SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS HAVE YOU GOT WHAT IT TAKES
Specifically, we’re going to be talking about:
The pros and cons of becoming a solopreneur.
The most popular types of solopreneur business and how to choose the right one for you.
Stuff you can (and should) delegate or automate.
Some of the pitfalls of becoming a solopreneur.
And more!
Of course if you want to get a head start on all this, I’ve put together a no-holes-barred manual that covers everything in detail. You can find out all about it here: SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS.
So what is a solopreneur and why should you become one?
Put simply a solopreneur is a one person business. It has just one employee: You. Whereas an entrepreneur will spend most of the time working ON the business and will hire other people to work IN it, a solopreneur fulfills both roles.
Now is the perfect time to become a solopreneur. Why? Put simply, the COVID-19 pandemic is changing the way we work – forever. Bosses now realize that if most people in the office spend the bulk of their time working at a computer, they can do the job just as well from home.
As a worker you don’t HAVE to limit yourself to one employer or need to live in a specific city (or even country) to earn a living anymore.
These are exciting times, and as a solopreneur you can take advantage of the changes sweeping the workplace.
Have you got what it takes
Have you got what it takes to be a solopreneur?
Some people like the security of having a job. It’s an illusion, but it’s what a lot of people feel comfortable with. They like the morning and evening commutes, having a boss tell them what to do and so on.
That’s not what being a solopreneur is all about.
First off, to be a successful solopreneur you must like making decisions. You’ll have to make ALL the decisions pertaining to your business and live with the consequences – good or bad, right or wrong.
You also need to be self motivated and a self starter. You don’t have a boss telling you what to do – although you’ll probably have clients telling you what they want. It’s up to you to go find the clients, figure out what they want, and deliver it to them in a timely manner.
Your “Just-Over-Broke” will pay a fixed amount. When you’re a solopreneur, what you make will be based on how successful your marketing efforts are – as well as the time you spend doing the work. You must be willing to put in the (unpaid) hours to land the clients in the first place.
You have to be mentally strong enough to deal with the knock-backs a solopreneur lifestyle will throw at you every once in a while. When the order book is as empty as your bank account but you’ve still got bills to pay, are you able to deal with the pressure?
Finally, are you happy with your own company? As a solopreneur, you’ll likely be working from home – probably by yourself. There’s no hanging out at the water-cooler shooting the breeze with coworkers.
If any of this stuff scares you, then perhaps becoming a solopreneur isn’t for you. If you read the above and it hasn’t put you off, then you’ve probably got what it takes to be a solopreneur.
PS. You’ll find a goldmine of information in my guide to becoming a solopreneur. Find out all about here SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS.
Here are some solopreneur pros and cons
When you ask people what motivates them to think about becoming a solopreneur, they usually give one or more of the following three reasons:
They like the idea of having no boss, they want to set their own hours or they want to work from home. There are pros and cons to each of these and I want to cover them.
No boss. Oftentimes this is the most popular reason people cite for quitting their j-o-b for a more freelance working life.
Let’s look at the pros: It’s true, there’s nobody to tell you what to do or when to do it. You’re the boss. You make the decisions. You’ll probably have clients telling you what they want, but that’s not the same thing.
On the cons side: There’s nobody to defer to when you need to make a tough decision, or turn to for support. You carry the entire burden on your shoulders. You’re not gonna get fired from your own business, but you can lose clients if they don’t like your work, or they find somebody who will do the job cheaper.
Set your own hours. The pros are great! There’s no more 9-5; you can work when you like and take a day off when you feel like it.
On the other hand, you don’t get paid for time off and you might have to start early in the morning or work late into the night when facing a tight deadline or when you’re working with a client in another time zone.
Work from home. No more commuting! You can spend the time more usefully – or just sleep later.
The downside is it’s hard to separate your work from your personal life. When you’re at home you’re always at work, and vice-versa. Each day seems the same with little variety.
Personally, I think the pros outweigh the cons, but you need to be aware that it’s not always plain sailing.
PS. Your copy of my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur is waiting for you here: SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS.
What solopreneur business is right for you
There is a practically unlimited number of businesses you can start as a solopreneur. If you have a skill or knowledge that you already use to make a living (and to make money for somebody else) it’s probably going to be pretty easy to convert it into a one person business that you can offer to the wider world and put money in your own back pocket. If you’re unsure as to which path to follow, though, I want to cover some of the more popular solopreneur occupations in today’s installment.
A very popular solopreneur business is freelance copywriting. All you need is a computer, Internet connection, and basic high school English. If you’re a native English speaker, this puts you at an advantage over other copywriters for whom English is a second language. If English ISN’T your native tongue, but you’re fluent in another widely spoken language – like Spanish, French, Urdu or Russian – there’s a huge, virtually untapped market waiting for you.
If you had an admin or secretarial job, consider becoming a virtual assistant (VA). There are plenty of startups out there who can’t afford to hire regular staffers, but still need somebody to answer e-mails, book plane tickets, make reservations and so on. You can offer these services at a premium for several companies at the same time.
Artistically minded? Consider starting a graphics service. There’s always a demand for print, online and video graphics.
Good at selling stuff? A marketing consultancy could be your calling, as could affiliate marketing – where you sell other people’s stuff in return for a commission.
My best advice is to pick a niche and become an expert at it. For example if you decide to become a freelance copywriter, consider a specializing in something like medical copywriting, or another specific area of the market. Likewise, if you’re going to be an affiliate marketer, tailor your offering to a narrow market segment.
PS. I cover this in more detail in Chapter 3 of my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur. Grab your copy now from SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS.
