Alex Williams

Starting a business is not as easy as it seems. If it were, everyone would be doing it, right? Wrong! Everyone IS doing it, but we’re doing it all wrong. I say this because i’ve been freelancing for so many years, but haven’t actually started a “business” per se (i.e: bank accounts, marketing, sales, management, accounting, etc). Come to think of it, I haven’t even registered my company with the govnt. (for tax purposes).

Starting a business is actually very easy, but you must make a PLAN for it. In the past, these were called “business plans”. I don’t believe in those because they usually take a year to write and that time should be spent focusing on other tasks. I have a different way of planning my business, and i’d like to share it with everyone. I obviously will not take credit for everything, so I will list (in no particular order) some of the people/companies which have influenced me greatly.

• Paul Graham
• 37signals
• Ian Landsman
• Erik Sink
• Joel Spolsky
• Brian Oberkirch
• Seth Godin
• Dharmesh Shah
• Google

I’m the type of person who likes to learn things on his own. Much of what I learned can be found in books, blogs or online forums, but a lot of it comes from the mistakes i’ve made in the past. My previous errors have prevented me from running a sustainable business, due to lack of funds, motivation, knowledge and experience.

I won’t go into details about my plan because I have no yet fully developed my idea, but i’ll give you a rough idea of what I learned and what I plan to apply over the next few years. This will serve as my basic guideline for running my business.

• To provide something of value to customers with exceptional customer service
• Remain flexible to changes for the evolution of my business
• Become a registered company with its own separate bank accounts
• Remain active in the industry by providing valuable insight and advice to upcoming entrepreneurs
• Perform regular advertising and marketing of my products/services
• Keep track of all expenses and stop using a shoebox for receipts
• Use technology to be more efficient
• Spend money on software and hardware only when needed
• Take my time to do things properly and build a sustainable business, rather than following the hype
• Say no when necessary
• As long as I love what i’m doing, i’ll continue doing good things

For those who are wondering how the title affects this post, well it is January 3, 2007 in Montreal, Canada, and it’s currently +10° outside.