When it comes to running your own business, how do you know where to begin? There are so many little considerations and moving parts to any business that it can seem overwhelming. You set out thinking business success is only a few short weeks away once you have launched your business however there are many things a serious entreprenuer has to think about when launching and running their business.
That's why I've collated these 100 tips. These are tips that will help you grow and maintain your business - whether you're just starting out in your business venture, or you are already a seasoned business veteran.
How to get to know your customers so that you can deliver the products and services they need in the ways they need them
The basics of business planning that every entrepreneur needs to know
What you need to do now to prepare for future disasters so that your business isn't derailed when they occur
How to document your systems and processes not only for your employees but also for potential investors
The essentials of small business finance
How to identify the help you need and build a solid network that will provide it
Ways to keep an eye on your market and its changes and developments
The basics of managing a strong social media presence and what to do with it
How to monitor and control your reputation online
Essential time management tips
Tips on reducing and managing stress for when things get hectic.
By the time you finish this blog post, you'll have the basics under your belt and a long list of things you can do today to make sure your business not only survives but thrives in 2021.
Here are 100 small business survival tips.
Know Your Customers
1- Look at Who's Looking
Whether you have an online store or an offline brick and mortar shop, pay attention to who is visiting and know as much about them as possible. If you're offline, watch your customers shop, talk to them and get to know them as well as possible. For an online store, pay attention to your metrics use google analytics or wp slimstat and look at visitor profiles. You can use this information to tweak and better appeal to your customers.
2 - Focus on Needs
Focus on your customers' problems and needs. Your products or services should fulfill those needs or solve those problems. If your products or services don't, how could they be improved so that they do? Or, thinking about it another way, what type of customer could benefit from your products or services?
3 - Focus on Relationship, Not Sales
From the moment a customer encounters your business, hold off on sales and instead focus on building a relationship. Think in terms of how you can help the customer. Interact with them and create a bond. Easing off on the sales means they may not buy anything today or even tomorrow, but if you build a good relationship they eventually will, and they'll stick with you.
4 - Create a Two-Way Dialogue
The best way to get to know your customers and build a solid relationship is to get two-way communication going. Encourage them to contact you and interact with you. A great way to do this is through social media. Remember that even offline businesses can and should use social media to do this.
5 - Find Out Who Is Filling Their Needs Now
Find out who a potential customer is buying from right now and how they feel about it. Knowing this information reveals a great deal about your customers' tastes and how they make their purchase decisions. Perhaps you have something unique to offer that your competitors don't.
6 - Put Yourself in Your Customers' Shoes
Put yourself in your customers' shoes and see things from their point of view. When you do this, you can better understand the wide range of buying options they have, as well as the pros and cons of each. This also helps you clarify the edge you have over your competitors.
7 - Take Advantage of Tools
There are many online tools to help you get to know your customers better. Metrics give you passive data on who visits your site and what they do there, but tools like SurveyMonkey which lets you create surveys, Activecampaign an email and CRM system that allows you to see what interests them can all help
8 - Don't Assume
You probably know the popular saying, 'When you assume, you make an ass of you and me.' When it comes to online business, it's more like 'When you assume, you get out of touch and lose relevance with your market.' Never assume you know what your customers like. Always rely on hard data or your customers themselves.
9 - Seek Out Face Time
Whether online or off, you should value the actual face-to-face time you get to spend with your customers. Phone calls and emails can be helpful for getting to know them, but there's nothing like actually spending time with them. Zoom meetings are the way forward for holding meetings and with more and more business owners and consumers becoming familiar with Zoom this makes it very easy to use your time wisely
10 - Find Out How They Feel
When gathering information about your customers, don't just focus on demographics or behavior, but also how they feel and think. This is part of what’s also called psychographics. When you're trying to address needs, ease pain and solve problems, your customers' feelings are extremely important.
