andwhynot

• Which tools were effective?

When starting this semester in Digital and Online Media, I was uncomfortable with the idea of having to keep up with a blog. The idea that I had to be constantly writing about a specific topic for people to see was daunting. I did not feel that I had the ability to do it. But, after a week or two, I started to be more comfortable. I chose a topic that I was passionate about and it made it easier. Some of the tools that I feel were effective include looking up other blogs for inspiration to write about, and the ability to incorporate a picture system to show images and text easily. Images really do help enhance people wanting to see what you have to share.

• Which tools weren’t?

I cannot really think of many tools that we covered that were not at least somewhat useful during this semester. If I had to pick something, I would say that incorporating an embedded link to another page was unnecessary for these posts. At times I believe it can be useful, such as when we found a similar blog to ours and wrote about it. This made sense to relaying what we were talking about. But, in general, it was probably the least effective to me.

• What would you want to improve or include within the blog?

To improve my blog, I would like to do more interviews with people that started their own businesses and were successful. I know the owner of the coffee shop Mazama’s in Dripping Springs, TX, and they were a start-up business. I would not mind picking her brain on her inspiration for starting her business and if she wish she had attempted it sooner. There are many things that I believe could improve my blog, but honestly, that would come more with time and experience with blogging consistently and figuring out what did and did not work for people who kept up with my blog.

• In what ways could the experience benefit you in the future?

I believe that this blog could greatly benefit me in the future by getting my brain focused on constantly working to learn something new, and to share what I have learned. I did not know that having to write about people starting their own business’s would require me to really dig deep into what I know and what I felt was necessary to share, as well as research more on the things I did not know before. This has already helped me as an entrepreneur.

• Discuss how you might implement these tools professionally in the future, in a job or an entrepreneurial endeavor.

It’s funny that this question should be asked. Considering my whole entire blog is on how to succeed at your own business, I feel that most of the information that I learned can carry forward to any professional environment. Everything from researching other successful start-ups, to learning how to use a system like WordPress, or even self-promotion are all things that would be extremely useful in an entrepreneurial endeavor.

 

• Which was your most popular week, and how many views and visitors did you get that week?

My most popular week was the week of February 29^th.  I had 3 views and 2 visitors.

• Which was your most popular post of the year? How many views did it get? Why do you think it was the most popular?

My most popular post of the year was my second blog post called Starting My Business. I had 2 views and 2 visitors. Which means that there is a good chance that someone outside of school saw it!

• In all of the Site Stats data, was anything surprising to you?

I was surprised by the map that they provided showing the countries that visited your posts. It was a cool feature. Other than that, most everything is not very surprising to me. All great things though!

• Do you have any Twitter, Facebook or other social media stats you want to share?

There are not really any stats that I would like to share. I may have learned a lot on how to use a system like WordPress, and effectively write over something I did not think was possible, but I did not really touch anyone’s life or make a huge impact outside my own learning. In other words, my stats suck. It was fun anyways

When starting your own business one of the biggest factors is money; there will always be expenses involved. Whether it’s buying the machinery or merchandise, it all costs money. Most people do not have the spare money in their bank account to fund all their projects, so where do they get it? There are many options, but we are going to take a look at loans and crowd funding.

Loans are a traditional and good way to go when getting the appropriate funding for your business. But, you should always research which bank will provide you with the best rates and quality service. Most banks have loans specifically for small business’s. It can be scary to think about being in debt, but if you have a great business, it will pay off. Everything great starts with a little bit of anxiety. So go for it!

One of my personal favorite ways to generate income for a business is through crowd funding websites, such as Kickstarter or GofundMe. They are a great way to get income without having to worry about paying anything back. Not only can you get the money, but you can gain supporters. People who donate tend to be future customers as well. It’s a win-win if you get the money that you need.

So whether you want to use a crowdfunding websites, or go with a traditional method like a loan, be proactive and go for it. This will be the point of no return. You are going to make a great business. Go for it!

