You don't always need funding to build your small business idea
Do you have a great business idea but no money to back it?
Many people who have start-up ideas for small businesses, always seem to get caught up on the money factor.
We cannot say we blame them. We live in a world that has trained us into thinking that money makes everything happen, including making the world go around.
And as much as money is important, it isn't the be all and end all when you are driven by passion.
Musi Atchar, a small atchar business started by Modikwe Musi during the lockdown, proved this theory perfectly.
As a way of proving to everyone that you can, in fact, build a successful business without the promise of a big financial backing, Modikwe took on the challenge.
"The challenge was to prove that one can start a thriving small business without funding and connections, and Musi took it upon himself to become the guinea pig." (Business Insider)
After joining an Instagram Live with an entrepreneur, he found that he had something to share and the entrepreneur saw that.
A person commented saying: "In the land that we live in, without connections and funding, you'll never make it in business."
This was motivation for Musi to start a business from scratch. After reminding himself of the deliciousness of his mother's atchar, he used his e-commerce experience to build a website and market the atchar.
After using word of mouth on social media with a barter system, it seemed that his experience paid off. A simple sales approach of reminding repeat customers to make their orders by encouraging them to sign up to a monthly debit order generated a six figure revenue.
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What this taught us is that sometimes putting in the hard work and working smartly is more important than having a marketing budget and funding.
Musi said it perfectly: "Never be scared of starting small but always think big. A lot of entrepreneurs feel like they cannot start their business without funding, they think they need the best offices and the best machinery in order to start. We started extremely small but always knew what the bigger picture was. If we had not started small, we would never been here today." (Business Insider)
Image Courtesy of Facebook