Business Planning
11 – Set SMART Goals
When setting goals, do it the SMART way. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound. In other words, make sure your goals are specific and locked in to a deadline. Decide how you'll measure them so you'll know if you've reached them or not. Make sure they're achievable and relevant to your business.
12 – Identify Your own Milestones
You reach large, overarching business goals by setting smaller sub-goals or even micro goals along the way. These are the milestones that get you to your destination. Not only do they give you direction, telling you what needs to be done on a daily basis, they also give you a sense of achievement when you reach them that keeps you motivated to keep working toward your goals.
13 – Keep Breaking Up Your Goals
Large goals are daunting, but so are your milestones. In order to reach each milestone, you should break them up into definable steps. Take your sub-goals and milestones and keep breaking these up further and further until you have specific tasks you can accomplish each day.
14 – Determine What Makes You Unique
In order to make your business a success, you need a strong unique value proposition. This is what sets you apart from other companies. Don't focus on being the biggest, fastest, cheapest or best, because something better can come along. Instead, focus on what you offer that's unique. This is harder for another company to outdo.
15 – Define Your Target Market
Create a profile for your target market that includes demographics, buying habits, and the feelings and attitudes that make up what's called psychodemographics. Create this profile as if it were an actual person, or avatar, and focus your efforts on marketing specifically to that person.
16 – Size Up the Competition
In the planning stages of your business, research your competitors. You need to find out the overall business climate, as well as come up with ideas to set your business apart. Look at what they offer, what makes them unique, and how they solve customer problems. Also, try to find out what their customers think about them.
17 – Focus on Details
When most people start a business they have a vague idea of what it is and how it will work. But to survive and thrive you need details spelled out as clearly as possible. Think about how your business should operate on a daily basis. How specifically will you meet your customers' needs? Where will the profits to keep you going come from?
18 – Find Out What People Do on Your Website
When designing or re-designing your business website, focus on what you want people to do there. Don't just think in terms of design and features, but what actions you want visitors to actually perform. For example, you may want them to sign up for a newsletter or start following you on social media. For each online marketing channel, identify a purpose in this way.
19 – Get the Resources You Need
Identify what resources you have to work with and which resources you'll need in the future. Outline how you will develop or secure those resources when you need them. Identify others who can help.
20 – Plan with Patience
If you’re just starting out, it's normal for a business to make little or no money for its first few years of operation. Be patient when planning your business. Give it the time it needs to grow and become profitable.
Preparing for Disaster
21 – Back It up
Create a system for backing up your business that includes routinely backing up all data and storing it. Include procedures for what to do if data is lost and define who has access to the backed up data. Consider using cloud services as well as a physical back-ups, and back-up your data in more than one place.
22 – Invest in Security
Invest in a solid security program or service that will ensure your network is safe. Update whenever updates are offered. You may also choose to have your network tested. There are services that try to hack into your site in order to discover its vulnerabilities.
23 – Use Password Protection Best Practices
Your greatest security is simply choosing good passwords and changing them regularly. Use random passwords that are impossible to guess. Avoid common passwords like birthdays, kids' or pets' names, or anything related to your company. Change passwords regularly and restrict access carefully. When you hire outside help, give them temporary passwords and delete when the work is finished. Always change passwords when a person leaves your company.Using a free service like lastpass will help you immensely.
24 – Conduct Security Training
Train your staff and outsourced team well on security procedures and how to avoid malware. Make clear guidelines on downloading from the internet and teach them about common threats like phishing schemes. Make sure everyone is on the same page.
25 – Create an Acceptable Use Policy
Along with your security training, create an Acceptable Use Policy. This is a written statement that outlines what uses of the company's computers are appropriate or inappropriate, especially in regards to internet use. It's important to have these guidelines spelled out clearly.
26 – Protect Your Customer Data
On your website, clearly spell out how customer data is stored and used. Write a privacy policy that covers everything and post it on your website. Treat this customer data like it is gold. Make sure it is encrypted and restrict employee access to only the information they need.
