Building With Shoestrings: Lessons I’ve Learned in Bootstrapping Business
50% of all businesses start at home. So many businesses start not with huge amounts of funding and resources but simply with an idea or vision someone has.
It can become challenging to grow your small business in the face of limited or lacking resources. This makes many entrepreneurs quit when the going gets tough.
However, with just a little bit of planning and awareness, you can create wonders with your bootstrapped business. Here’s a handy guide to help you navigate the path of building a business with limited resources and thriving. Keep reading to know more.
1. Stay focussed on your goal
Around 5.4 million applications were received to start a business in 2021. Millions of people are starting their businesses and not all of them have funding backing them up. Most only have an idea and hunger for success.
While there is nothing wrong with aiming high with your business, it’s important to understand the essentials of running and growing a business: earning profits consistently. No matter what your internal goal is with your business, such as helping people or solving their problems, you can only achieve it by earning consistent profits.
For this, you need to have a consistent stream of customers — new and old. You need to attract and engage customers to keep your business up and running. Here is a handy guide to how to generate more leads that will help you get started right away.
Given below are some additional tips to stay focussed on your primary goal of earning profits and moving forward:
- Write down your short-term and long-term goals with your business and stick them somewhere you can always see them. This will serve as a reminder and motivation.
- Set realistic deadlines for yourself to achieve. Following through with them gives you a sense of purpose and keeps you on track.
- Review your work from time to time to see where you’re lagging and would need improvement.
- Keep your focus on meaningful lead generation as it helps you acquire customers that help your business grow.
2. Plan things out
Creating a formal business plan beforehand makes you 16% more likely to have a successful business venture. No matter how big or small a venture is, planning it out beforehand is critical to its success.
Planning your bootstrapped business has paramount benefits, such as:
- Helps you understand the scale of your business, both current and future.
- Helps you procure the needed and suitable resources.
- Prepares you for contingencies.
- Helps you maintain the appropriate cash flow to ensure optimum liquidity.
When you plan your business venture, you’re more equipped to allocate resources and ensure a smooth flow of operations. This gives you financial freedom and keeps you one step ahead of your financial planning.
There are many top financial planning software that will help allocate available resources better while keeping the cash flow liquid. They will ensure that you’re always prepared to handle a project, no matter how limited your resources are.
3. Embrace your bootstrapping ways
Many entrepreneurs feel that they’re inadequate to compete with others in the market because their business is bootstrapped. This is nothing to feel inadequate about. In fact, you should embrace your bootstrapping ways.
Be proud of the fact you’ve built your business with limited resources. Advertise it and let people know how you use limited resources to create stunning products. This helps you earn the trust and sympathy of customers and associates you work with.
They’ll see how authentic you are in your ways and be more willing to engage with you. Embracing your ways lends authenticity and credibility to your business. People can see that there are real people behind the business working hard to take it forward.
Here are a few ways you can embrace your bootstrapping ways:
- Create a compelling story for your brand that highlights how you started with/work with limited resources to bring your products to life because of your passion for your field.
- Display this story permanently on your website (the ‘about’ section) as well as your socials. Create long and short versions as necessary.
- Relate back to this story in everything related to your business as much as you can. For example, describe why it’s important for you to source only the most organic raw materials in your product descriptions because you want to create the best quality products with limited resources.
- Mention it in social media posts in brief and invite users to know more about you from there.
4. Make sure your business is on track
For a bootstrapping startup, reasonable use of HR dashboards can be a game-changer, offering invaluable insights without breaking the bank.
Here are some examples of HR dashboards to use for your new business:
- An employee performance dashboard allows for continuous evaluation and goal tracking, optimizing workforce productivity and minimizing the need for costly performance interventions.
- Workforce demographics dashboards aid in targeted hiring by offering a breakdown of the workforce composition, helping the startup strategically allocate resources.
- The gender salary comparison dashboard ensures equitable pay, a crucial aspect for a business mindful of budget constraints and aiming to avoid legal issues.
