A new business often brings unpredictable and exciting journeys with it. Moreover, a source suggests that more than 200,000 ventures start every year in the UK. However, almost all enterprises face common blunders during the initial phase.
Unfortunately, most of these mistakes fall under the business startup kit category. On the other hand, successful companies pay attention to these minute details and flourish by avoiding such errors.
A few common blunders of new startups include the inability to build a stable foundation, entrepreneurial overconfidence, unclear focus, etc. Others might also have preconceived notions of the target audience, outdated technology usage, avoiding legal issues, incorrect pricing, etc.
10 Most Common Blunders of Startups
● Unstable Foundation
Startup and small business entrepreneurs often fail to leap towards growth for receiving solutions to most problems. However, pursuing growth with an unstable foundation majorly leads to failure and bankruptcy.
Entrepreneurs can avoid this common mistake by focussing on the foundation. It includes the finances, business model, and management team, among other critical areas. These factors can also help to achieve the targeted growth and build a timeline for the same.
Moreover, the foundation can provide an analytical and statical idea of the ongoing and upcoming growth scenario based on facts. Therefore, business owners won’t have to rely on assumptions and create effective plans.
Besides this, the foundation includes the business plan that helps to review the solutions for different scenarios. Additionally, it helps to clarify the tasks for other teams and impress the board of directors and lenders.
● Wrong Pricing
New business owners often tend to keep a lower price than their competition. However, this is an unfair practice, especially for B2B organizations. Moreover, customers and clients don’t only refer to the pricing while purchasing a product or service.
Both also evaluate the value for money received from the latter. Additionally, lowering the pricing below the industry standards can help to secure a new business. But it can also raise questions when it goes up.
Moreover, pricing should not only involve only these characteristics. It should depend on the company’s product or service, positive aspects associated with it, USPs, etc.
By taking this approach, entrepreneurs can become an established brand in the market in a short duration. Additionally, if a company consistently develops the correct pricing, it is more likely to attract more purchasers overtime.
● Preconceived Notions
Entrepreneurs that have recently launched a startup or a small business often make preconceived notions of their customers. The situation also occurs while scaling a business or going to the next stage.
Moreover, these notions prove wrong because they rely on human intuition instead of data. However, instinct and intuition become critical for every entrepreneur during different company stages.
For example, they may help decide a very bad credit loans from direct lenders in the UK, type of lender, service providers, etc. However, they don’t be helpful for three critical areas. The latter includes recognizing the target audience, market, and demographic.
Unfortunately, new organizations may not have an initial customer base. Under such a circumstance, other methods such as online survey, questionnaires, feedback, comments, etc., can provide the relevant data.
● No Separate Business Account
Another common mistake made by the business owner of startups and small businesses is mingling personal and business accounts. Entrepreneurs have the urgency of starting the organization and require an account for entailing funds from lenders and investors.
However, it can create chaos, mainly if family members and business partners use the account. Moreover, owners also make personal payments through the same account. Therefore, it becomes challenging to separate business and personal expenses while filing tax.
Therefore, business owners’ ideal solution is to open a separate business account and setup cards for only office transactions. It will help keep a check on partner payments, any other linked business debts and avoid separating expenses while filing tax.
Besides this, it will also provide a clear idea of the business savings and separate money for upcoming investment business projects. Additionally, it will help to make detailed plans for the financial growth of the organization.
● Ignoring Insurance
A new business owner often ignores insurance because they have no or low funding. However, it is necessary to take Public Liability Insurance, Professional Indemnity Insurance, and Employer’s Liability Insurance to avoid high costs.
A Public Liability Insurance safeguards an organization against compensation claims or legal expenses incurred by the public, client, or suppliers. However, the claim is only possible if the latter suffers property damage or personal injury.
Similarly, Professional Indemnity Insurance is against claims made by a client for negligent service, design, or advice. However, the client often claims because he/she lost money due to the latter.