27 – Use Multiple Channels to Keep in Touch
Make contact with your customers through as many different channels as possible so that if you lose one, you can still communicate with them. For example, if your site gets taken down, you can still maintain contact through social media or your email mailing list. Using a service like liveagent will allow you to have multiple channels of communication filtered into one place to keep it organised for your business
28 – Establish Disaster Protocols
Establish clear protocols for any type of disaster that could occur, from data breaches to natural disasters that shut down your company. When something like this occurs, you and your staff need to act quickly and in an organized manner.
29 – Hire Good Legal Back-up
Hire a business lawyer and make sure that all of your legal documentation is in order. Keep copies of all paperwork and understand well what you legally can and can't do. This will include your terms of business and any contracts you need with your customers.
30 – Listen to Legal News
Keep an ear open for changes in internet law. Especially where ecommerce is and Data Protection is concerned, there have been major changes in recent years that anyone doing business online needs to know. Make sure you understand copyright law well and how it pertains to what you do online.
Systems and Processes
31 – Map It Out with a Manual
Define all of your business practices and write them out in a manual. This can be used as a troubleshooting guide for when things go wrong as well as a training manual for new employees. Document each process for every area of your business including product development, quality control, customer service, internal and external communications, the sales process, financial processes, etc. Use graphics and checklists to make it easy to follow.
32 – Create Training Materials
From your manuals, create materials specifically for training new staff or contractors. These should give an overview of how the company works, as well as specific information for learning systems, processes and policies.
33 – Make Training Videos
If you rely on virtual help for internet or computer based tasks, an easy way to train this help is to create videos. Use screen capture video production software and film yourself actually doing the work. When you hire someone, you can give them these video tutorials and they only need to watch and follow.
34 – Secure Funding
If you’re working on a start-up, write your business systems and processes with financial funding in mind. If you want to take out a business loan, you'll have to show these materials as part of the application. The more detailed and thorough they are, the more likely they are to get you the funding you need. You may also need to show this documentation to investors.
35 – Write Step Processes
When writing your processes, take each process or thing your business does, and break it down into steps. The steps should be simple and easy for anyone to understand even if they don't have any knowledge of your industry. If a process has more than about seven steps, break it down into two sub-processes.
36 – Write a Style Guide
Some companies write a style guide. This is a manual that explains how communications should be made in a detailed way. A style guide might cover, for example, how you write emails to customers, what to say on the phone to clients, and words and phrases to use/avoid in marketing materials. How you communicate is important for your brand image, so it should be consistent. Some style guides also include ready-made templates you can use instantly for communications.
37 – Go Visual
Whenever possible, use visuals in your documentation. A graph or diagram explains a process instantly at a glance so that there's no confusion over terminology. A great way to document your processes is by using mind maps. A mind map allows you to present a ‘big picture' of information in a simple, easy to understand way.
38 – Allow Room to Grow
In your business processes and systems documentation, allow room to grow. Your business will evolve over time, and your processes and systems need to be able to sustain this change. Make each process scalable and write your documentation with your future growth in mind.
39 – Ask for Collaboration
Enlist your employees or coworkers to help you document your systems and processes. They may think of details you would forget. They may have other input as well that helps to explain the system more clearly. If you have a larger company, you might ask your employees to document their own processes, and then have others review for accuracy and clarity.
40 – Identify Areas to Improve
You can use your documentation not only to outline and clarify processes, but also to identify areas that need improvement. By writing everything down, you get a clearer picture of how your company works. You may find areas where there is waste or inefficiency. It helps if you ask employees and customers for feedback.
Financial Survival Tips
41 – Create a Solid Budget
Every business needs a budget. No business can survive without one. Your budget is your estimated monthly expenses and profits. Start by considering expenses. Most start-ups can't rely on profits early on until they have a steady cash flow going.
