Simple Steps to Start a Business in University

So you want to be an entrepreneur in university. Yay!

Building your own business in university is awesome - there are tons of opportunities, networks and tools to help you out. And if it fails, what’s the worst that could happen? You add it to your CV as a ‘lesson learnt’. University is one of the best times to start a business - you’ve got more time and more energy, so it really couldn’t be better.

Here are some steps you can take to get started on the bizz.

1. The birth

You may have an idea, you may not. That’s fine: all you need to get started is the will - the way will come later.

If you have literally no idea where to even get started, it’s time to do some research. Do you want to create something online (blog, dropshipping, freelancing)? Do you want to be producing something? Or offering a service? Take a look at what other students have done and see if there’s something similar there for you.

What you’re looking for: something that solves a problem. What product/service could you offer that helps people solve a problem?

Read books, listen to podcasts and read blogs to do more research. Some business books out there will give you great ideas and a ton of motivation to get started: Side Hustle by Chris Guillebeau, Dream Year by Ben Arment. Side Hustle Nation is a great podcast with tons of business ideas, and blogs such as Chris Guillebeau and Ryan Robinson are also great.

If you surround your brain with as much interesting info out there, it will absorbs the cool stuff and eventually spit out a good idea. You just have to keep working at it.

Or you could also try being an idea machine for a few months…

 

2. The modeling

The most daunting part: creating a plan. This involves trying one thing, testing, then trying another thing, testing, and on and on and on. Here are some questions you can base your business model on:

• What problem does your business solve?
• Who are the customers?
• What are the most important features of your solution?
• Who are your competitors?
• What is your unique selling point?
• What is your marketing strategy?
• How will you measure how well your business is doing?
• How will you make the money?

Take it step by step. First, just scribble the answers down and start building the business in your mind. Then, as you start to get a better picture of what you want it to do, start breaking down every question and analysing the answers. Once you can answer all the questions properly, start building your business model - all you need is a pen and piece of paper.

Yes, it may look easier said than done, but the trick is to go bit by bit and do every bit well. Remember how I said you have time in university? You do, so don’t rush it.

3. The talking

Share your business idea and plan to other people. You’d be surprised to hear how much good advice or feedback they can give. If you’re pretty serious about the business, why not share it at a networking event? I talked a lot about Financially Mint to random strangers at networking events and they gave me a lot of ideas for the future of the blog and even other contacts I could talk to.

If you’re too embarrassed or shy to talk about the idea, go online. Ask people on Reddit, Quora or Twitter what they think of your idea. You never know what you could find: someone who wants to help you out, someone who’s willing to invest in you, or just good advice. But you won’t know unless you put yourself out there.

And if you don’t mind going a bit further, try asking your professor or even career advisor. They can advise you on funding and on how the university can help you out. Try and talk to as many people as possible about it - you never know who might say the exact right thing that’ll take your business one step further.

 

4. The baby steps

Once you’ve got a rough idea of what your business is about and what the strategy will be, write down the steps you need to take to get started. This helps with the overwhelming thought of ‘Ahhh I’m starting a business’. If you’ve got every step written down you’ll actually feel like you know what you’re doing and that it all follows a logical path.

For example, my business idea is to start a blog about teaching dogs cool tricks. The first three steps could be:

1. Prepare 5 blog posts on dog tricks
2. Set up a WordPress site
3. Design site

Then I could break those three steps down:

1. Prepare 5 blog posts on dog tricks
   • Research 5 different dog tricks
   • Draft each post
   • Edit and add images
2. Set up a WordPress site
   • Find a good hosting platform
   • Select a domain name
   • Start up the website
3. Design site
   • Etc, etc, etc

Breaking down every single step makes each part less daunting and more doable. And once you finish one step, tick it off and move onto the next. Ta-da! Business being created.

5. The start

Now to the easy part! You’ve done all the preparation, all the research and all the feedback - now you just have to follow the steps you’ve written above. But let’s keep it organised.

Remember, you are still in university and your priority is still studying for your degree - so you don’t want the business to interfere too much. What I recommend: having a little schedule with the amount of time you’re willing to put into the business every week. Ask yourself whether you can spend 3/4/5 hours a week and then slot in when works best for you. And when that time comes round, work on your baby steps.

Eventually you’ll see what works for you and can adapt accordingly.

Now you’re creating a business and you’re organised. More than most startups can say.

 

6. The faith

Everyone in the blogging world knows this: if you want to get anywhere, you gotta keep going. Keep putting in those 3 hours a week. Keep improving your business model. Keep asking people for feedback.

This doesn’t just apply to the blogging world, it applies to business in general. You keep improving it until one day your business starts working: your strategy is in place and the $$ is flowing. It may seem a little far off right now, but with perseverance comes results.

But I’m going to stop for a second and say that it’s important to know when to give up. Keep improving and working on your business, but once you reach your limits, you reach your limits. If there is no point in going on, there’s no point. You’re in uni and you have time to learn from your mistakes and start again. There’s no pressure to ‘never quit’. More accurately I’d say: ‘sometimes quit’. Taking a step back and starting again has a lot more benefits than you’d believe.

So, are you thinking of starting a business? Which problem are you thinking of solving? What’s your unique selling point? Lemme know in the comments!