If you have any questions on how crowdfunders work,  check em out here.

 

This year, I have been posting about college students and their ability to start their own business. I decided to talk to a Texas State student and see how they view starting a business as a college student and their own involvement in such areas. So here is a video of me interviewing him.

This is all about the things that may be overlooked when starting a business. It is very easy to be excited about starting a business, bu the hard part is knowing if it is the right thing for you. I truly believe in starting your own business if you have thought it out and seen where it works and doesn’t work. It’s not for everyone. But here are somethings that you may have overlooked when starting a business.

1. Is this something that you love doing in its supplementary role?

It is easy to start something from passion. If you really love to cook, this doesn’t necessarily mean you should open your own restaurant. It may mean that you need to find a job as a chef. Finding that right niche for you is what matters. You have to be ready to jump into the role of management if you are going to start a business. You won’t be cooking all the time if you open your own restaurant.

2.  Are you capable of doing the business you want to start?

It definitely is a silly thing to think about, but there have been many small business’s started with little thought. There are people who think they have found a formula for success and that it’s in a niche that they don’t know how to do. This is something you need to avoid. Always know what it is you are doing in every aspect of the business.

3. Are you ready for expansion?

Things will be a time when things become to difficult to manage. You have to be okay with letting more people into the business. A successful business will have growth, and when it happens you have to be okay with it. Are you okay with letting go and delegating?

These are important things to consider when starting your own business. So, if you know what you want and can do it. DO IT!

Here are some more great things to consider when starting your own business. Check it out here!

When you are starting a business, it’s not always about what you know, it’s about who you know. You can have a ground breaking new business; maybe you created a new piece of revolutionary technology, maybe you have a more efficient product than what’s out on the market already. None of this matters if you can’t get it popular enough to sustain a business. It takes a lot of financial capital to start a business from scratch, especially for someone who has no experience in the game, so knowing who to talk is key. Having advisors in similar fields or just friends in high up places are all important.

The first thing that needs to be done when starting to network is identify the people in your life who already have connections. Never take a single person out of the equation. A friend of a friend may be that one person who has higher connections. Ask to speak with them and they may give you an idea or insight that can boost your business. Another big thing to have is business cards. Make sure that you have a lot already made, and take them with you everywhere; you never know when you are going to run into someone that may ask for it, and you can never get a second chance at a first impression. It also takes a lot of energy and charisma to make connections. It has to be genuine and real. So go look for conventions or business’s that fall similar to yours and start mingling. Never rule anyone out, because they may have more to offer than you realize.

When I first started my business, the biggest factor to moving and networking was from our crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter. We had many people reaching out to us all over the world. And once we were successful, we had other business’s asking us for advice. It became a whole new world and moving much faster than we could have anticipated. We even called a very successful business in our field and asked for advice. It became the foundation of our business, and now we have many connections to many business’s. The key is to never lose faith, have energy, and find those outlets that will help you meet people. Have the time and energy for your business, you will have the same for networking if you want to be successful.

For more on networking, check out this article by Forbes.

 

When having a business, it’s good too have a process that’s easy to maintain and replicate. Make your business plan and get to work! Here is a a short, simple how-to process of how we make picks here at epicks Guitar Picks

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Today, we will be looking over Forbes’ blog writer, Martin Zwilling. Mr. Zwilling has been working as an executive in business for over 30 years, as well as consulting. He has become a popular writer on what it takes to start a small business. We will be looking over an article of his: 10 Reality Checks Before Starting Your Own Business.

I really enjoyed reading this article, not only because I felt it would be helpful for showing you all, but because it helped me in my business as well. He brought up many points that were great for me as an upcoming business owner to consider. I will dive in on those as well as other things I felt he did well.

