The digital entrepreneurship is a way to realize your dream of leaving formal employment and become master of your own business. However, for that, only good ideas are not enough: as in the case of enterprises with physical space, the success of online acting companies also requires starting with a good business plan.
First steps for a digital venture
First, you must establish exactly what type of digital business you want. Many think that because it is a virtual company, definitions, plans and structure are not necessary for success. However, you will basically need to take the steps you would take if you were opening a company with a commercial point.
After preparing a first draft of the main ideas surrounding your project, look for points in your plan that differentiate it from all competitors, be it virtual stores or applications that fulfill the same function. If you cannot differentiate yourself from your competitors, return to the draft.
From that point, assemble a business plan as detailed as possible. It is essential for its structuring. Good ideas are only potential before planning. Then they can become a successful business.
With a properly drawn plan, it is time for execution. Forget all the old precepts and all the recipes: this is the time to show how your digital company differs from others. Do not presuppose anything. Question yourself to move forward. “It reduces ideas to their essence and works from there,” says Elon Musk, creator of the company that originated PayPal and CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX.
On the page, structure the content around a good SEO (Search Engine Optimization) strategy, so that your brand approaches your audience.
To publicize your company and your ideas you need to go behind your target audience. Invest in actions in social networks, in publications on your blog and interact with readers whenever possible.
Bet on innovation
To be an entrepreneur, in a basic definition, is to have the capacity to do your own business, in many opportunities, ceasing to be someone’s employee, changing the course of the career. That simplistic idea, however, does not always take into account a factor highlighted by various authors as extremely important for the entrepreneurial activity: innovation.
In the 1940s, for example, Austrian economist Joseph A. Schumpeter already stressed that being innovative, above all, is being a basic agent of a process of destroying good ideas to create something new, and therefore innovative.
With digital entrepreneurship, the relationship with the new became direct on more than one occasion. Innovation is necessarily the essence of that market. First, for being relatively new every year, we observe companies taking technological leaps and creating new needs both for those who produce (content, products …) and for those who consume.
Second, because of the exploitation potential that still exists, since there is an unexplored public entering the digital world daily according to UN data 4.3 billion people still do not have access to the Internet.
Good examples of digital entrepreneurship
At the same time that there are traps waiting for those who want easy money, there are a number of good examples to analyze …
Netshoes: a company that sold in the courtyard of a university in the early 2000s, which in the first month online did not generate even a sale and which became years later the largest e-commerce site for sports goods in Latin America.
Facebook: today the largest social network in the world, with about 1.4 billion users. Initially it was for the exclusive use of Harvard students. The giant Mark Zuckerberg acquired in the last years two other success stories on the Internet: Instagram, application to share photos, and WhatsApp, application to exchange messages.
In common among them, and among many others, there is that same prominent factor as the essence of digital entrepreneurship: innovation. Therefore, when you think about making money in the virtual world, do not forget the rules that make any business stand out, on the Internet or outside it: market research, competition analysis, and well-structured business plan. All that and an innovative product can lead your company to success.
