When I was doing my final year in engineering I chose the path of entrepreneurship with some of my colleagues. It is only after some time that I realized some common mistakes associated with not only my company but with many other student startups as well.
Problem No.1 : Lack of work experince: We may be gurus in what we do, or at least we feel so. But knowing your work and knowing your industry are two different things. Without knowing the work flow pattern in an industry you will have a hard-time managing your customers, works, workers and partners.
Problem No.2 : You are the best in the field: This is a common mis-conception among many college startups. While launching your products or services you believe that it is foolproof and is the best anyone can get. But as long as there is competition there are companies better than you.
Problem No.3 : Lack of skill set: Often it is your technical ability that gives you confidence to start a company. You may know how to do something in your field, but not everything. For example you know how to make a wordpress template, but don’t know how to develop a wordpress plugin or a widget. There are many clients asking for them all. There are many companies who have skillset in all. So being skilled in just one thing may not help you as an entrepreneur. Either you have to have expertise in related fields or you should be able to hire experts in that area.
Problem No.4 : Lack of study on market scenario and underestimating the value of Marketing: This is associated with Problem no.2. When you believe that you are the best in the field, naturally you feel that customers will come for you without any marketing efforts. I know many companies that still spend more money on technical side and more or less ignore marketing. Many feels that marketing campaigns and network meetings are irrelevant because they do not win instant customers and hence spends more time on learning shortcuts. But in the long run these campaigns and meetings will prove useful to your business.
Problem 5: Deviating from your business plan: It is common that startups face financial problems. To overcome this many resort to do small works that are not in your actual plan. It is normal and even advisable but you should always set the limit. We faced a similar problem with our company Techseol Web Solutions. In the first month we developed some blog networks to earn money and we literally struck gold! We made almost 5 times the amount we planned to make and that within 2 weeks. So instead of expanding our market for our actual services we went on with these blog networks. After a few months when we looked at our actual market we were still where we started, winning zero clients with zero marketing effort. Avoid such a scenario and stick to your business plan.
Problem no.6: Pricing too low: It is a common belief that you can earn a lot by pricing low. It may be true in the case of established business, but for a startup it is not so. As a start up you won’t have enough skilled man power at low operating costs to handle large volumes of work. Instead concentrating on potential clients can get you enough money, good references and a better market.
Problem no. 7: Maturity problems: Whatever you are, a student at college aging 21 or 22 is still immature in many aspects. There are many problems faced by startups due to lack of maturity. Many problems associated with your business will cease to exist gradually, but many problems arising from lack of maturity are not so, especially in internal matters.
a. Doing business for the sake of friendship: This problem is often seen in many student startup companies. This arises during decision making and when someone is under-performing. Not asking someone to improve their work thinking you may offend them is the worst mistake you can make in a business. In the long run this will hurt your business than any other problem.
b. Lack of an efficient leader: This occurs when you start a company with friends of similar age. There will be no one to control you or you will be obedient to. This problem is faced at the time of decision making and plan execution.
c. Personalization of problems: It is common to have difference of opinion, but at the end you should find a common solution. It is only possible if you can look at the problem at different angles and accept the facts. But when you are not mature enough this doesn’t happen. Instead you personalize these matters and end up hurting everyone and your business.
If you know any other problems associated with college startups, feel free to share.
Great insight.
Comment by smartin — June 29, 2010 @ 7:26 pm
Good one man.
Comment by Jojo Joson — July 1, 2010 @ 7:33 am
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Pingback by Tweets that mention A Wannabe Blogger's Blog » Blog Archive » Common problems faced by student startups -- Topsy.com — July 2, 2010 @ 6:24 am
Perfect for student startups
Comment by Arun — July 3, 2010 @ 6:34 pm
its really good work..thanks
Comment by anil kumar — July 17, 2011 @ 7:25 am