
**The best freelancers follow consumers empathy.**
**2. Build a network:**
- You should join a professional association
- Join events
- Give a small talk about your expertise
- Create a loved bank account of relationships
- The combination of networking is client referrals, freelancers, and your prospecting
- Tap your existing network and build relations with them
**3. Pre-qualified prospects:**
- Make sure that you connect with the right customer
- Don't ask for the job to ask how you can help them
- Stay in touch without being creepy
**4. Choose your prospect:**
- What makes them ideal?
- Are they fit with your skills?
- What are their size, pay scale, and reputation?
- Do they have blue-chip potential?
- Which organisations do they join?
- Which website/blog do they follow?
**For example:**
- Johnson& Johnson's target customer was in major cities.
- They placed their advertisements on Youtube and Google because people in these cities used them to get knowledge about child care.
5. Start with industries where you have already worked
6. Don’t be obsessed about how to say it
7. Follow up, follow up, follow up
**Golden statement:**
**Not following up with your prospect is the same as filling your bathtub without putting a stopper in the drain.**
8. Know when to persist or resist
9. CRM to track the conversation
**Golden statement by Mr. Bill Gates:**
**How you will gather, manage, or use information will determine whether you will win or lose.**
Also, you should do following things for customer acquisition:
- Sharing lead as investment
- Consistency builds recalled value
- Common connections
- Build authority
- Build your trusted inner circle
- Job portals
- Cold calling
- Local agencies
- Freelancers & entrepreneurs
- Create compelling business cards
- Google alerts for relevant news
- Sample portfolio
- List & get introduced to agencies
- Build an online reputation
- Export of new tools
- Case studies on your expertise
- Targeted ads for the ideal client
- Directories list
- Join a co-working space
- 30 minutes phone conversation
- Partner with people who complement your skill
- Monthly newsletter
- Register to freelance newspaper
- Use websites for startup
**Golden statement:**
**The struggle you are in today is developing the strength you need tomorrow.**
Also, the sales cycle of customer acquisition should cover the following points:
- Number of days required to acquire a customer
- Length of the sales cycle
**#12 Pricing strategy**
**Golden statement:**
**Your goal shouldn’t be just to pay your bills but to be paid what you are worth.**
You should do the following things for pricing:
- Always ask for a budget before giving a price
- Always say “we”
- Always shows bundled price
- Call yourself a consultant
- Don’t lower the rate for the hope of future work
- Do free work for testimonials
- Exclude revision from your scope
- Learn to say “no”
- Listen more than you talk
- Decide shorter days at a higher rate
- Schedule work with a milestone- track your time
- Use value-based pricing
- Know how much you will charge
- Plan your fee structure
- Calculate your fee structure
- Know your lowest price-don’t go below that
- Know the benchmark for rates in the industry
- Calculate and communicate the worth to the client
- Don't fear price fluctuations
- Add a special budget for change in scope of work
- Calculate COGS (Cost of goods sold)
- Break down the decision-making unit
- Pricing should be based on the life cycle of the product
- Predatory pricing
- Define end consumer profile
- Milking of skimming
- Barrier pricing
- Penetration pricing
- Loss leading
**Golden statement :**
**The moment you are making a mistake in the pricing, you are eating your profit.**
- Freemium pricing
- Premium pricing
- One time upfront charge + maintenance
- Cost-plus model
- Hourly rate
- Subscription
- Licencing
- Consumables
- Upsell –high margin product
- Advertising platform- media/YouTube/Google
- Operating and maintenance
- Transaction fee
- Usage base
- ARPU(average revenue per user)
- Franchisee model
- Offer flexibility in the pricing model
If you do overprice it will reduce sales, if you do underprice it will reduce profit, so you should do the right pricing.
**Golden statement:**
**जंगल** **की** **अर्थव्यस्था** **चाहे** **कुछ** **भी** **हो** **शेरर** **कभी** **घासनहीं** **खाता** **I**
**#13 Negotiation**
**Golden statement:**
**Freelancing doesn’t mean work for free. If you are good at something, never do it for free.**
You should keep in mind these points for negotiation:
- Never go blind when you go for negotiation. You should read about following things:
- Read financials
- Press release
- Compliances
- Website
**Golden statement:**
**Never negotiate out of fear but never fear to negotiate.**
- Identify you must have
- Think twice before lowering your price
- Silence is a powerful tool
- Be cool about talking money
**Golden statement:**
**It's very very hard to cost out a project accurately without the proper information.**
- Don’t work for free
- Be selective and trust your gut
- Determine your minimum acceptable rate
- Start with quoting a high price
- Seek a mutually agreeable outcome
**Golden statement:**
**He who learns to disagree without being disagreeable has discovered the most valuable secret of negotiation.**
- Expecting way more than they are paying for
**Golden statement:**
**A good reputation is more valuable than money.**
**#14 Quantify your value proposition**
You should create and show value by explaining:
- How you are adding to their project?
