So, being a business owner is cute and all. But nobody warned me about the struggles… okay! Going into this, I knew that financially, I’d see a dip before I see any real profit. Although a profit is a profit. We accept all small wins.

Before we even get into the advice I wanna introduce my business. So the first is The Little Gift Box, and here I personalize items, make gift boxes, acrylic place cards, personalized jewelry, and homemade candles. The second is stickwithme808 which is my press on line. This one is fairly new, and fingers crossed hopefully we make business this year.

To start off, I recommend jotting down all ideas. Whether that be the business name, what you wanna sell, a product audience, etc. Having a plan sets you up to not be overwhelmed. When starting my small business where I customize goods, I kind of just jumped right in. I didn’t know who I wanted to target, what I wanted to sell, what I would make, if I wanted it store style or made to order style. All these things kind of made me look unprofessional as I constantly went under changes on the site, the products, the name of the business and everything else that should have been established.

Give yourself a realistic time to have things done without being rushed. Now that my first small business is up and running, I decided to go for another. This time around I planned 6 months in advance. Seems like a long time, and it might be but if I learned anything in my past business endeavors it is that you must take your time for something to be good. Slow and steady wins the race. I can not begin to tell you how many stores I opened on Shopify, from lashes, to luggage, to pet items, just for them to fail. I was in a rush trying to make money, that my site was literally displaying bare minimum energy. Down to the logo, instagram page, misspelling in item names and descriptions, you could that I didn’t take it as seriously as I should have.

Do not over sell! If it’s one rule of thumb I wish I knew, it would be to not do too much selling in the beginning. When I say this, I mean start small. Come up with five items you are going to sell and just focus on those five items. In the beginning of my customization business I tried making so much stuff that the quality wasn’t as good. I was so excited to sell and be selling, that all I cared about was making things that look cute, in half the time to get people to click on my page. So start with five, and work your way up.

Work on the products first. This may be backwards, but sometimes we have a good store name, color scheme, make a great website and don’t even know what we want to sell. When you work on what you want to sell, and then come up with your five items everything kind of flows. This came easy to me as I knew I wanted to sell press ons. So i decided on a few colors and designs, gave the nails names, and took product photos. Once I got those out the way, the name came to me. I know i wanted to play on stick or press because after all you stick your press ons on your nail. I always text my friends and mom for nail ideas, and they sent Stick With Me. That was it, that was the one. I figured out my logo, and colors right off that. Now I was able to put my site together with all the pieces in place.

My last bit of advice, is to stick it out. Sites, and businesses do not go up and just start booming service. Take it from me, even with all the mistakes I made with my old sites I am sure if I stuck it out that they would’ve actually been pretty okay. Treat your business like you would a newborn, or a garden. Tend to it, figure out what works here and there, be patient, and remember no two businesses are alike. What works for someone else, may or may not work for you and vice versa. But if you believe in your passion, business, item, craft, then push through.

PS: anyone who reads the blog gets 30% off their next order with either The Little Gift Box or Stickwithme808 with the code “blogreader”