7 Tips on online entrepreneurship that you need to know

El entrepreneurship, and everything that has to do with it, is a subject that is being dealt with more and more frequently in talks, workshops, courses and events that I attend. Above all, there is talk of online entrepreneurship and, especially, with WordPress, which is what catches me closest. For this reason, today I want to talk to you about the 7 Online Entrepreneurship Tips You Need to Know. Here we go.

1. Choose a good mentor

My first advice, and the most important, is that never follow entrepreneurship advice from someone who has never started a business.

Now there are some public institutions that are promoting this type of workshops and consultancy, offered by… officials? This is exactly what I mean.

Never take entrepreneurial advice from someone who has never started.

On the other hand, follow the advice on entrepreneurship from someone who has undertaken and has been wrong, failed, stumbled, ruined. Many times (in my opinion, always) you learn much more from mistakes than from triumphs.

Someone who has already made mistakes will spare you. Believe me, I know what I'm talking about, I have a master making mistakes. 

2. Choose your clients

The next point is your relationship with customers.

Si tu entrepreneurship is online, you can offer your products or services to a few people or to many, and in each case, obviously the amount of what you charge will be different.

If you want to earn, for example, 3.000 euros per month and offer your (limited) time personally to 10 clients, you must obtain at least 300 euros from each of them. So far you have counted beans, pure mathematics, but this is something that 90% of entrepreneurs do not. They do not stop to calculate how much money do you need to raise to make your business profitable, how many clients do you need, how much personal time and at what price should you invest. You know it?

The problem resides when any of those 10 clients not willing to pay those 300 euros and/or take more than a tenth of your time. This is a "toxic" customer, which will make you look bad with the rest of your customers and lead to frustration.
 
El "toxic" customer» has certain characteristics such as:

• calls you constantly to ask you things that he could include in a simple email and, instead, he has you on the phone for half an hour (or more). And obviously you don't pay that time.
• He asks you for sales and discounts, but then you want the work to be done to be impeccable. 
• Always pay late, you have to go after him.

Does it sound?

Well, some advice stop working with him (not for him, which is what he probably thinks you do)

Goodbye bad customer.

3. Don't let yourself be subdued

Freedom is what is worth undertaking.

If you are an entrepreneur, you are owner of your time, you choose when, how and with whom you work, for better or for worse, never forget it, you're free.

Freedom is what is worth undertaking, not money, believe me.

Yo In the last year I have stopped working with a client that he treated me as an employee, not as an external collaborator or freelance. He demanded schedules from me, that I not take vacations, he asked me for many jobs at low cost. In addition, he thought that I owed him eternal gratitude because (as he believed) I lived off what he ordered me to do.

Well, it seems that it was not like that. It really took a huge weight off my shoulders, since being subjected to someone like that is never worth it. No matter how much work I send you. your freedom comes first.

4. Value yourself

Also, and this is even more difficult to achieve, You must work with people who value you., thank you for your efforts. 

En mowomoand for many years, we always offer a little more than what the client pays. There are clients who appreciate it, in many ways, and they always win. There are also others who, on the contrary, think that they have the right to demand more than what they pay.

Value your time. Set a price/hour and don't go down from there.

If, as we have mentioned before, you want to earn, for example, at least 3.000 euros a month, and if you work, for example, 6 (effective) hours a day, your hourly price should be around 25 or 30 euros. If you do not mark your prices, your price/hour, you will never be able to know how much to charge for each order and you will end up charging less than delivering pizzas. 

If you start charging a price that allows you to pay your expenses and obtain a benefit that gives you to live well, little by little, working on your brand, receiving recommendations and positive evaluations from your clients and "making a name" in your sector, you can raise your prices and choose your customers even better.

5. But also admit your mistakes

We all mess up and make mistakes, but not all of us have the courage to admit it before ourselves and before our collaborators and clients. 

If you screw up, acknowledge it and offer a solution or compensation.