Separate expenses into three categories: Fixed expenses which don't change, such as rent, leased items, and insurance; variable costs, which are related to sales volume and include things such as raw materials, shipping and software to meet sales demands; and semi-variable costs, which are costs that can be adjusted depending on volume of business such as advertising and salaries.
42 – Use Accounting Software
Make it easy on yourself and use an accounting software program such as QuickBooks. While you can't completely automate your financial operations, automating what you can is a huge help. It makes managing your finances that much faster and easier.
43 – Forecast Major Expenses
Make a list of all of your business's major expenses such as computer upgrades or subscription services. Put these on your yearly calendar far in advance so that you have time to plan how you'll pay for them. This way, you won't have to take money that's needed elsewhere when it comes time to make your payment.
44 – Pad Your Estimates
When estimating costs for expenses that aren't fixed, such as rent or salaries, pad your estimation because things usually cost more than expected. For advertising and marketing expenses, take your estimate and double it. For legal and licensing expenses, triple them. They may not cost this much but at least you're covered if they exceed expectations.Detailed research will help you with this so you can be fairly accurate and there will be no sudden surprises.
45 – Plan To Survive Shortfalls with a Credit Line
Arrange a credit line with your bank when things are good and you don't need it. Then, when you experience a shortfall, as every entrepreneur inevitably does at some time, you can borrow only what you need. The reason this is a good strategy is that banks are wary of lending to creditors who need it immediately. It's much easier to establish a credit line when you don't need it.
46 – Get into a Regular Billing Cycle
Create policies for billing clients if your goods or services are such that you receive payment later. When you get payments later, you're extending credit to your clients. Like any creditor, you need to regularly invoice them and create clear policies for dealing with late payments. Unpaid invoices (Accounts Receivable) can really hurt your cash flow when they get out of hand.
47 – Plan Taxes Well in Advance
One thing that's not a financial uncertainty is taxes. Tax season rolls around every year at a set time, so plan ahead. There's nothing worse than being caught unprepared when tax season hits. Put together all the resources you need including any legal help. It's good to also set aside some extra cash for tax season in case you have to pay more than expected.
48 – Don't Set and Forget
Create a budget and revise it constantly. Revisit it each month to see what has changed, as some things certainly will. Update your budget based on the activity of the last month. Also take into consideration any changes in your company that may affect finances, such as new staff or new regular clients.
49 – Scan Your Paperwork
Scan all financial paper work and back it up. This makes it easy to store and retrieve financial documents. You can also easily share documents with potential lenders or others who need to see them. Scanning saves paper and protects you if you get audited.
50 – Record Your Finances
Record your finances honestly and keep in mind that someday a banker may be pouring over them, deciding whether or not to offer you a loan. If you think about this future banker when you make financial decisions, it may influence you to make decisions that are sound now.
Building a Support Network
51 – Identify Resources
No business can do everything itself. You're going to need help along the way. Brainstorm a list of the kinds of help you'll need from others and try to determine who could help with each function. If you don't know anyone offhand, reach out to freelancers, virtual assistants and other businesses whose help you can use.
52 – Build Your Network
Everywhere you go, think about networking. For each person you meet, try to figure out how you can add them to your network. Start by offering them some help they can use. This is how you build relationships with others. Regularly attend networking events in your community and grow your network.
53 – Find a Mentor
In addition to networking and sharing information with your peers, it's good to have a mentor. A mentor is simply someone who is further along on the path of success than you are. Their experience can teach you a great deal. They can help you avoid making mistakes they made along the way.
54 – Schedule Networking Time
Like other aspects of your business, networking works best when it's a regular part of your schedule. Scout out opportunities and make it a point to attend events on a regular basis. Set goals on growing your number of contacts.
