How to figure out what business to start – 5 step plan

In this weeks episode of Rosie’s Rituals, I wanted to go over the all important question of ‘How do I know what business to start?’.

So many people have brilliant business ideas and simply don’t take action and then sit back and watch as someone else has the same idea years later and start that exact business they thought of first! 

If you lack direction or confidence in your idea or dream business, know that you want to work for yourself but not sure how, then this post is for you! We’ll go through some steps you can take to work out what you want to do and what small steps to take first. 

Figuring out what you want to do 

This section is reflective and will encourage you to question what you have been doing up until now. 

Exhibit A is definitely figuring out what you want to do with your life! Do you want to work for a big corporate company and climb the ladder? Start your own business? Set up a freelancing business? Or simply have a side hustle that brings in extra money? 

The first step to figuring out what you really want to do is to consider what you’ve been doing up until now, have you been doing what you ‘think’ you should be doing rather than what you want? Are you happy with your current work situation? Do you enjoy your job or do you need to take a whole new path?

Jot down what springs to mind when you think about the above questions. Are you truly happy with what you’re doing now?

What are you passionate about?

Nothing sells better than authenticity, especially these days! With AI (artificial intelligence) taking over, people sharing fake realities on social media and big corporations constantly showering us with adverts, there’s no better way to stand out from the crowd than by being your true authentic self. 

The first step to doing something that truly aligns with you, your beliefs and values is to do something that you’re passionate about. You’ll be able to honestly promote your business and your passion will be the super power breaking through any crowded market spaces. 

If you don’t feel like you have any passions, think about what you loved to do as a child and then consider how you can have a similar experience as an adult. Try a similar activity now and keep going until you land on something you love. 

Do something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life. 

Before I started Rosie’s Rituals, I wanted to create my own marketing company that taught businesses the foundational skills to bring some of their digital marketing in house to save on their costs during a tough financial time. However, I’m just not passionate enough about marketing but I am passionate about teaching and empowering people. That’s how I ended up deciding to pursue Rosie’s Rituals to help and inspire women, particularly mums to start their own businesses and gain freedom in their life and their finances. Eventually, I’ll lean into my Marketing experience and skills and help my readers do exactly this!

The power of brainstorming

If you’re still unclear on what you’re passionate about you should have some brainstorming sessions to start generating lots of ideas. 

During these sessions don’t limit your ideas and have the mentality that no idea is a bad idea. This will give you a great variety to consider and may even highlight a theme to help you find what you truly want to do. 

There’s lots of different ways to brainstorm and it works differently for everyone. Before you get started, make sure you’re comfortable, have eaten, have a drink available and feel positive. This will really help to get the best out of the session.  

It’s important to have some prompts ready to get you started and help to pick you up if you lose your flow or get distracted. Here are a few prompts you could use to get started; 

• What do I enjoy doing? 
• What do I do for fun? 
• What do I like about my current job? 
• If you was super confident what would I do? 
• If money wasn’t a factor, what would I do for work? 

The prompts need to be open ended to give you space to consider new perspectives. 

Here are a few different ways to brainstorm; 

1. Pen and paper: you can sit down with a notebook and jot down any ideas that flow to you. 
2. Exercising: I get the most creative ideas come to me when I’m out walking. I walk along day dreaming then jot down anything I want to remember in the notes app in my phone. 
3. Meditating: some people work best when in a meditative state. Simply write down the ideas afterwards. 
4. Journaling: free write about whatever comes to you from the prompts and keep going until you have nothing left to write. 

These are just a few different techniques, you should do whatever works best for you! Some people get their greatest ideas come to them in the shower or even in their dreams! 

How do your skills align with your passion? 

By now you should at least have an idea of the direction you want to go in, if you haven’t figured out exactly what you want to do! 

Now it’s time to think about what skills you have to accompany your passion. For example, are you a good story teller or writer? Do you have good people skills? 

Consider how your skills can align with your passion, do you love children then you’re going to need good people skills. Do you want to teach? Then it would be great to have good communication skills. 

Have you realised there’s a gap? Don’t worry if so, it just means you’re going to need to develop new skills! Think about if you need a registered qualification or can you self teach yourself the skills? Either way, everyday is a school day and you can learn new skills at anytime and at any stage of life. It is so much easier to learn new skills if it’s to enable you to do something you love! 

How to make your passion profitable? 

Now you know what you want to do, what skills you have and you’ve identified any gaps. It’s now time to think about how you can make your passion profitable. 

For example do you love animals and have a passion for parrots? Could you become a TikTok sensation or start a blog all about parrots or create products especially to entertain parrots. 

Are you passionate about the interior of your home? Could you do an online interior design course and start offering your services to paying clients and promote your services through Instagram? 

If you’re unsure on how you can monetise your hobby, go back to the brainstorming section and think about the below prompts; 

• What problem can I solve for others?
• What do family and friends always ask me to help them with? 
• If you had to teach your passion to someone, what exactly would you tell them? 

You can also do some research on how others have profitable businesses in the same area, this could prompt some good ideas. 

How to get started? 

The best way to get started is to simply start! Too many people procrastinate over a logo and branding or their social pages and never actually get going! 

Here are the steps that I took; 

1. Set a launch date. I set mine for 6 months time (I was pregnant at the time and wanted to focus on my new baby solely for 16 weeks) 
2. Took a free course to get my website up and running 
3. Put together the minimum content to get my site live
4. Created simple branding (to be rebranded in due course) 
5. Purchased a domain and secured the social handles 
6. Created two digital products to launch
7. Launched on the date set! 

This isn’t where the work stopped and of course there was so much to get done once I set that launch date. However, it gave me something to work towards. My main focus was getting together what was needed to launch and then I’ll look at making things perfect as my business grows. 

How to think of a business idea in 5 steps 

In summary of the above, please see the steps you need to take to figure out your business idea and the practical steps to get started; 

1. Be clear on what you want to do, for example do you really want your own business, to freelance or do you want to climb the corporate ladder? 
2. Figure out your passion in life. 
3. Align your current skills with your passion and learn new skills if required. 
4. Decide how you can make your passion profitable. 
5. Set a launch date and get started! 

I hope you found this post inspiring and it encourages you to pursue a career you love! 

Now you know what to do, do you need to find a little extra time? I’ve got the perfect post for you to check out here. 

As always, thank you so much for reading my post!

Rosie xx