Likewise, an Employer’s Liability Insurance safeguards an organization against claims of injury or illness to employees while engaging in work. It can cost £2,500 every day for an uncovered organization.
The best method of finding the right companies for providing these three significant is by researching and budgeting. The latter would help in deciding the optimum insurer based on the available funds.
● Accidental Leverage
At times, company owners neglect to recognize the importance of Intellectual Property. It includes brand name, design, domain, and technology. However, even accidentally leveraging the IP to a contractor can prove as a costly affair.
For example, a partner creates domain names but doesn’t assign IP rights to them. Under such a circumstance, the partner gains accidental leverage in the company. However, the case differs for designs and logos.
If an employee uses the company domain to develop a design or a logo, it automatically receives the IP rights. Organizational owners can even provide an IP assignment document to contractors to get the rights of remote employees.
According to a source, there are numerous IP assignment documents available online that don’t require a lawyer’s involvement. If the company incurs costs against such claims, short term loans with no credit check or other options to recover from it.
● Unspecified Shareholders
Business owners can decide the value of each share for a private limited company. On the other hand, the shares of public companies undergo open market trading. However, the organization requires a significant cash flow to become a public company.
However, under either of the situations, it is necessary to have written documentation of the shareholders. Business owners can even decide to add the enlisted shareholders during the later stages too.
But adding shareholders during the company formation makes them a part of the Memorandum of Association (MOA). Handshakes and verbal communication do build interpersonal relationships but don’t count as an agreement for a partnership.
Mentioning shareholders and partners also make them obligated against their organizational responsibilities. Hence, a company can legally remove, file a legal case, or decide any other future decisions based on the signed documents.
● Over expenditure
According to a source, cashflow management’s poor ethics is a significant reason for failure for eighty-two percent of the businesses. Unfortunately, most entrepreneurs tend to overspend their funding on future projects, investments, and growth.
However, business owners must avoid the temptation of over expenditure during any stage. Instead, they should have minimum business overheads, avoid getting a premise until they receive sufficient funds and make necessary purchases.
Over expenditure disrupts the budget and business plan of the organization. It can even lead to bankruptcy, closure, higher debts, and insolvency. Often, lenders may not provide the best loan options to such entities, charge higher interest rates, etc., to recover the repayments.
● Inadequate Budgeting
Although a primary part of the foundation, budgeting becomes inadequate during many business stages. According to a source, thirty percent of businesses close down due to budgeting failures. Freshbooks states that it takes two to three years to build a profitable organization.
The main reason for budgeting failures is miscalculations and over-enthusiasm. The latter leads to making investments in developing a profitable organization during the early phase. Often this venture leads to the development of a unique structure and marketing program.
Unfortunately, it leads to overboard the budget and doesn’t achieve the market sales. Most businesses fail to receive manageable profits to retain consistent cashflow. However, the setup of most small businesses should include sustainability and growth.
The model should include the business’s average operating costs, and after that, owners must value the three-year profit margins.
● Avoiding Suitable Funding Options
Business owners should avoid making personal investments as the profits would get divided, and receiving the repayment may not become possible. Moreover, the myths of small businesses and startups often sway business owners from suitable funding options.
For example, a debt consolidation loan for bad credit with no guarantor can help a financially laid-back organization. They can even prove beneficial for managing personal debt.
Likewise, invoice financing, borrowing money from friends, opting for peer-to-peer lending, etc., can sustain the business plan and operating costs.
Jessica Rodz is the Senior Content Writer at Cashfacts. She has a long career in the field of content writing and editing. Jessica has the expertise in the UK lending marketplace where she has worked with 7 different lending organisations and acquired many responsibilities from preparing loan deals and writing blogs for their websites.
At Cashfacts, Jessica is managing a team of experienced loan experts and doing a major contribution in guiding the loan seekers via well-researched blogs. She has done graduation in Business (Finance) and now currently doing research papers on the UK financial sector.
