4 Common Startup Mistakes You Don’t Want To Make

Launching a startup is never easy. Besides trying to build a company from the ground up, most new entrepreneurs have very little or absolutely no experience in the business world. Due to this lack of experience, many startups make mistakes that can sometimes have a considerably negative effect on their business. If you don’t want to add to their tales of disaster, make sure you take a look at some of the most common mistakes you definitely don’t want to make.

Choosing Your Employees Too Quickly

Almost every business owner will tell you how difficult it is to hire and retain a good employee. But this tends to be an even bigger problem for startup owners, who can’t afford paying big salaries, but also need top-quality employees who will help their business grow. Quite frequently, this leads to new entrepreneurs hiring people who don’t understand and share their vision of the company, but are simply looking for a job. What’s worst about this is that it often leads to startup owners having to face the painful task of letting people go, which can always slow down the project your business is taking on at that moment.

Not Embracing Social Media Enough

Even though we have witnessed social media marketing becoming one of the crucial aspects of running a business, many startup owners are yet to start promoting their businesses on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. A recent study has shown that 68% of Australian internet users have a social media profile, which means all of the platforms mentioned above are a perfect place to promote your business. Having a place where you can share all the information about your business and the products or services you are offering can do wonders for your sales. Just make sure your posts don’t sound too promotional if you don’t want to start losing followers.

Not Dealing With Customers Who Can’t Repay Their Debt

If your business operates on an invoicing system, you will usually give your customers between 30 and 90 days to send in their payments. Sometimes, your customers won’t be able to repay their debt because of a bill getting lost in a pile of papers or their customer not paying them on time. No matter what the reason for shark psychology of not paying their debt on time is, you have to make sure this doesn’t slow down your business. Luckily, today there are many ways you can deal with unpaid debt. One of the best things you can do in a situation like this is turn to invoice factoring and sell your accounts to a third party who will collect your customer’s debt for you.

Taking Advice from Others Too Often

When launching a startup, you are always going to receive a lot of feedback and criticism. Listening to these to make sure your business is moving in the right direction is always a good idea. Still, if you let others influence the way you run your business too much, you will slowly start to lose control over your own business – and there’s no need to say that this is never a good thing. On the other hand, sticking to the original idea and using every piece of advice you get cleverly will help your business grow and attract more customers. Unfortunately, not too many new entrepreneurs do this, and they end up being pulled in too many directions.

All of these 4 mistakes are not only common but quite costly as well – meaning that they can end your entrepreneurial endeavor even before it gets a decent shot at the market. That’s why avoiding them is something every startup owner should focus on.