Valuable Lessons for an Entrepreneur 1 - Stay Motivated

Valuable Lessons for an Entrepreneur I - Stay Motivated

So finally, Rain Dear is reaching the momentary end of its days on the course and I must say, it is quite sad to see it go. AS part of our group course, we have to officially close the business and distribute all the group members’ equity by the end of this week. If we wanted to see Rain Dear continue, one of us would have to be willing to let the business continue. It has been a challenging and exciting year that has gone by speedily, and there have been countless valuable lessons that I have learnt as an entrepreneur. Over the past few weeks we have also had many entrepreneurial speakers that have brought some truths I have learnt this year to the forefront of my mind, and our last board meetings and general weekly meetings have had a lot of points of reflection and evaluation on this year and plans for next year and our future plans as entrepreneurs. So for my last few days I will share three significant lessons, which I have come to realise in the last few days and have not shared here before.

My first learning I will share with you is how significant it is to stay motivated. Our enthusiasm and energy curve tends to follow the same curve every year. We start off enthusiastic and excited about our resolutions and plans for the year, then we go through an energy slump through the year as we get into routine, and the year loses its excitement factor, then we finally pump up towards the end as we see the festive in sight, and that a new year beckons.

With our genesis product, we experienced a very similar curve. Once we had found our product we were going to work with, we were in complete euphoria. As the product continued to be developed through prototyping, manufacturing and the launching and development of the brand, our excitement continued to grow. When we started selling and online and at markets and seeing the reaction and intrigue in our product our excitement grew even further. Then when we relealisd that our target market’s interest was not translating into sales, then our enthusiasm started to change. Once we further realised that we were really starting to miss our sales targets and struggling to find a way to move our final stock by the deadline, then we reached quite a slump and our energy levels toward our product was not quite the same.

What was important at this stage was for us to keep motivated. I personally struggled and was not as enthusiastic about our product as when we first started, and this started to reflect in my sales numbers and overall effort. In my mind, we had kind of reach the end of our sales before the deadline. I have realized that this only has a negative effect on your brand as people feed off your energy, and the entrepreneur speakers have emphasized that your business will go through many challenges where you want to give up. It is at these points where you need to most motivated! So next time and even now I will certainly make more efforts to find what my motivation up. Whether that means constantly reviewing finances and sales numbers, improving product quality or constantly reminding myself of growth opportunities in the market, I will ensure that my curve is a lot more consistent.