Starting A Business with 10,000 Naira
Disclaimer: This is not a business advice nor should it be regarded as a business consultation.
You’ve seen it everywhere.
You’ve squinted at it, disdained by it. Even felt disgusted by it.
Because you don’t believe anyone can start any business with 10,000 Naira.
It’s absurd.
Or so you think.
Whatever you believe, just read on.
Ten thousand naira!
That’s just about $20.
Looks ridiculous.
Really ridiculous.
But
Yes, you can start a business with 10K.
Starting a business in this social media age is just as simple and easy as creating your first Instagram account.
To start a business with 10K, you must first have a great knowledge of the business and the kind of people that will be buying your product.
If your product users are online, great! This is for you.
The most important aspect of having a great business is having a great brand. This is beyond graphic design, but truly a good design is 70% or more of it.
Pay your graphic designer friend for a business card design and a social media (specifically Instagram) flier. Instagram, because the design can easily fit into your WhatsApp profile picture.
If your power of negotiation is strong, you can get that done for 7K or less.
So, you have 3K left.
With 1K, buy data (Airtel SmartTrybe offers 1G for 500). Massively do campaigns on social media pages, which I expect you to have created by now. Share your designs. Ask your WhatsApp friends to help you repost.
Are you good at Maths?
Maybe not.
But you have 2K left. Please, don’t give it to those people asking for 2K urgently yet.
You want to do something really important with it.
You want to run a WhatsApp ad with all those WhatsApp TVs that you’ve been laughing on their status. On average, they charge 2K for a sponsored post.
Now, you’re back to being broke.
But
You’re not.
You’ve only invested your money.
By now, if your designs are captivating enough, and you’ve accompanied them with great marketing content targeting your actual customers and not just some people you think should buy your product, you should be having your first buyer soon.
What is left of you is to learn how to strategize your social media content to attract the customers you need. Pinterest can help here. Look for pins that suggest posting styles for specific social media platforms. Instagram has a different style than Twitter and WhatsApp.
Next, learn how to make simple designs by yourself. Get Canva, Spark Post, Photoshop Express and PhotoGrid. Continuously practice using these tools. You’d get better.
By now, you should have a lot of people asking about what you’re selling. Keep in touch with them. Refer them to your WhatsApp catalog, you should definitely have one.
Try as much as possible to collect contact details of prospects and customers, especially their email addresses.
Then get in touch regularly with email marketing. Email marketing may sound like a big technical ish, but it’s just selling to your prospects via email but with direct targeting. You can learn more at the Business Hangout organized by CumbreHub Consult coming up next week.
And before you know it. You’re on everybody’s lips. People know you and what you’re selling.
Fantastic.
If you’re still lost about anything, just come for the Business Hangout. It’s free and yes, it’s online via Zoom.
We’ve invited some really amazing people like Dara Sobaloju of Carrit Hub, Kingsley Uwem of iDesign Graphics, Ayowole Solomon of The Set-Up Network, and of course, Ayobami Adebayo, the Venture Manager at Opolo.
It will really be a great gathering to learn about business branding, customer engagement, and promotions.
If you really care about starting a business in 2021 or you want to improve in your business skills, then this Hangout is for you. It’s definitely gonna be worth it.
You can learn more about the Hangout by sending me a message on WhatsApp.
I really hope you don’t miss it.
See you soon.