You’re not alone
Just because you’re a solopreneur doesn’t mean you have to do it all yourself. I know that sounds counter-intuitive, but bear with me.
There’s lots of stuff you can delegate to a process or person. This is particularly true when it comes to your marketing activities. For example, if you’re not a copywriter it’s a good idea to hire a professional copywriter and delegate that task. Having bad copy won’t win you many clients, so this is a good investment.
Likewise, when you start to get busy, hire a VA to assist you with some of the more mundane aspects of your new business.
You can also automate certain aspects of your business. For example, if you’re sending the same e-mail out to lots of people, subscribe to an autoresponder service. This will send your e-mails out at regular intervals, so you don’t have to remember to do it yourself. This e-mail was sent to you by autoresponder. I hired a professional copywriter to write it, too. I practice what I preach!
When it comes to delegation and automation the golden rule is only to delegate or automate things that are mundane, and where doing them yourself would take you away from doing things that are more valuable to your business as a whole.
There are also a TON of tools out there that can make your life easier by automating and coordinating mundane, routine tasks. I cover them in detail in Chapter 7 of my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur. You can get it here SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS. Incidentally, the sales and delivery process is automated, too. Check it out and see what I mean.
Do you know about this?
I want to cover some things you may not have thought about when it comes to starting your own one-person business.
One of the biggest shocks many people have when they start their own businesses is how difficult it can be to stay on the right side of the IRS and other tax authorities. When you have a job everything is deducted from your paycheck before you see it, but as a solopreneur there’s no payroll tax, so you need to put money aside for taxes and social security. Exactly how much you’ll need to put by and how often you’ll need to hand it over will vary depending on where you live, so discuss this with your accountant.
You have got an accountant, haven’t you? You’ll need one, and a lawyer, too.
Something you’ll need to determine before you even get started is: Are you allowed to work from your home? Check tenancy agreements, deed restrictions etc. Even though you may not see clients at your home, and you spend all day in your spare bedroom looking at a computer screen, a business is a business. You don’t want to get kicked out of your home or hauled before a deed restriction committee just because there’s a clause somewhere that says your home must be a residence exclusively.
If you can’t work from home, it’s not the end of the world. There are shared workspaces you can hire, or you can take your laptop to a coffee shop and work from there – COVID restrictions permitting.
You’ll need to tell your insurance company about your new employment status, as well as taking out extra insurance policies to cover things like public liability, business continuity, medical expenses and so on.
Banks HATE the self employed, so make sure you already have credit cards, overdrafts, mortgages etc. in place before you quit your j-o-b.
PS. There’s still time to grab a copy of my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur. Here’s the link:
I want to cover some things you may not have thought about when it comes to starting your own one-person business.
One of the biggest shocks many people have when they start their own businesses is how difficult it can be to stay on the right side of the IRS and other tax authorities. When you have a job everything is deducted from your paycheck before you see it, but as a solopreneur there’s no payroll tax, so you need to put money aside for taxes and social security. Exactly how much you’ll need to put by and how often you’ll need to hand it over will vary depending on where you live, so discuss this with your accountant.
You have got an accountant, haven’t you? You’ll need one, and a lawyer, too.
Something you’ll need to determine before you even get started is: Are you allowed to work from your home? Check tenancy agreements, deed restrictions etc. Even though you may not see clients at your home, and you spend all day in your spare bedroom looking at a computer screen, a business is a business. You don’t want to get kicked out of your home or hauled before a deed restriction committee just because there’s a clause somewhere that says your home must be a residence exclusively.
If you can’t work from home, it’s not the end of the world. There are shared workspaces you can hire, or you can take your laptop to a coffee shop and work from there – COVID restrictions permitting.
You’ll need to tell your insurance company about your new employment status, as well as taking out extra insurance policies to cover things like public liability, business continuity, medical expenses and so on.
Banks HATE the self employed, so make sure you already have credit cards, overdrafts, mortgages etc. in place before you quit your j-o-b.
PS. There’s still time to grab a copy of my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur. Here’s the link: SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS.
.If it’s for you, there’s no going back.
Once you’ve decided the solopreneur lifestyle is for you, there’s no going back.
The great thing is: When you’ve found a business model that works, you can start to scale it and build your business. Begin by delegating the mundane and routine to processes or to other freelancers. When you can afford it, hire staffers to do some of the work. Move out of your spare bedroom and into an office. Delegate some of the other tasks you do and concentrate on working ON your business instead of IN it. Before you know it you’ve moved from being a solopreneur to being an entrepreneur.
Pretty neat huh?
Wow! We’ve covered a lot over or so. Let’s just recap:
We covered some of the pros and cons of becoming a solopreneur. I covered how to choose the right solopreneur business for you, and covered some of the more popular ones. We discussed some of the stuff you can (and should) delegate or automate to help you get more out of your time. I warned you about some of the pitfalls of becoming a solopreneur, and told you some things about being a solopreneur that you may not have thought about.
But you know what?
Within the confines of this short e-course I’ve only been able to scratch the surface of this fascinating subject and share some of the many things I’ve discovered (often the hard way) during the many years I’ve been a solopreneur – how to work smarter instead of harder, the importance of networking and social media, why downtime is important to the success of your business (to name but a few) – as well as going into more detail about some of the stuff I’ve covered in this course. I cover it all – and a TON more besides – in my guide to becoming a successful solopreneur. It’s still available. Head over to SOLOPRENEUR SUCCESS right now and grab yourself a copy before it’s too late.
To your success!
Fernando Allen
