The best way to grow your wealth is to create your own business. But that’s easier said than done. Creating a business is a multi-layered process that involves staying on top of lots of moving parts like web hosting, accounting, and more. To make things worse, you’ll be competing with businesses that have been established for years, so you have to figure out what you’re doing as quickly as you can.
But this doesn’t have to be overwhelming. All you need to do is tackle each step, one by one, until you’ve created your own successful startup.
Here’s the checklist to help make sure your startup gets off the ground:
Table of Contents
6 steps to building a successful startup
1. Make it legal
Ask a lawyer what kind of legal entity is best for your startup. For instance, will you be creating a Limited Liability Company (LLC), in which you won’t be personally liable for your company’s debts or liabilities, or will you be creating a joint-stock company, in which shares of your company’s stock can be bought and sold by shareholders?
Also, find out how one goes about creating a company in your country.
Some people get stuck on this step, but don’t let it weigh you down. If you think you’re getting stuck, skip it and move to the next step. You can always come back to it later. (Just don’t put it off for too long.)
2. Create a website
Like “creating a startup”, creating a website is actually a number of steps masquerading as a single step. To create your website, here’s what you need to do:
- Get web hosting
- Use a website builder
- Use a CMS (like WordPress)
- Set up your SEO strategy
Let’s take these step by step:
Getting web hosting
If you don’t already know, every website on the internet is stored on a server. But servers are expensive to buy and maintain, especially for startups. To get around this, you use a web hosting company. A web hosting company maintains servers where you can store your website in exchange for a small monthly payment.
Choose a hosting company that offers cloud based backup and fast servers, and you’ll be good to go! (Cloud based backup protects your data in case it gets lost or corrupted.)
Use a website builder
A website builder is a tool that lets you create a beautiful website in minutes. Because a website is so crucial to the development of your brand, you’ll want to create one as soon as possible, so you can start attracting web traffic.
Our website builder has hundreds of templates for you to choose from, and it uses drag-and-drop technology for easy customisation.
Try a CMS
A CMS (Content Management System) lets you create posts on your website, format your webpages, organise your comments, and so much more! WordPress is the most popular CMS, and you can use it by itself or with our website builder to create a site that’s beautiful and perfectly designed to reflect your brand.
Set up your SEO strategy
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation, and it essentially means making your content more attractive to search engines, so you get more web traffic. A good way to cheat this is to use an SEO tool.
3. Get accounting software
This is another step that’s probably a bit boring but absolutely necessary. If you don’t keep track of your money, you could end up wasting it, which could bankrupt you, or recording it improperly, which could land you in all sorts of legal trouble. For your startup, the best way to do this is to automate as much of this process as possible, using accounting software.
What to look for in accounting software:
- Real time reporting: You need to carefully track your money, so don’t settle for accounting software that doesn’t offer reporting in real time.
- Invoice-creating capability: This takes the sweat out of billing your clients.
- Taxes and VAT calculation: There’s no point in choosing software that makes you have to do this yourself.
These are three important features in accounting software, but you should also look out for features like free support, inventory management, bank account management, and any other features you think will make your life easier.
4. Take care of data security
In the past couple years, we’ve seen so many scandals about companies that have suffered data security breaches, which cost them millions and sank their reputation. To prevent this from happening to you, choose a web hosting company that takes data security seriously. A good sign that your hosting company takes data security seriously is that it has well-maintained servers and offers cloud based backup.
Also, make sure you choose strong passwords and limit user access to your data.
5. Set up Google Analytics
Google Analytics helps you measure and track your web traffic, so you can understand your customers’ buying patterns. Here’s how you set up a Google Analytics account:
STEP 1: Create a Google Account
If you already have a primary Google account attached to your brand, set up your Google Analytics account under the same name. If not, create a new account.
STEP 2: Sign up for Google Analytics
To do that, go to the Google Analytics homepage and follow these steps:
- Click the Sign In link in the upper right-hand corner. You’ll see a dropdown menu. Select Analytics. You’ll be redirected to a page where you can choose the Google account you want to use.
- Click Sign Up, then, on the next page, select Website and fill in your details.
- Check the boxes next to all the recommended options, and then click the blue Get Tracking ID button.
- Accept the Terms of Service.
You will now see your Tracking ID and your Analytics tracking code. You can also find these at any time by going to Admin >> Property >> Tracking Info.
To set up Google Analytics on a WordPress site, use the Monsterinsights plugin.
6. Promote your brand
Now you’re ready to promote your brand through email marketing and social media! To get a good idea of how to do this, check out our small business social media guide.
And that’s it! Follow these steps carefully, and you’ll have established your very own startup. Focus on making a high-quality product and delivering an amazing experience for your customers, and you’ll have them handing you money by the fistful!