55 – Join Your Chamber of Commerce / Federation of Small Business
A great place to get started networking is your local Chamber of Commerce of FSB. Many online businesses forget to do this since most of what they do is over the internet. The Chamber of Commerce and the FSB works for the mutual benefit of every member involved. It's a chance to meet like-minded business people as well as find out about events and spread awareness locally of your company.
56 – Join Groups
Seek out similar business people everywhere you can both online and off. Think of it not only as networking but also as a chance to share ideas and learn from each other. You never know when someone you meet in a group can be helpful. If you don't find a group you like or fufills your purpose, start your own.
57 – Manage Well
Everyone knows there are those who are good managers and those who are terrible at it. You need to be a good manager to your employees and outside help. Good managers are patient, flexible, easy to communicate with and trustworthy. Get to know your helpers well, whether they work for you full-time or on a project basis, treat them well and they will be a big asset to your business.
58 – Prepare Your Elevator Pitch
An elevator pitch is a short description of what your company is all about. It explains what your company does and who it helps. It's called an elevator pitch because it's supposed to be so short you could deliver it in a short elevator ride. Use this quick summary whenever introducing your company during networking or while hiring outside help.
59 – Keep in Touch
Keep in touch with your contacts fairly regularly even if you're not currently doing business with them. An email updating them on how your business is going is alright, but even better, offer them help again just like you did when you first met. Another great way to stay in touch is through social media.
60 – Ask for Help
Never be afraid to ask for help when you need it. No one can possibly run every aspect of your business. Learn to recognize when you need help and get comfortable reaching out to contacts who can help you.
Monitoring the Market
61 – Keep a Regular Eye Out
As part of your daily business operations, keep your eye on market trends and stay on top of news and current events that relate to your business. A good entrepreneur or business owner must be constantly monitoring what's going on in the market. Make it part of your regular routine.
62 – Sign Up for Alerts
To stay on top of important trends, sign up for Google Alerts and other alert programs. Identify keywords that are important to your business and sign up for these services so that whenever someone posts that keyword online, you'll be notified.
63 – Use Social Media Subscriptions and Searches
Use your social media accounts to subscribe to news services and other sources of information. Twitter and Facebook are great for this and you can even save searches within these platforms. Seek out news sources and thought leaders, and pay attention to what they post.
64 – Learn from Other Businesses
One way to stay abreast of what's new in your industry is to follow the competition. Read your competitors' blogs, follow them on social media, sign up for their email lists and check their websites occasionally. You may find valuable information you can use for your own business.
65 – Connect on Social Media
Use social media not only to watch trends in your industry but also to listen to your market. Engage them with content that encourages them to communicate with you and with each other. Listen to their discussions with one another to discover how they feel about the companies they buy from.
66 – Conduct Surveys
Find out what your market thinks directly by offering surveys and polls. Use your social media site to ask them direct questions about products and services. Conduct focus groups online or off to get your market's opinions.
67 – Use Analytics
Use analytics tools to analyze the behavior of your market. Google Analytics is a good, free place to start. It monitors visitor behavior on your website. Most social media sites, blogging platforms and other marketing channels have their own built-in analytics that show you how you're doing.
68 – Ask for Input
Anywhere you have communication with your market, run your ideas by them. If you're thinking of developing a certain product or offering something new from your company, ask your customers what they think. They may provide you valuable input that helps you create better-selling products or services. This is also a good chance to establish two-way communication.
69 – Offer Multi-Tiered Pricing
A good way to monitor your market in terms of price points is to offer several different packages for your goods or services. Offer one package that's stripped down and others that have added features, each with a different price tag. Through sales, you'll discover how much your market likes to spend on products such as yours.
70 – Attend Conferences
Attend trade conferences and trade shows in your industry. You'll learn a great deal about what's going on currently, what's new and what's projected for the future.
Social Media and Online Reputation Management
71 – Choose Social Media Well
There are many social media websites to choose from and each that you choose takes time out of your schedule to maintain. Identify a few key social media sites where you know your target market hangs out. Decide how many you can successfully manage at once.