- How is your skill a great match for their project?
- Every skill has a price
- Value creation is the foundation of the pyramid
Benefits of quantifying value proposition are:
- More compelling and data-oriented
- Selling ammunition
- Easy to price
- Differentiator
Don’t sell the product rather sell the outcome.
You should consider these points:
- The critical success factor of the customer
- The critical success factor of customer's customer
- The critical success factor of your customer's competitor
**#15 Offseason or dry time**
Your business can be seasonal but your commitment should not be seasonal.
Benefits of dry time are:
- It pushes you to “ask”
- AAFTO-Always ask for the order
To save yourself from damage during the dry time you should follow these things:
- Follow a strong routine
- Potential blue-chip client
- Prospecting
- Cold calling
- Referrals
- Build new contacts
- Build networks
- Revive old contacts
- Use online platforms
- Capture customer’s mindshare
- Evaluate the business model
- Focus on what you can’t do in a season
- Consider bartering
- Do volunteering work
- Prepare a financial cushion
- Go where the season is
- Extend your season
- Serve other industries
- Build strategic partnerships
- 10 X your content marketing
- Work on technology automation
- Build scarcity with limited edition products
- Give new life to your old data
**#16 Cost of customer acquisition**
You should understand about following points:
- Profitability
- Lifetime value
- Cost
**Golden statement:**
**Acquiring anew customer is 7X costlier than retaining an existing customer**.
- Estimate the lifetime value of the customer
- Average revenue on a new customer
- Customer lifetime value
- Customer revenue streams
- One time revenue stream
- Recurring revenue stream
- Additional revenue opportunities
- Repurchase rate
Following are the benefits of lifetime value:
- More saving
- Brand loyalty
- Saves time
**Golden statement:**
**ग्राहक** **को** **यदि** **मिल** **गया** **ज़रूरत** **से** **ज्यादा** **तभी** **वोदेंगे** **आपको** **lifetime value** **का** **वादा** **I**
Lifetime value can be calculated with the help of following:
- Average purchase rate = Total revenue / Number of order
- Average purchase frequency rate = Number of purchase / Number of customers
You can improve customer lifetime value by improving:
- Customer satisfaction
- Customer retention
COCA = Facebook ad/ Customers acquired
**For example:**
**1. Facebook Ad**
- You spend Rs.1000 on Facebook ad and acquired 100 customers.
- So, the cost of acquiring one customer is Rs.10.
- Now, you spend Rs 10 on acquiring the customer and if he brings the business of Rs.5 only, your business will not retain.
- But if he brings the business of Rs. 30, it will survive.
Therefore, your cost should always be less than your lifetime value.
**2. Amazon**
- Amazon spends Rs.6500 for bringing one customer who buys products worth Rs.650 and it saves Rs.65 only.
- So it faces a loss of Rs. 6415 in adding one new customer.
- But this customer buys from Amazon repeatedly and becomes a member of Amazon Prime.
- So the lifetime value of this customer is more, so the initial amount invested by Amazon gets recovered.
Golden statement:
COCA को करके काम आप ला सकते हैं अपनेव्यपार में दम I
Also clarified expectation helps in customer retention so you should follow these things:
- Discuss the complete scope of work
- Decide communication practices
- Availability on weekdays, weekends and holidays
- Method of monitoring progress
- Feedback & approvals
- Policies & procedures
- If something can derail a project, record it
- Stay in close communication with client always
- Ask for the right medium E-mail/message/ WhatsApp/call
- If client is upset let him vent out his emotion
- Never go out of communication
# **#17 Be there/ prepare/ say “you care”**
You should do the following things:
- Make notes when you meet customers
- Ask a feedback
- Friend raising vs. fundraising
- Keep up with the latest news about clients
- Prepare an agenda before every meeting
- Send a recap e-mail after every meeting
- Underpromise & over-deliver
- Say what you can do not what you can’t
- Be on time
- Avoid multitasking on calls
- Don’t take calls in between meetings
- Stay in touch
- Build transparency
- Personal caring
- Stay close while breaking bad news
Always keep in mind the following points while giving feedback:
- Stay focused on project, task, timelines
- Collect your thoughts and speak prepared
- Be honest & respectful
- Suggest solutions
- Be positive
- Follow up in writing and take a buy-in
- Honour commitments
- Be responsible for money
- Acknowledging is not admitting
- All clients and all projects are not equal
- Always begin with the good news
- Acknowledge, analyse and act
- Use the statement of "I can" and not "I can't"
- Don't take the blame for what isn't your fault
- Take responsibility when it is your fault
- Never let the client dominate- be assertive
- Always have an exit strategy with the tough client
# **#18 Next new market**
Now after startup, you have to scale up in the following ways:
- Identify gaps in the outer market
- Begin with the market of the periphery
- Give less quantity and less credit to a distributor
- Don’t block your money
- Take payment before 2nd supply
- Decide your credit limit
- Become a local brand
- Market share 10%- move further
- Create visibility in the local market first
- Control distribution cost
- Keep delivery and distribution cost reasonable
- Same commercial terms across all trade
- Estimate the total addressable market size (TAM)
Golden statement:
नये की पहचान कर बेहतर से बेहतर का अनुमान करनये की पहचान कर बेहतर से बेहतर का अनुमान कर I
- Follow up on the new market by asking yourself:
o What is the next target market?