- The executive HR dashboard provides leadership with a snapshot of key HR metrics, enabling informed decision-making even in resource-limited scenarios.
- Team role dashboards assist in balancing and optimizing team compositions, potentially reducing turnover costs.
- Finally, the employee development dashboards enable businesses to track training initiatives and identify areas for skill enhancement, contributing to long-term cost savings by fostering a skilled and motivated workforce.
Together, these dashboards empower a bootstrapping startup to make informed HR decisions, foster a positive workplace culture, and strategically allocate resources, ultimately contributing to significant cost savings and the long-term success of the business.
5. Be resourceful
The most important trait of a bootstrapping business is its ability to handle limited resources. While big businesses have the luxury of leaving a resource unattended if it’s not in use, small businesses need to derive the most uses out of every single resource they have.
A simple example of this is using a stapler as a paperweight instead of buying paperweights. This works two-fold to save money you’d spend on buying paperweights while deriving more use out of a stapler.
Of course, business operations are much more complex than that. But this is the essence you need to carry into your essence — making the most out of the resources you have. Here are a few tips on how you can do that:
- Survey all your resources in terms of the function they serve.
- Brainstorm to think of what other functions they can serve to better utility.
- Make sure that deriving multiple functions out of something doesn’t dent it.
- When you acquire a new resource into your organizational structure, pick alternatives that serve multiple functions.
6. Make the most of free resources
An excellent way to make sure your bootstrapped business runs smoothly is to make the most out of the free resources available to you. Most of the services in the market have a free version of them available.
For example, initially, you can make use of any free invoice generator tool from FreshBooks or QuickBooks to create personalized and professional-looking invoices. There’s also a 30-day free trial, allowing you to try it out first before making a purchasing decision.
The catch here is that these free versions don’t have the complete host of functions. However, as a small business, you might not need the full version anyway. Take the free resources and see if they fulfill your particular needs.
If they don’t, you can discard them and try another alternative — getting out without paying a penny. And if they work for you, you get a free service to fulfill your needs. Moreover, you may go ahead and buy full versions of those services when you’re able to.
There are various portals and communities on the internet where you can find out about useful free resources, such as:
Be on the lookout for them to get your hands on them before your competitors and use them to their full potential. Make sure they’re compatible with your system and don’t cause it any harm before incorporating them for the long term.
7. Keep customers your top priority
Serving customers should be your top priority to keep your business up and running. This relates back to the first point about acquiring customers and turning over profits to keep your business afloat.
Ensuring that your customers have a good experience with you is just as necessary to running your bootstrap business. It helps you gain the trust and loyalty of the customer. They’re then:
- More likely to return to your business in the future.
- Going to bring other customers by recommending you to them.
- Going to provide valuable reviews that help you establish credibility.
As a small business, it will be challenging to provide seamless customer service. Follow these simple tips to do more with a few resources:
- Let the customer know beforehand that you’re a small business and are trying your best to serve them the best you can. This relates to the previous point about repeating your story. It also lets the customer know what you’re up to and will not panic if there is any sort of delay.
- Use email or phone messaging services to send scheduled and automatically generated messages relating to purchases and other important information. This relays information instantly and assures the customer that they’re taken care of.
- If you can, deploy a chatbot at your website. It assists the customer as they browse the website and make a purchase. It resolves simple issues instantly and ensures that the customer goes on the desired path with you.
- Dedicate someone in your team to assisting and taking care of customers so that no customer is left unattended at any point.
Stay focused and make the most of what you have to find success as a bootstrap business
Bootstrap businesses start with little money but a big vision to achieve the greatest heights. With simple resourcefulness and knowledge, you can take your business to the next level in no time.
Stay focussed on your goal and remember that turning profits is the most critical element to keep your business afloat. You can achieve this by consistent meaningful lead generation. Plan things out beforehand to ensure financial stability and liquidity. And derive the most uses out of the resources you have to ensure longevity.
Let us know in the comments how you think bootstrap businesses can flourish.
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