Rapidly Building a Reputation for a Startup

For a new business, the most difficult hurdles are making the first sales. But the only way to meet this challenge is to present your company to the market and start building a reputation. To make the initial sales requires the same formalities used to approach the millionth customer—an existing corporation with a salesperson holding business cards.

An important part of financial planning for a new corporation is that you might have to give away some of your first sales. So you’ll need enough capital for production without much revenue. The classic dilemma is that a new business attracts customers from its reputation with past customers. But a new business doesn’t have prior buyers. So ultimately gaining the customers who pay full price means first offering deep discounts in order to create a sales base.

From there, a new company grows with endorsements by the earliest users of its products or services. A common method to accelerate this process for a new company is obtaining testimonials from initial users. To assure optimal results, a startup business keeps costs low and concentrates on quality service.

In addition to gathering customer recommendations, a new businesses gains credibility by its professional affiliations. Get input from other businesses. You can create an advisory board for your corporation that includes new as well as experienced entrepreneurs. At the least, you’ll want to network with colleagues and business associates.

The main ingredient to building a startup business is having a group of contacts. These lead to finding the first users of your product, gathering feedback, and assessing how to improve. This formula turns small businesses into big successes for their founders.