Starting a creative business is both exciting and overwhelming. As a new business owner, you’ll likely face road blocks as you strive to build your brand and reach your customers. While some of these challenges are unavoidable, there are steps you can take to reduce the risks of facing them.
So whether you’re just starting out or looking for ways to refine your approach, this post will provide valuable insight on how to keep your creative business on the right track!
Transitioning a Hobby into a Creative Business
Starting a creative business from a hobby is way more common than we think. Jumping in head first, it’s absolutely natural to feel overwhelmed. There’s so many factors that we don’t really understand until we actually do it. BUT, that doesn’t mean we can’t!
Many new creative businesses start out with a single person, however we set our own expectations based on successful existing businesses. That’s not realistic! We don’t know what size their teams are or how long they’ve been building all the things. Keep this in mind while your transitioning your hobby into a business.
Focus on growing on area at a time, make it strong so you’re not getting overwhelmed trying to spin a 100 plates.
Through Makers University, we’ve worked with hundreds of creative businesses and we’ve pulled some of the most common road blocks to talk about in this post.
5 Common Roadblocks that Creative Businesses Can Avoid:
- choosing a business name
- building a website
- social media marketing
- visual branding
- defining ideal customer
I can’t decide on a business name
You’d be surprised how many entrepreneurs struggle with this. Overthinking is usually the culprit. We don’t need our perfect business name right from the start. It’s like trying to buy the dream house with our first home purchase. That’s not how it works!
There are a few main factors to keep in mind:
- Don’t get creative with spelling. Your business name needs to be easy to remember.
- Keep it simple. You can always start with an easy formula like “your name + your products” like Christine’s Wreath Shop
- If you want to leave room for growth or expansion keep a little more broad like “Christine’s Home Decor”
You can always change your business name later. We see so many people get stuck on this 1st step that they don’t end up launching their business. Your business will transition as you grow, so you don’t need to create your dream house just yet.
Where should I build a website…I’m not tech savvy!
The simple answer is you don’t need one. When you’re first getting started use Etsy to create your own online store. It’s a great place to establish your business without having to invest in an expensive website or pay for advertising.
Once you build up a loyal community then determine if it’s more effective to move away from Etsy.
Now, you may be concerned that there are fees associated with running an Etsy store. There should be fees, you’re tapping into their 89.4 million customer base. There’s also costs for hosting your own website too. Even Shopify has fees, but in that case you’ll need to create your own customer base too.
So, hold off on creating that website until it’s a better fit for your time and money.
I don’t like social media!
Social media is necessary for marketing no matter what level of business you’re at. You probably discovered us through one of our social media channels or possibly Google, which is a different marketing strategy all together.
Letting your feelings get in the way of getting your business found online is going to get frustrating for you. Social media is a tool that we can use to find our perfect people! Don’t get in your own way of growing.
Pick a single platform and make it strong. We start with Facebook in the Cha-Ching Blueprint Course and move on to Pinterest, Instagram, and more! Again, trying to do it all as a solopreneur sets the stage for burnout and we don’t want that for you, I’m sure you don’t want that either.
I can’t afford a logo
You don’t need to have a fancy logo! You can create a simple text logo that looks like the one pictured below.
Nothing fancy, just done! This goes back to building our dream house vs our starter home. All of these starting pain points are like paint and carpet. We can redo them when the time is right. If we want to get up and running, making sales. Let’s just get it done!
Help, I don’t know who my perfect customer is!
Sound familiar? Defining our perfect customer is key to creating a successful creative business. Knowing who they are, what they want and how you can reach them helps us make decisions on product design, pricing, marketing tactics and more.
Take the time to create your ideal customer profile today so that you can start making wreaths with confidence! With the right strategies in place, you’ll be able to create wreaths that sell and make sure your business stays successful. Keep in mind your ideal customer profile when designing and marketing your products, as this will ensure that they have the features people are looking for.
Use demographic information to understand who is likely to buy your product so you can accurately target them with the right message. Additionally, keep an eye on industry trends and customer feedback to make sure your products are meeting their needs. With the right customer analysis, you can craft wreaths with greater accuracy and accuracy.
These roadblocks are avoidable!
They truly are. When we get out of our own way and stop overthinking, it’s easier to see that some of these challenges are unnecessary for someone just starting a creative business. We aren’t locked in to our business names, platforms, or branding at all.
It’s all about getting things moving, growing our customer base, and really making sales! Sales create revenue that we can reinvest into our businesses to grow even further. We don’t need all the bells and whistles right out of the gate.
By reading through all of this, we hope you’ve given yourself permission to keep going. We love seeing new creative businesses start and grow.