Is Your Virtual Business Thriving? Please Share Your Best Advice!

When you earn money by something of your own creation, how much you earn is not a superficial fact--it is often a reflection of part of who we are.

It reflects our diligence, creativity, problem solving abilities, our integrity in creating great products and services that people want and that we stand proudly behind.

In much the same way someone who has built his own house with his own two hands will proudly tell you how many hours he spent working on it, how many nails he used, what kind of lumber he used, how many bruises he got, and how much the house is now worth, so an entrepreneur will likely be willing to give you an idea of what went into building his work of art (his business).

An entrepreneur who shares with us that his business is thriving is telling us a whole bunch more than just how much money he makes--he's telling us that he has found a way to create and run an successful online business, one that endures for years and years and one that continues to grow with his dreams.

Going From Surviving To Thriving

 
   

As everyone knows, starting an online business has a pretty low barrier of entry--many, many folks start internet businesses but relatively few make it, and even fewer get to the point where they pass the "surviving" threshold and sashay into the arena of the "thriving".

But some smart, savvy, patient, forward thinking online entrepreneurs do break into the "financially thriving" realm and many do so with an increased quality of life and a renewed sense of what they can accomplish.

One of these super internet entrepreneurs is a client of mine, Steve Shaw.

In his newsletter the other day, he absolutely blew my mind with telling an inspirational story of how he got started, how at first he was running everything himself and then gradually his business, SubmitYOURArticle.com, took off and now he's taking his success to next level with one of the goals being to kick his earnings into the realm of 7 figures! Yay--go Steve!

I read his words and was inspired, particularly by 2 bits of advice he gave (quote is from Steve's newsletter which you can subscribe to here). Steve shares:

"Looking back, I can tell you two main factors that got me from
scraping a living, to earning a healthy income:


1. Changing my mindset - there are psychological barriers that most
people have towards wealth, and I was no exception. I
subconsciously prevented myself from earning above a certain level.

Once I learned to deal with that, and got over it, my income
started to rise substantially.

I also used to resent the wealthy or successful - this meant I was
subconsciously sabotaging any hope I had of either wealth of
success, for I couldn't do anything my mindset was against.


2. Learning to set goals, and follow through a plan to reach them.
If you don't know where you're going, you're permanently lost, and
your priorities will be set by everyone else but you.

Once I defined a goal, and constructed a plan to reach it, I had a
route to success that I merely had to follow consistently. Of
course, you can never guarantee that you will reach a goal that you
set for yourself, but the probability is hugely in your favour that
you will get somewhere close.

In my case, the business went way past my goal, and kept on
running, and I had to struggle to keep up. I could have worse
problems!"

I love that advice, because those two tips are about challenging our preconceived ideas about what we can accomplish and taking ourselves seriously enough that we come up with concrete ways to accomplish our dreams. It's not enough to dream--you've gotta follow through!

Being able to tap into the hero within ourselves is crucial when it comes to having a thriving business, and it's not something that you can just flip on like a light switch. It takes work. Changing your mindset takes work and so does having the discipline to set goals and consistently work to achieve them.

What Is Your Best Advice For Going From Surviving To Thriving?

I think the most important advice I could ever give anyone on how to have a successful online business is:

*Create standards and boundaries for your business and honor them.

When I say "standards" I mean deciding ahead of time what your business stands for, how you pledge to treat clients, colleagues and everyone else you come in contact with, what kind of work you'll do, the quality you'll hold yourself to, when you'll work, etc.

Boundaries are the other side to the coin--having boundaries means deciding ahead of time how you want folks to treat you, what is acceptable to you and what is not, and then coming up with guidelines for behavior that you will and won't tolerate.

I think of my standards as reflecting how I want to present myself and my business to the world--this is how I pledge to treat people.

I think of boundaries as being me educating people about how I want to be treated.

My belief behind this is that in order to get what you want, you have to ask for it (duh, right?). When you educate people about how you want to be treated then there is a much higher likelihood that your needs will be met. It's all about being clear about how you want to be treated and how other people can expect you to treat them.

I'm proud to say that I've maintained my standards and boundaries since Day 1 of my business, and the impact has been huge! It helps me to attract the folks I want to work with because I'm so specific about all this stuff. It may seem like it's extra work or like it's a pain, but it actually makes life so much easier.

I know that we have some newbie business owners in the house who would love to learn from the more seasoned entrepreneurs who have worked very hard to reach a level of success that is inspiring to the rest of us. 

Come on you guys--don't be shy. Please share with us your best advice for going from scraping a living to earning a healthy income. Your wisdom may help someone else achieve their goals. :-)

 

Comments

[Sandra]

Your article encouraged and inspired me to continue doing research to start a virtual business in Atlanta, Ga. I just don't know where to start. I have 8 plus years of administrative experience and completed my program as Information Processing Specialist, May 1994. How can I find out if virtual services is a demand in Atlanta, Ga? Your advice is greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your time. Continue the S U C C E S S...

[Sharon Sarmiento]

Hi Sandra,

Do you know what the great thing is about having a virtual business? You are not restricted to working with people in the town where you live! Yay, for this!

The beauty of a virtual business is that you can work with anyone no matter where they live, so it really doesn't matter if anyone else in Atlanta is interested in virtual services. You will find your clients on all corners of the globe :-).

So, instead of seeing what's in demand in Atlanta, you should do research to see what types of virtual services are in demand in the WORLD! Isn't that fun?

[KG]

I've learned a lot from Fabienne, the Client Attraction Mentor. I've seen her speak, and I've bought her Client Attraction System. She is awesome, and her advice definitely applies to internet businesses. Here's her URL: http://www.clientattraction.com/home.htm

She is really inspiring and authentic. You can feel how committed she is to helping her clients succeed. I hope to work with her in person one day or attend another workshop.

[Sharon Sarmiento]

Hey KG--thanks so much for the tip! I need to check her out. I've heard of Fabienne, but don't know that much about her. Sounds like it's definitely worth it to investigate...

[Maryam in Marrakesh]

I am just embarking on the process of starting a virtual business - a shop. It is frightening and fun. I am trying to work methodically through the things I think I need to do. So any advice I find here will be much appreciated!

[Sharon Sarmiento]

Hey Maryam--Yay for you! That sounds like so much fun. I eventually would like to open a virtual store too. I can't wait to see yours!

In general, if you can find a model of a shop that you like online, then you can use that "model" shop as a guide to creating your own shop.

This is what I'm going to do when I start my shop (I would be doing this for chocolatechipped.com, rather than eSoup)--I'm going to search the internet for a profitable, attractive shop that has a customer experience and look that I want to sort of mimic (not copy or anyting, but use as inspiration). I'm going to first look in my own niche, then outside of my niche to find the best model for building my own shop.

I would focus on customer experience first--an easy shop to navigate that displays the products in an attractive way. Then I would focus on the brand of the shop.

I can't wait to see how yours turns out--let us know if you have any specific questions cuz we might have the answers! :-)