Over the years I have learned about many things including but not limited to computers, business and education. The knowledge acquired helped me develop website designing, entrepreneurship and community activism skills.
These skills help me, run a small mobile money business, with the aim of employing at least 3 youths before the end of 2017 and Gagawala graphics ltd, one of the fastest growing website design, graphics design and printing business in Kampala, Uganda employing 8 young skilled professionals who didn’t have jobs. In all the businesses I involve, I like to emphasize self sustainability.
This is the reason why I honour invitations to hold workshops in rural and rural-urban areas.
The last free entrepreneurship workshop, I facilitated was in Masese slum at Jinja(Eastern Uganda).
To make it inclusive and have maximum attention from everyone, I suggested we have a question and answer session instead of a speech kind or black board kind of class.
Everyone agreed. Questions started to flow from participants. One of the questions the participants asked was “What things do we have to consider, to be able to start a business?” Answers contributed were idea, market, labour, skill, capital and time. I emphasized that without embracing all the 6 elements, the business my not grow or even serve it’s purpose in a single day. Business the discussion, we had a little physical activity in which participants made a circle while holding each others’ hands raising it up high.
This activity helps participants to work together for productivity. And also help relieve and resolve what’s learned from the discussions.
More activities at the event were poping, breakdance, sports workshops and dance competitions happened.
Tag: Human progress
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Pursuing happiness by building communities.
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How can I help the human race progress? The 7 Tips
Have you ever looked for someone who can give you some tips to help you progress at anything in life? How about challenging yourself to share 7 tips to people. For me my people are my blog readers. Because you care, I also care and would like to share with you my tips. We humans survive if some humans cares and gives a hand otherwise we would lose hope. That’s why I have decided to write this series once a week. The posts in the series will be about anything in the categories but not limited to personal development, business, coding and writing etc.
1. Don’t launch unless you’ve done research.
Because we are desperate for recognition, we sometimes forget the basic principles to birthing ideas. Of course all ideas are mostly problem solving but you don’t want to approach your solutions the same way others do. Because that would feel like copy and paste. So to be on the safe side do some research and analyse whether your solution is not offered by others, and if is offered by others, how best and authentically can you beat competition. Research does not only help you to uniquely package your idea, it also helps you find and define your audience.
2. Define the client avatar.
If you want to be a top seller, you would never leave out this stage, else you would be doomed. Whether it’s a non-profit idea it’s needs a buyer, all ideas need buyers in form of consumers. As much as you some entrepreneurs start by targeting a mass market, not many start ups, can sustain this. Lack of client avatar usually misleads because without it you don’t know who to focus on and at the end of it, you listen to everyone. Everyone may not buy. Yet developing and producing for everyone takes a bigger budget than producing for a a targeted audience. So know who you want to sale to, how many are they, where are they located etc.
3. Build and keep a happy inspired team.
However much the idea is the best at the right time, without a team it will never make it to the second consumer, assuming you and your family are the first consumers.
To take it out there someone must be committed to put in time and develop, package, market, sale it, listen to customer feedback, correct errors and the cycle continues. Which means if you don’t keep a consistent, happy and inspired team you will likely experience hardships if not fail completely.
How to keep the team happy and inspired, first hire character as much as skill. The rest about this story for another day.4. Let your brand standout!
If your brand doesn’t standout it will eventually fade out completely and serve no one. Corporate branding is important, so do and keep it professionally smart, unique and consistent. In Uganda, I know and have worked with many branding agencies those who serve locally and internationally. I have found Gagawala Graphics to be the new kids on the Brock, but understand the game. Check them out! They take you through choosing the right colors, to logos, flyers, brochures, colors, invitation cards, business cards, and all the way to building and launching a website.
5. Learn marketing and embrace marketing 3.0
Today is not industrial days, today is digital and it will continue to be for some years until virtual reality will take over the world. Which is not going to happen soon since the technology is not as affordable as smartphones. Marketing 3.0 is about inventing solutions which solve real problems, and are spiritually connecting with the consumer. It’s also about complementary goods. You don’t want to miss out. It’s cheaper than traditional marketing, for example a $5 USD daily budget, would get you into eyes of many.
6. Be ready!
Are you ready, as in do you really know people? Like Simon Sinek, said if you don’t know people, you don’t know business. I totally agree with him. You must be ready to understand what people need and not only that, you also need to provide them what’s better than they want. Look at Apple products for example, at their prices, their consistence, durability and portability is taking allover the planet. Simply everyone needs a phone, but a phone which is secure and can take good photos, is just better than a usual phone. Are you ready? Define your craft, work it intensively, be ready to offer the best. And also be ready to be reject sometimes.
7. Get a mentor and a leadership coach.
I don’t agree with you, if you think you are the only genius on this planet. School grades tend to hype people and they forget that the solutions they must make large depends on the people’s lifestyle. This is why you need a mentor. You need someone who is knowledgeable, open-minded and willing to educate. You need that person has gone through it, seen it all, had a fair share of failures and enjoyed some success.
It will be helpful to spend less while learning quality and fast enough. As much as you need such people in physical life, sometimes it’s hard especially in the developing countries. Then social media should be your best market place to find an indirect mentor. Check out linkedIn profiles, facebook and instagram. Choose the best in your field, follow them, interact with them, read their biography, ask them questions, buy their books, DVDs and give time to listen. You won’t be disappointed.Conclusion
If you read up this line, then you care, thanks for supporting me and feel free to send me questions. Add tips through comments and if you think the information may help someone, please share it.