I have screwed up on many more occasions than I would like, but I have learned from it, I have stood up and offered an alternative, solution or a compensation. Not only is it worth apologizing, which is great, but if you've done something that has caused problems for a customer, give them compensation.

Offer not to charge for your service, give them extra tasks that were not included in the initial budget. Offer a package of free hours, web hosting or free support for a compensatory period (remember that my thing is WordPress) and above all, offers a solution, there always is. 

Try to correct the error even if it costs you many more hours of work than those who initially hired you. If he's not a "toxic" customer, he'll appreciate your initiative and willingness to make amends, and you'll have a customer for life.

But don't fall for "the client is always right" either, since, on occasions, he has screwed up, either because he has touched where he shouldn't, or he has asked you for a development that affected other parts of his site that you were unaware of. , etc. 

In this case, inform the client of what happened and make him see, with all the left hand you can, that you are not responsible for it, although you are willing and can help him solve it. 

Relatively recently I came across such a case

A client asked us for some improvements in his theme and we offered him a solution. He had hired an SEO to whom, apparently, he did not comment anything, and this significantly affected the SEO strategy of the same. Matched the latest algorithm Google, the so-called "medical update" and the site, he told us, lost a lot of visits, which he blamed exclusively on this development that was requested of us.

Of course, it is not going to be the case that this algorithm that had knocked down hundreds of similar sites had nothing to do with it. We will never know.

We offered to solve the problem, apparently the whole problem was caused by about 40 entries, and the response from the SEO was rude, unfair and arrogant.

Neither the client assumed that we had been expressly asked for this development, nor did the SEO attend to possible solutions. We were to blame for them not communicating. 

But they also did not contact us to see what had happened. They simply assessed the case from their sole perspective, canceled our contract, and left us money to pay. 

One less "toxic" customer. END. Let's learn from experience.

6. Undertake, but do not forget to live

In this first case, that of selling your time in exchange for money, you must understand that your time is limited and that no matter how hard you work you need to rest, eat, sleep, live. 

Set aside time for yourself every day. 

Set a schedule and stick to it. For example, if you work from 9:00 a.m. to 17:00 p.m., you have the whole afternoon to dedicate to yourself, your family, setting new challenges, training, networking and establishing new business relationships, sports, eating in a healthy way You will notice this balance in the short term.

I have worked up to 18 hours a day. I've worked all night and slept a few hours. But that did not lead me to meet my goals. Working hard is not synonymous with working well. We believe that if you are an entrepreneur, you must work a thousand hours every day, weekends, not have vacations, work even if you are sick...

I don't know about you, but I was not born to be a slave to my work. I believe in that phrase so repeated and so little put into practice: "Work to live, don't live to work." 

7. Organize your time

If you follow a schedule, even if you work at home, you must organize your time to be as effective and productive as possible. 

It may be a cliché, but you really need to focus your attention on your tasks and not do a thousand things at once. 

Let's go in parts, as Jack "The Ripper" said

Divide your projects into tasks of between 60 and 90 minutes and organize yourself by phases or stages and priorities. 

Each day, at the beginning of your day, select the 3 most important tasks (those that lead you to achieve your goals) and get to it, without distractions, during blocks of 60 or 90 minutes, depending on your sector. 

If you are done with those tasks (congratulations!), select another one and continue with it. 

If every day you perform between 3 and 4 effective tasks you will reach your goal. 

Leave some time in between those tasks to get up, have a coffee or drink some water, talk with colleagues (if applicable) or answer emails, make calls, etc. 

Try it for a month and tell me 😉

if after these 7 Tips on online entrepreneurship that you need to know You have been wanting more, we have the solution. Join our list and find out before anyone else about the launch of mowomo school, where we will offer courses in different fields and at different levels. Web design specialized in WordPress, frontend development, backed development, digital marketing focused on WordPress, online entrepreneurship with WordPress These are some of the courses that you will have available. Do not miss it.