72 – Engage Daily on Social Media
Spend some time on social media daily. Check in at least once during the day, but more often if possible. The more you're on social media interacting with your audience, the more engagement there will be and the more results you'll see from your efforts. Just don’t make it the main focus of your day.
73 – Learn Social Media from the Pros
If you're not sure how to use social media, follow brands you like and consider successful. Observe how they engage their audience and promote their business using social media. This can give you some good inspiration for how you can interact on your own channels
74 – Stake Your Claims
Search for your business on all directory social media sites such as Google Places and Yelp. Claim your listing if you find it and make sure all of the information there accurately reflects your business. Work these business directory sites into your regular social media routine and keep an eye on them for new reviews.
75 – Sign up for Social Media Alerts
Sign up for alerts on social media so that you know when people are talking about you or things related to your business. Some social media sites have features that allow you to sign up for alerts, and there are also online services that do it for you. You can also search many social media sites by hashtags.
76 – Respond to Negative Feedback Quickly
If you get a negative comment on social media or elsewhere online, respond quickly. Don't let it sit unaddressed for a long period of time where others can see it. Address the problem and try to find ways you can either correct the person if they're misinformed or make them happy if they're an unsatisfied customer.
77 – Establish Protocols for Social Media Disasters
Social media disasters happen and they can be extremely damaging to a company that doesn't respond well to them. Imagine different situations and establish clear protocols for you and your employees to follow in dealing with them.
78 – Stay Cordial on Social Media
Always maintain a friendly tone on social media. There are people who will make you angry or annoy you, but don't let them get to you. The worst thing for your company's reputation is to lose your cool on social media. Make sure you're always ‘on brand.'
79 – Bolster Your Rep with Social Proof
A great way to maintain a good reputation and drown out any negative comments is to seek out social proof. Get testimonials from happy customers and post them on your website and blog. Ask customers to leave good reviews for you on review sites and recommend you to friends. If there is plenty of positive content about your company online, it will offset any negative comments you get.
80 – Offer Free Help with No Strings Attached
Another great way to establish a good reputation is to offer free help to your customers, social media connections and website visitors with no strings attached. This shows that your company is here to help and not just to make money.
Time Management
81 – Decide How You're Going to Manage Your Time
Time management is as important to your business as any other kind of planning. Just like planning your business operations, you need to sit down and create a time management plan to help you get everything done.
82 – Monitor Your Time
A great place to start in creating a time budget is to monitor how you spend your time now. Log your workday and write down how you're spending your time. Keep this going for a week or two and you'll see patterns. It will often show you where you're wasting time and can tighten up your schedule. It also shows you a realistic picture of how much you can get done each day.
83 – Make Prioritized To-Do Lists
Make to-do lists each day with items prioritized, with the most important or pressing ones first. Work your way through the priorities and if you end up not finishing the last few tasks, put them onto the next day. It may be helpful to create weekly or monthly to-do lists as well.
84 – Pad Time
When deciding how long you need to finish tasks, pad them. Add more time to each task than you think it will take. This way, if there are distractions, they won't derail your overall plan. Plus, you'll end up getting most of your tasks done sooner than you expected.
85 – Identify Peak Focus Times and Use Them
Identify the times of day when you're the most focused and use these times for tasks that require the most focus. You can do this through observation. Keep a journal and check in throughout the day, noting how you feel and your energy level. Go back over your log after a few days and you'll see when your peak times are.
86 – Schedule Non-Working Time
In addition to scheduling your work time, schedule time when you're not at work. It's hard for entrepreneurs and small business owners to maintain a work-life balance. Many find it easier to keep this balance if they schedule times when they are not ‘at work.'
87 – Stay Focused with Short Breaks
Take many short breaks through the day to help you keep your focus. During these breaks get away from your computer or workstation and move around as much as possible. Many people find that the more they take breaks, the better they're able to keep their focus when they're working.
