When it comes to building something that you want to turn into a business and earn a living from, there’s a lot of paths to success.
Sometimes you go viral because one specific person tweeted you. Other times there’s 3-4 years of hard work behind the scenes before a coordinated launch effort.
Maybe you’re the guy who spent 18 months doing daily videos about wine before you got your breakthrough moment.
Your path is going to be different than everyone before you and everyone after you.
That’s the beauty of building a business. Nobody else is going to do it like you can do it.
Be uniquely you, and never stop improving yourself and your position.
Investing in yourself is the most important investment you’ll ever make, and investing the right amount of time, energy and money can be the difference between a failed business and an absolute success.
Cash Investments
Investing your own cash is one of the most common ways that people tell you to invest in yourself or your business. Sure, there’s a lot of great things that can come from a lot of funding being pushed through your business.
However, I believe that too much cash investment becomes a crutch to build something profitable instead of trying to build something useful.
It takes your eyes off the end goal, and focuses a lot of attention on how to recoup your cash investment.
However, there are some easy ways to invest cash in your business without letting yourself become dependent on it for your survival.
Business necessities
You build for the web, right? Then you’re going to need to invest in the following, at the very least:
- Domain name
- Hosting account
- Social media accounts
The above cash investment will cost you anywhere from $20+ depending on what hosting provider you go with and what domain name you choose.
These are the bare minimum needs for an online business.
At this point, you can hustle your way into some cash which you can then flip and invest in the other necessities that come with running a business.
Depending on your business and what your ultimate goals are, you’ll also need to make sure you’ve got analytics set up, a couple marketing automation tools, a DBA or LLC, an accountant (or accounting software), marketing materials like business cards, and the list goes on and on.
Business extras
Now that you’ve got some of the basics out of the way, what about investing in some of the cooler items as a business owner?
How about your own t-shirts branded with your logo? Maybe you’re wanting to attend a conference and have your own booth to interact with people at? You might also want to wrap your entire car in your logo like the Kush Gods?
The ultimate goal when you invest is to get a return on that investment, so make sure that you’re spending your money wisely and holding onto some for a rainy day.
If not, you’ll be paying for it in sweat equity.
I know this feeling all too well.
Sweat Equity
The other way that you’ll see a lot of business owners invest in their own company is through sweat equity.
Putting your own time and energy into a project is what sweat equity is, and the amount of return you get on your sweat equity is based on the amount of skill and drive you have within yourself.
Some people build businesses and hire out workers to create the actual products.
People like me build it ourselves instead, putting sweat equity into the product, pushing it to become a sustainable source of income.
When that happens, then you can re-evaluate how you’re spending your cash and figure out different ways of investing in your business.
Hard work pays off
Building something yourself is very rewarding. The amount of joy I felt when I launched WP Dispensary is unrivaled by anything else I’ve done over the last decade.
Coming up with an idea, working on it (sometimes for months, like I did with WP Dispensary) and releasing it for the world to use is fucking awesome.
If you haven’t done it yet, I’d highly recommend it. There’s no other feeling in the world that’s like it.
Focus on the plan
You’ve got your online accounts set up, you’ve got your business accounts set up and now it comes time to actually put the work in.
Are you going in blind, or do you have a business plan put together?
It can be a loose plan and should never been too long term. Things change in business much too fast for you to have a 10 year plan.
Think in years, plan in months, work in days. ????????????????
— Robert DeVore (@deviorobert) May 23, 2016
Sometimes you get muddled with all of the details and never actually get your business off the ground.
Planning can be endless. Instead of overthinking, try overdoing.
Get out there today and build something.
Blood sweat and tears go into great businesses, and if you’re not willing to invest in yourself, why should anyone else?
Long term goals are great, but have a loose plan on how you want to get there.
Then execute that plan relentlessly.
One last piece of advice
Investing in yourself is great, and it helps you to feel more confident about your business and yourself as a business owner.
But don’t overspend.
You don’t want to end up broke, scrambling to keep the lights on and food on your table while your business is barely off the ground.
Trust me, it’s not a great position to be in.
Save! Save! Save!
Whatever profit you receive, put a percentage of it away and never touch it. That’s your emergency funds and should only be used in times of great need.
Starting a business is rough, and the added pressure of not knowing how you’re going to pay your rent will only distract you from your main goals even more than you already may be.
Don’t let yourself get into that spot.
Work hard, be nice to people and save as much as possible. Then, and only then should you invest cash.
Until then, work the plan and sweat your ass off!
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