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How to become a teenage entrepreneur
You become a teenage entrepreneur by leading yourself. To become an entrepreneur, you make a decision to pursue your endeavor. You deal with the many situations you encounter in your pursuit of entrepreneurship and find solutions.
As a teenager, you think about life after high school. Certainly, you see your parents get up early in the morning or get home late in the evening because of their work hours. Do you want to follow your parents footsteps?
You’re the only one who has control of your future destiny. You have the ability to fast forward your financial future at an earlier age. You can start here and learn how to become a teenage entrepreneur.
Learn about finances early in life
You want to become an entrepreneur because you want to. You saw your parents struggle with their finances and try to make ends meet. Wanting a better financial life is a motivating factor for individuals becoming entrepreneurs.
You need to make a decision and start today. Once you’ve decided to become an entrepreneur, stick with it! You are your own business leader, success motivator and problem solver for your venture.
All I can say is “Enjoy the process”! Each individual will have different results. Some may become instantly successful while others may have a steady income. Some of you may not even make a dime!
When you’re not making money, give your venture some time to build itself. After giving your venture some time, you will need to re-evaluate if you will continue on or explore other ventures.
Many successful entrepreneurs have experienced failures in their beginnings so this is not uncommon. Keep your head up high and keep moving forward.
Because you’re a teenager and there are legal matters that are involved when you are under aged. You will need the support of your parents for opening accounts as well as their signatures or consent for your planned endeavors.
Steps to become a teenage entrepreneur
Work for free
You may think it’s crazy to work for free! Working for free will not give you extra cash in your pocket. Working for free or volunteering will give you hands-on skills that schools may not even teach you.
Tell a business you want to work for free so you can learn skills from that business. It’s a win-win situation for the two of you. The business will get free help for their business and you get hands-on learning skills you don’t learn from school.
You can also do volunteer work for nonprofit organizations that reach out to your community. Working for free will keep you in touch with your community. It’s a form of public relations for yourself that will become a building block for your future success as an entrepreneur.
Start a business
What do you like to do in your spare time? Determining a business niche can be determined by what you like to do. Is it baking pastries, doing graphic designs, making sparkling jewelry, being outdoors cleaning pools or doing yard work? Take a moment to think about that.
After you’ve decided what business you want to do, plan for your business to succeed.
Factor the cost of your materials or inputs to get to your end product. For example, if your baking pastries, record the cost of your ingredients, the time it took to bake the pastries, your electricity for the oven, mixers etc. Apply this same concept to whichever business you’re doing.
Mark up your finished goods or services accordingly to cover what you’ve determined from above.
How to fund your business start up
You may be asking, what if I don’t have money to start a business? Great! We just talked about leading yourself at the beginning of this article and finding solutions.
Everyone’s home has different financial situations. Your family may barely make ends meet financially and others have above average finances. The ball is in your court.
If you don’t have money for your business start up, here are 5 ideas to fund your business start up:
Work A Job
You can set a goal to save money by working part time after school. Remember now, this job is only temporary. Determine how much money you will need to get your start up going. Give yourself a few weeks or a few months to earn some income for your startup.
Sell used items from home
Work with your parents on cleaning up your house. Help them get rid of the clutter. Items in your home that haven’t been used for years can be sold to fund your startup.
Of course you want to start selling items that will get you the highest dollar amount. Start with getting rid of large items like furniture, appliances then smaller items like televisions and stereo systems. You can sell the larger items through your local Craigslist. The small items can be sold through Ebay.
Borrow Money
Ask your parents or relatives to borrow money for your business startup. There’s nothing wrong with asking to borrow money. Borrowing money and paying it back is essential in developing a good credit rating.
Just as an example,suppose you used a credit card to purchase your supplies or services for your business. When your credit card bill arrives, you can decide to pay your entire balance before the payment due date.
When you pay off your entire balance, you’re signaling the credit card company that you are a trustworthy borrower. To borrow money means you are responsible to pay them back an agreed amount over a certain time period.
By being a borrower in good standing, it’s possible to be rewarded with a good credit rating and a higher credit line.
Freelance
You can raise money for your business by freelancing. If you’re going to give freelancing a try, sign up on FIVERR.
No, you don’t have to charge everything at $5! If you start freelancing, you may want to advertise gigs at $5 just to get your feet wet. After a number of great reviews, certainly you should up the price of your gigs to maximize your income.
If you browse on FIVERR, you can see the many types of different gigs these individuals are selling. For example you could do voice overs, write content for blogs, graphics design etc. I’m sure there’s a FIVERR gig that is available for the personal skills that you possess.
Create a partnership
Creating a partnership can be beneficial because it lowers the cost of your business startup. A partner can be your sibling, your parents or even close friends. As the leader of your business, determine the percentage or dollar contribution amount between your partners.
A big advantage of having a partnership is that business start up costs are cut down or split among the partners.
A disadvantage of a partnership is that each partner may have a different goal or direction for the business. Disagreements can cause a business to sink rather than grow.
Have a clear plan, direction and goals for the business before entering a partnership agreement.
Each partner will have their role to make the business successful. Be sure to discuss the necessary tasks that are required of each partner.
How to promote your business
Start a blog or website
You can promote your business through your own blog or website.
With your parent’s help, you can start a WordPress blog. A website or blog can help to promote your business or be an important part of your business. Share your information about or promote products or services for your business.
I recommend using Stable Host for your website hosting. Their service is EXCELLENT!
Build your blog or website and get traffic to your website. You can build your website by writing articles and posting on your site. Write articles or posts that help answer people’s questions about your product or services.
As your website or blog gets more traffic, consider monetizing your website. You can make money from selling advertisement space on your site. In addition to selling your products or services, do some affiliate marketing and selling digital products like e-books or online courses.
Start a YouTube Channel
We all may feel differently about being in front of a video camera. I know that I’m scared like crap when it comes to speaking in front of people or a camera. Why should you start a Youtube Channel?
What does entertaining people with your videos have to do with promoting your business? Of course your videos will let people know more about your business. Your products or services can be promoted on YouTube.
YouTube is a great marketing tool that gives buyers a visual look at what your business is doing. It’s also a great place to place your website or sales page links so people can buy from your website.
The other important point about starting a YouTube channel is that it’s also a search engine. Other than Google, Youtube is also a search engine. Actually, the second largest one.
When you start inputting a search on YouTube, you will notice that the search box will start to automatically input topics as you are typing. Just like Google, it’s doing its job in actively helping you do a search for a topic.
Keep YouTube in mind as it can be a valuable tool in promoting your products or services quicker.
Becoming a teenage entrepreneur means you are leading yourself to your own success. You live it and breathe it everyday. Not all parents will be supportive of your decision to start a business. Be sure to keep your head up high and overcome any obstacles that may come your way.
Never give up and always find ways to improve yourself or your business. You will be the one to reap all the benefits of all that you’ve put into your business.