o How to build a scalable business?
o What is the total opportunity size?
- Define your core
- Build your core by:
o Unique idea
o What is highly valuable for customers?
o Intellectual property or patent
- A fundamental element to a strong core:
o Unique
o Important
o Continuous growth
## Examples of core:
- Microsoft- Intellectual property protection
- Pharma industry- patent & licensing
- Unilever/Pepsi- Distribution network
- Xiaomi- Exclusive rights with Pepsi
- OYO- Affordable hotel rooms
- Reliance Jio- High capital investment
- Big bazaar- economies of scale
- Dominos- excellent customer service
- Apple- loyalty beyond logic
- Hindustan Unilever- ongoing innovation
- Patanjali – the national sentiment
- Mr. Entrepreneur- Personality
- Mr. Entrepreneur business core- company’s name
# **#19 How to scale your business?**
You should check the following points for scaling your business:
- Immediate cash flow
- Regular cash flow
- Sustainable cash flow
- Increasing cash flow
- Personal time
You should so MBA-management by absence by:
- I-Integration
- D-Delegation
- E-Elimination
- A-Automation
- L-Liberation
You can increase your turnover by:
- More customers
- More transactions
- More frequency
- More price
- More products
# **#20 Technology for speed & scale**
There are 3 T s for scaling which are:
- T- Training
- T- Technology
- T- Team
## For Example:
**1. Tansh**
- Tansh is a brand that has build technology for jewelers.
- They have built online technology for jewelry.
- It has become a medium to connect jewelry manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers.
- They also generate leads.
- They have connected more than 170 jewelers covered 10 cities.
- They optimize SEO.
- They have a 24 x 7 range available of more than 10000 products.
- Tansh has scaled through technology.
Golden statement:
> The more your money works for you the less you have to work for money.
Therefore, you should build technology.
Also, you can move from solopreneur to entrepreneur by:
- Raise price
- Market yourself to higher-paid clients
- Subcontract work
- Develop passive income streams
- Attend complete business training
- Develop multiple income streams
- Geographical expansion
- Consortium based projects
- The new technology transfer agreement
- Higher capacity utilisation
- Explore new market
- The global internet e-commerce company
- Political & economic factors in the destination country
- Consideration of working capital
- Localisation is the real globalisation
- Distributor / Super stockiest/ C&F
Following are the benefits of a distribution network:
- Low sales marketing & distribution cost
- Market penetration becomes easy
- Trustworthy partners in the market
- Improves efficiency
How to find the most favourable distributor?
- Hire sales representatives & channel sales, representative
- Join industry association
- Attend trade shows & exhibitions
- Use websites designed especially for distributors
- Keep an open eye on competitors
- Become a ground-level SME during initial days
- Take help of existing distributor
You should do the following things for the recruitment of a distributor:
- Exciting aspirational packages
- Great offers
- Total solution
- Training
- Service
- Price & catalogues
- ROI
- Demo team support
- Testimonial package
- Media plan
- Customised product
- Marketing team support
# **#21 Proven start-up
You should join business consulting franchise that has following advantages:
- Lifetime opportunity to get associated with Entrepreneurs
- Direct learning & training from Entrepreneurs
- Pull product
- Work from home opportunity
- Part time & full-time options
- No infrastructure
- No office
- By monthly commission payment
- Opportunity to represent
- Direct support from our CP & HO
- Handholding support from our local trainer
- Marketing support
- Freedom to sell from anywhere
- Free & easy EMI options
- Virtually zero investment
- No minimum qualification
- Network opportunity
- Free Everything about entrepreneurship
- Quarterly rewards & recognition
- Learning management system
- Assistance- customer conversion
- Learn management skills
- Referral scheme