88 – Don't Multi-Task
Try to keep multi-tasking to a minimum. When you perform several tasks at once, none of them get the full attention they deserve. When something urgent comes to your attention, set it aside for later.
89 – Just Say No
Learn to say no when people make requests of your time. These requests can easily derail you or cause you to lose focus, partly because they may be important things that need to be done. One way to do this effectively is to tell the person that you're busy now but you'll get back to them.
90 – Delegate and Automate
Wherever possible, ask others to perform tasks for you. Look for tasks that can be easily delegated or outsourced. Look for automation tools that allow you to automate certain tasks to get them off your daily to-do list.
Stress Management
91 – Develop Good Stress Reduction Strategies
Business is stressful but you can minimize the stress by developing good stress reduction strategies. Find some things that help you de-stress and work them into your schedule. You can also try something new like meditation or yoga and see if it provides relief.
92 – Recognize When You're Over-Committed
A small business owner wants to do everything to make their business succeed, but it's easy to over-commit yourself. Learn to recognize when you've taken on more than you can reasonably handle.
93 – Stay Positive
Keep a positive attitude, even when things go badly. If you can stay positive, you have a kind of armour that protects you from all of the daily frustrations. One way to practice positivity is to reframe negative thoughts and statements into positive ones.
94 – Take Care of Yourself
Make sure you're eating well and getting plenty of rest. When you're operating hungry or in a sleep-deprived state, your brain doesn't have what it needs to deal with daily stresses. It also helps a great deal if you get some moderate exercise.
95 – Balance Work and Life
Maintain a healthy work and life balance. Make sure that you're doing something outside of work that you enjoy so that your life isn't consumed by your job. If you're especially busy with work, schedule time to spend with friends and family or doing activities you enjoy. Write it into your calendar so it can’t be ignored.
96 – Learn to Let Go
You can't control every aspect of your small business. No matter how well you prioritize and manage time, there are times when you simply can't get it all done. When this happens, learn to let go and put it off until tomorrow. Next time, put fewer items on your to-do list. You’ll feel better simply seeing more items crossed off at the end of the day.
97 – Keep a Stress Journal
A good way to combat stress is to keep a ‘stress journal' where you write down things that frustrate you and how you feel about them. Your journal offers a way to vent and rage on paper. Don't try to solve problems or deal with frustrations. Just write them down and note how you feel about them. Sometimes you’ll feel a weight lift off your shoulders after letting it out.
98 – Own Your Feelings
When things go wrong, take responsibility for them. The old cliché that you can't control what happens but you can control how you react is absolutely true. When you own your feelings, you take charge of them and this means you're not helpless or susceptible to random things that happen. It empowers you and helps to cut down on stress.
99 – Turn It Off
Set aside some time each week to go offline and unplugged. Turn off your computer and put away your electronic devices. Go somewhere no one can reach you. In today's age of constant electronic communication, turning it all off offers great stress relief.
100 – Cultivate a Sense of Humor
If you learn to laugh at things, you're untouchable. Nothing can get you down. Cultivate a good sense of humor and use it when you face adversity. Laughter is a great stress reliever. If you can’t find anything to laugh about, try watching a good comedy or surfing YouTube for funny videos.
Conclusion
Running a small business isn't easy and you'll find many roadblocks along the way. But these 100 survival tips are enough to get you started with conquering those challenges and getting past many of the common mistakes business owners and entrepreneurs make.
Here are a couple suggestions for using these tips to your best advantage:
1. For each of the categories of tips, try picking one tip that you know you need to work on and explore it in more depth.
2. You can also pick a whole category and devote a week or month to implementing some of the tips.
Some absolute corkers in here – and I love the idea of focussing on one area a week or a month to really nailing it. I also think its a great list to come back to in the future, to help focus the mind. (I have also put a note in my calendar for 6 months time to make sure that I re-read it then too.)