Entrepreneur ideas to get your business started

You want to start your own business and are looking for good entrepreneur ideas to build it. A profitable idea is just the first step yet it is very important for just that reason. The right idea can make or break your business.

Before you start

Things to consider about potential entrepreneur ideas:

• What need does it address? Does your proposed product or service solve a problem someone has? McDonalds sells hamburgers but address the need for convenient, fast food.
• Who are your customers and how will they find you? The target market for McDonalds are people who are rushed for time and know the trusted brand of McDonald is off the highway on the way home (location and brand awareness are McDonalds strong points).
• How will you make money? Some people believe money comes with volume, but your business will struggle if you never figure out how to make money even off of small volumes. McDonalds' business system, low labor skill requirement, and central marketing allows them to sell billions of hamburgers profitably.

Entrepreneur ideas are all around us. If you just look at the objects in the room around you, everything is the outcome of an entrepreneur who had an idea. The coffee mug you are drinking your coffee from - that is the product of someone's business. The calendar on the wall was sold by someone. An entrepreneur saw the need for expression and resulted in the pen you are writing with.

List of potential entrepreneurial ideas

Sample ideas to kickstart your creative entrepreneurial venture:

• Take up a craft and sell your product at arts and crafts markets.
• Mow lawns in the neighbourhood (or set up a system of laborers that are contracted out).
• Wash windows of businesses' storefronts.
• Barter to get what you want (One Red Paperclip)
• Pet- or house sitting. Watch people's pets while they are away on holiday.
• Breeding animals. Thoroughbred dogs can sell for quite a bundle for example.
• Office cleaning. Business to business (B2B) can often be quite profitable.
• Get a trailer and haul people's junk away. For a fee of course.
• Self storage: buy some lock-up units and rent it out as self storage space.
• Buy and sell websites. Identify websites that are under valued (or where you can add significant value) and sell for a higher price. See flippa.com.
• Sell pixels like milliondollar home page (okay, don't since its already been done, but creativity and purple cows rule).
• Know your area well? Start a local tour company (guides) and show interested people the area.
• Can you play an instrument? Give lessons or record a how-to video series or DVD and sell it via the internet.
• A fan of adventure? Start a bungee jumping- / skydiving- /scuba diving- / white water rafting experience company.

Execution

Entrepreneur ideas are plentiful. Execution is where it all goes down. Even if your idea has been done dozens of times before, if you can execute better than everyone else, you can make a difference. To start you of on execution, see the following examples of start-ups from ideas to business.

• The $40 challenge. Started from a post in an online forum, the idea is to start something from $40 and turn it into $400. Ranging from yard sales to writing and selling an e-book (electronic book) you can aim high or low, but you only need to start with $40.
• $100 business. Every three months a new group of 150 entrepreneurs join and starts (or continues) to build their business using or spending only $100. How much can you bootstrap and grow your business using just $100?
• Start a business with $500 in 7 days. This writer for the Australian Anthill Magazine used his technical skill set to solve a need one of his business friends had. Who haven't had people complain about something? It is an opportunity to solve a problem and start a business. This guy did it in 7 days and used less then $500 to get it off the ground.
• Hobby related entrepreneur ideas - start a website. This website started out as a hobby, but I'm starting to make a nice chunk of change from it. If there are any hobby or field that you are passionate about and feel you can add value to the field, you have a potential market niche for your business.
• A new small business idea for everyone

A good business starts with a good idea, but to make it a great business, you need great execution. So go out there and act on your good entrepreneur ideas and make the execution excellent.