In this article you can see that he starts by giving a small intro over a situation relating to him. This helps connect a real life scenario to the steps he lays out after; giving a clear idea of how it would work. Now, the title alone tells us there are ten steps, and ten steps is what he lays out concisely. This is important on the internet. The internet is fast paced world that many people have learned to navigate by skimming. If you do not keep a sleek and concise blog, people will, more than often, pass right by it.

The whole point of the blog is to make you reconsider what it is that you are trying to start. This is not because he wants you to fail, but to challenge you. Many people rush into small business with dreams of grandeur, and very easily fall flat on their face. These steps make one take a step back and analyze points they may not have considered. He then ends with a closing statement that shows us what happened to the friend that was wanting to start his own business.

Overall, I think that this was a great article from him. It was concise, accurate, and provided a real life situation that people can relate to as they read. If you are interested in knowing more, please take a look at his article here.

Here is his twitter handle, please follow him.

 

Hello, everyone! I’m excited to get into the topic of how to start your own business. There’s a big gap between knowing what you want to do and how to achieve that. This post is going to take you through how I started my own business with my friends. The doubts that we had and how we managed to work around everything

To begin, I had just graduated high school and made my way to the University of North Texas. I had signed up to be a RTVF Major (radio/t.v/film), although I had no aspirations and no idea what to do with it. I felt pressured to choose something just as I felt pressured to go to college. I was living in a dorm, my best friend a couple halls away in the same dorm, so we practically lived in each other’s rooms. We went to high school together and were in a band together for four years. This is important to the start of our business. We were deep into the middle of our first semester and being off on our own. We would walk around and discuss where we wanted to go in life, the stress of debt, and how to succeed in life. I specifically remember walking around the union as the sun was setting and discussing how all the most successful people were people who dropped out of college or didn’t go at all, and started their own business. We both lacked self confidence and thought we had nothing to offer the world.

It wasn’t until a month or so later when my best friend, Ian, made me a guitar pick for my birthday. He started to make his own for himself and friends, and around the same time he had just shown me the crowd-funding site, Kickstarter. I had my lightbulb-moment and told him we should start a business. We were nineteen at the time and he had no real belief that we could do anything with this, and that nobody would donate money to our cause. After much provoking, we made proto-types, put out flyers to have guitarists try them out, and improved on our designs. Then we made a Kickstarter for our business; we decided to call it epick guitar picks. We shot a crappy video off his phone in our dorm room and let it go to fate. Well, as fate would have it, we had made over 300% of what we were asking for in a months time. epick guitar picks was a go!

From there, we jumped into the business and started playing around with ideas. We added a team member, and began to innovate. Years later, we have added two new members and have taken a monumental leap forward. Looking back, it made me realize that the only thing that was holding us back before was not trying at all. Not having an idea to go with. Once we found our passion and made the commitment to try, there was no holding us back.

So find your passion, and if you have the right attitude and motivation to try and make it happen, it is completely possible!

link to our kickstarter and how we set it up those years ago: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/36843427/epicks-guitar-picks/description

 

I chose this topic because when I started college, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. It wasn’t until I made the decision to start my own business that it all started to fall into place. The things in school that I wanted to study began to revolve around my roll in this business. I didn’t think it was possible when I started college, having no money and no experience in any real field, yet here I am with my own company that I started at age 19. I want other people to know that you don’t have to be a genius to start your own business; you just need motivation!

I hope to explore all the different aspects of starting a business from scratch; ranging from the technical and monetary characteristics, to the mentality and motivation deep within yourself.

My audience is anyone who feels lost and wants to figure out what to do with their life. To all of the people who say “I can’t do it”. I ask “And why not”?

There will be all sorts of elements in my posts, from stories and photos of my personal experience, to friends around me who joined the business and how they felt starting, to Q&A’s with business-savvy men and women, and hopefully videos with random strangers discussing their plans in life. I hope to include other online platforms such as Instagram and Facebook.

Here is a link to my FDOM16 Twitter:https://twitter.com/dmschmitzer

Keep Rockin’!