You work full-time but it’s just not what you imagined your life to be like. Punching the clock, taking orders from someone else, and draining your life away. No, what will really wake you up is starting your own online business and that’s just what you’ll do. But a bit of an obstacle stands in the way: your current job. How on earth are you ever supposed to start a successful online business when already working full-time? RepricerExpress is here to tell you it’s not just possible — millions have already done it — but it’s possible.
Find Something You’re Really Passionate About
If you’re going to take the big leap of actually quitting a steady, paying gig for one that’s completely on the other end of the spectrum, you’d better darn well love it or you’ll be in trouble before it even starts. You’re going to be spending just about every waking hour in the beginning on getting your business off the ground, and it will be a lot easier if you can find something about it to look forward to.
Making money is nice, but there are easier ways of earning it than starting an enterprise completely from scratch. Another thing to consider: people who follow an unconventional path don’t typically do so because money is their primary goal.
Choose the Less Risky Path
You don’t have to risk everything to try building up an online business, but that’s in fact what many do. They invest in an online store, buys lots and lots of stock and then realise they have little money left to tell the world where their site is and what it sells—the result is little traffic and even fewer sales. As a general rule, if you spend £20,000 on setting up an online shop, you should have at least double that to drive traffic to it. Whilst that’s an over-simplified statement, hopefully, it will help many realise that setting up an online store is but part of a complex jigsaw that together offer the chance of success.
There is a much less risky way of selling online that actually offers many more benefits to you as a seller, not least of all cost. And it’s a way that more and more individuals are turning to. The route is selling on Amazon as a third-party seller and perhaps FBA seller in the future. Set up your Amazon Seller Central account, find some stock to sell and try it out. There’s sometimes a free trial for the Pro Account (which is worth using first as it can save you a lot of hassle if you decide to continue selling on Amazon).
Soak up Everything You Can Before You Start
Before someone can cannonball off a diving board, they need to know how to swim. And before they can know how to swim, they need to know how to tread water and hold their breath.
It’s the same with starting your own business. As savvy as you may think yourself in knowing how to start a business, simply having a passion for certain products isn’t enough. There are so many more concepts involved, like taxes, marketing, advertising, finances, computer programming, the art of repricing and more. And plus, do you have a plan in place for all the unexpected that can — and will — happen? Unless you’ve been in the situation before, it’s always better to study and find a mentor who can guide you. And if you choose the Amazon route, there is more than enough information available to help you along.
Prepare for a Really Tough Slog at First
One of the first things you’ll notice at first, except if you’re one of the really rare few who hits a grand slam on your first at-bat, is that things will really suck. You’ll have a hard time moving your inventory, hits in the triple digits will be an excellent day, money will be incredibly slow to come in, and you’ll wonder more than once why you ever made the decision.
Hang in there.
Give yourself at least 18 months to really give it a go before you even think about giving up. And if you think that’s too long, think back to how long it took you to get your current job, and not just the application process itself. Think about the years of education you had to put in, any months of side training/interning/volunteering, and how you’ve prepared your whole life to finesse the social skills necessary to deal with all sorts of people.
18 months of working at starting your own online business doesn’t seem like so long now, does it?
Amass a Rainy Day Fund
If you’re smart about your finances, you’ve no doubt piled up a little nest egg that can see you through tough times, like a stretch of unemployment. Well, think of starting your own business as that stretch. What you have right now is the luxury of a steady paycheque, and put as much of that aside as you can.
When you start, you’ll be putting more money into your online business than you thought possible, and there’ll come a day when you’ll be incredibly happy and relieved to know you’ve got the account balance to float it. Take on overtime and any extra hours you can find: not only will the added money help you out when you least expect it, but working more than you’re used to will be great practice for when you finally take the leap.
Final Thoughts
Starting an online business when you’re currently working a full-time job is far from easy, but it’s most certainly doable, and it’s definitely less risky via Amazon. And we here at RepricerExpress want to do what we can to make your life and business enterprise easier, such as offering a 15-day free trial on our repricing software. It’s one less factor you have to worry about so you can focus on getting all the other pieces right.
