In Nigeria, most people begin businesses for 2 major reasons.
- It’s popular culture
- If you can’t get a job, create one for yourself – hence a business.
Another widely popular reason is – ‘I want to be my own boss’.
But beyond being your own boss or just doing it to pass the time, businesses that will thrive and succeed must have owners at the helm who are determined to invest in the quality of their business.
Business owners and entrepreneurs who have no strong sense of vision or plan for their business are more likely to experience stunted growth or complete business closure.
If your business is of utmost importance to you and you would like to expand it or grow, you will have to work on your vision and mindset as a business owner. In this blog post, we are sharing 5 habits of highly successful business owners that you should imbibe.
- They’re constantly learning.
Bill Gates and Warren Buffet have revealed that they clock in about 5-6 hours daily just reading. Now, that might not be feasible for most business owners, but the lesson to be learned is to develop a habit of constantly learning and growing.
If you stumbled into business, or have no prior experience in business, then there are a lot of things that still must be learnt.
Whether it’s bookkeeping, business marketing, best production practices, new innovations and ideas in your industry, your business will benefit from a head who’s on top of trends and new opportunities.
For example, to get things typed in the past, it was necessary to get a typewriter and learn to operate it. But the computer boom came and most people began to switch to that and left typewriters. Typewriting business owners who weren’t aware of computers, or ignored them eventually went out of business because their services became obsolete.
This year, intentionally make a decision and create blocks in your calendar to learn something about your business. Listen to a business podcast, check new regulations in your industry, find coaches in your field and follow, read books, and attend seminars & conferences.
2. They take feedback
Successful business owners have a consistent funnel and pipeline for receiving feedback and working on it. Although not all feedback may be helpful, most of it typically is.
Whether it’s monthly or quarterly, make time to check in with regular customers and one-time customers to get feedback. Checking in with regular customers will help you find out what keeps them coming back, so you can highlight that reason in your marketing to acquire new customers.
Checking in with 1-time customers will bring in a fresh perspective as they’ll be truthful in what made them stay away or any other feedback they might have. Also, if you have hired staff create an environment where people feel free enough to share feedback with you, especially people who interact directly with customers.
This year, prioritize feedback.
3. They’re heavy on market research.
How can you advertise/sell your goods to a market you do not know? How can you stand out in a market if you don’t know what to improve on? Or what do your competitors lack that you do have?
Effective & regular market research is a staple for successful business owners. Market research will help you:
Proper market research will do everything for you from understanding what your customers need more of, to how you can gain the upper hand over other existing businesses.
- Understand new innovations in the market
- Draw up and execute effective marketing & sales strategies
- Find gaps in the market
- Leverage feedback
- Prioritize fast-selling products
Let your market research per time tie in with the goal you’re trying to achieve. If your goal for the 1st quarter is to make 5x more sales than the previous quarter via entering new markets, you want to research what is missing in your industry, or something new that is opening up that you can tap into.
For example, as a baker, you can decide to go into new markets by making healthy goods and eats. So research the fitness and healthy living industry and find out how you can make your way in.
In this particular podcast episode, Oluremi Martins shares with us how she was able to leverage a community love for black girls and kinky hair to grow her business – Natural Girl Wigs.
4. They’re planners
In tech and software businesses, there is something known as a product roadmap. That product roadmap contains details and features that the product team plans to build and release over a period of time.
Highly successful business owners make the effort to plan. They don’t stumble into one phase of their business and just go with the vibe. They actively plan for months, quarters and years. This is necessary if your business is in for the long term so you have clear direction on where you want your business to be, and the steps that are needed to get there.
5. They are constantly evaluating
What works today? What worked that isn’t working anymore?
What products need to be retired?
How can productivity be maximized? Are we producing enough with the available resources? What particular seasons or weeks do we sell most? What kind of content converts best?
These are just 1/10th of the questions that successful business owners continuously ask themselves. This evaluation is why a good number of businesses or companies have weekly/monthly evaluation/check-in meetings to track how the previous week/monthly went. Constantly evaluating where your business is will always help you make better decisions for your business.
These are the top 5 habits of successful business owners that you need to imbibe.