I first started working as a freelancer back when I was 19. Signing those papers to become a freelancer felt like I started a huge business. At the time, working ‘for yourself’ didn’t feel stressful, but pretty similar to a regular job. I hopped in the car, did the work I had to do, signed off, and went back home. When I got the opportunity to start hiring employees and becoming more of a manager, it slowly started to feel like an actual business. From that moment, I started to realize how building an actual business is way more stressful. I felt the pressure of having people working for me and making sure they could pay their rent at the end of the month.
I’m writing this intro knowing there are many people out there who underestimate the difficulties of building and owning a business. Not starting prepared can result in major implications, setbacks, and disappointments. That’s why today, I will discuss what I found to be most difficult when building SensoriumArte, how I stayed focused, and finally, how I turned hardships into positives.
The most common assumptions about business owners
As mentioned earlier, many people underestimate the difficulties of being a business owner. Even though I had my own assumptions before I started my journey as an entrepreneur, I was quickly proven wrong. So, let's take a closer look at some of the misconceptions people have about business owners and uncover the realities they face.
It’s easy to start a business
Alright, let’s get the big one out of the way. Building a business is everything but easy. Of course, it depends on the type of business that you’re building. But no matter what industry you’re in, there are a few major components that need time and effort to accomplish. Think about finding customers for example. You have to do a lot of research to determine your target audience. If you offer some sort of service, you might need to narrow it down and specialize in serving a specific niche. Reaching out to those people through advertising or cold calling can be an extremely expensive and unrewarding thing to do. I was very surprised by the complexity when I researched my target market and target audience.
Building a business requires consistent and sustainable growth over time. In order to do that, you have to find a way to generate consistent sales while slowly scaling the operations. Besides that, adapting to the market might influence profitability, which could negatively impact business growth. While many believe that having a good business idea will automatically generate sales over time, that often isn’t the case. Many factors make it difficult to realize sustainable growth and profitability over time.
Minimal work hours, because you can decide it yourself
This is another point that, in most cases, couldn’t be further from the truth. Building SensoriumArte, I woke up at about 5 A.M and worked for about 12 hours a day before heading to the gym for a workout. On days like today, as I sit here writing this blog, I arrive at the office around 6 A.M., and I anticipate that I will be wrapping up this writing session around 11 P.M. Doing this without having launched the business yet shows how time-consuming it can be building a business.
For all the work you put in before launching the business, you won’t even get paid. You only get paid when you deliver your service to a client or sell a product to a customer. In the best-case scenario, your business grows exponentially and you can figure out a way to hire people that can do some of the work for you.
Rapid growth and expansion are always around the corner
When you start your business, people assume that you immediately start selling your product or start receiving phone calls from people who need your service. That’s not how it works. Especially nowadays, with an increasing amount of people starting (online) businesses, it can take a long time before you get your first sale, or land your first client. You may even need a significant budget for advertisements to get your name out there. With SensoriumArte, I have dedicated a lot of my time and efforts to creating a solid content strategy, hoping to inspire people to tag along with our journey and try out our personalized wall art.
Immediate work-life balance
This is the one that feels the hardest for me to maintain. when building a business, you become more and more attached to the process. With SensoriumArte, I want to make sure everything is perfect, and that there are no mistakes to be found anywhere when launching the business on September 16th. Imagine how much time it will cost to work on the business while having to answer customer emails, order products, run your socials, and do your admin all while maintaining a life outside of work. It gets difficult, and it certainly takes time to adapt. I noticed that it doesn’t just take time for me, but also for friends and family. Suddenly, I wasn’t able to hang out with friends as much anymore or be home every night to watch a movie with my family. It takes a lot of sacrificing, without having any certainty that the business you are building will result in something successful.
How I stay focused and motivated
Building a business on your own can be a difficult journey, demanding long days and long nights alone in the office. During these times, it wasn’t uncommon for me to get distracted. When I felt demotivated, I could easily waste most of my day sitting on my phone, watching sports highlights, or going out for lunch. Luckily, I found a few ways to get rid of any distractions you may have.
First of all, I started working with an agenda, writing down everything I needed to do every day of the week. Every Sunday I sat down, planning the entire upcoming week from morning until night. I wrote down what I was going to do each hour of the day, whether it was working on the branding aspect, having a call with the development team, or having a lunch break. This way I knew what to do at any given time, which decreased the feeling of doing something else.
Another thing I did was watch and listen to business-related videos and podcasts. Hearing the founder of Canva talk about how she built the interactive interface for her customers and grew the way she did is so inspiring that I couldn’t wait to hop in my car the next morning and head to the office.
Ultimately, staying focused and motivated takes a lot of discipline. Building a business from the ground up generally does. Following a specific routine, maintaining solid time management, and listening to success stories and tips from other business owners are methods that have helped me stay focused throughout the years I worked on SensoriumArte.
Turning hardships into positives
Me giving some more insights into common assumptions has hopefully shown you that life as a business owner isn’t all that easy. It takes a lot of time, money, and effort without having any certainty about the business becoming successful. Worst case, the product you have created didn’t come out of the test run well, which means you have to make changes to the product design and reinvest your money into a new testing phase. Your social life will often take a big hit as well. There will be times when all of this can get you demotivated. I very often struggle with thoughts like “Is this all worth it?”, or “What if my target audience won’t be interested?”. How do I deal with these negative thoughts?
As cliché as it sounds; remember why you started. When I started SensoriumArte, I had a few goals. For my personal goals, I wanted to get out of my comfort zone and find a reason to start exploring the world, which is something I have barely done up until this point in my life. On the business side, one of my goals was to offer a way for people to gain the ability to relive certain moments and experiences. I mean, how special would it be to have an art piece of a passed-away relative with a personal video or audio note? Or using a highlight of a family holiday to create a family portrait? I truly believe that starting this business will bring something special to customers, making them feel proud to hang it on their walls.
At the end of the day, life is about dealing with challenges that are put in front of you. Over the past 3 years, things haven’t been easy for me, facing work-related challenges and challenges outside of work. But, keeping your goals in mind and reminding yourself better times are coming can give you that extra bit of motivation that will help you see it through.
