Living the Dream – The Business Side of Phase One
To manifest my success and make my Palisade Posh dream a reality, I thought it important to learn as much as I can about the business side of starting and owning my own business. This blog post will focus on sharing what I’ve learned thus far, as well as links and documents to resources that have helped me gain the knowledge I’ve learned to date. As my business savvy skills develop on this journey I will provide updates with more tips, info, resource links etc… So that you have access to all the useful information that I’ve found helpful to me in my endeavor to start and run Palisade Posh LLC.
So here we go! The first big break I got was when Andy (my husband) found the Small Business Development Center www.sbdc.org. This group has been amazingly helpful and supportive when it comes to providing workshops, classes, access to free Consultants who then provide additional information, recommended readings, and advice. It is a Nonprofit organization, that operates in each state across the United States!
Once Andy located this organization for me, the first thing I did was to bookmark the Denver branch on my computer https://www.denversbdc.org. After looking through their website and all that it offered I also bookmarked their videos link https://www.coloradosbdc.org/resources/entrepreneurs/e-learning-videos/ so as time permitted I could study the different videos they offered. The first workshop I took was Business Foundations: StartUp. It cost $50 and was a three hour zoom program from 5:30 – 8:30 pm. By signing up for it, I got my first introduction to how to start a business, but more importantly it opened the door to access free business consultants! Basically, once you sign up for a SBDC program, they view you as a client and work to support you on your journey to starting your own business. My success reflects their success, so their motivation to help me succeed is huge! One key conversation I had with Kim Roberts, who is the point person for SBDC programs in the Metro Denver area, was when I shared, I didn’t have much business experience, but I did have a clear vision. Her response was a game changer for me – she said most visionaries don’t have a business background, and most businesspeople aren’t able to be visionaries! You can learn the business side of things; the real challenge is to come up with a vision! Until that moment, I thought I was starting at a disadvantage because I didn’t have a business background but come to find out having a clear vision (aka idea) is the hard part!
After that workshop, I had a zoom meeting with a Marketing Consultant to discuss my Palisade Posh website and the marketing challenges I have regarding selling products on it. From that conversation, I came to the realization that I jumped the gun, so to speak, on getting it set up and in essence I put the cart before the horse… meaning I didn’t have things set up in the correct order which makes achieving success much hard! So, after much reflection, I decided to dail back the content on the website and have its focus (for now) be on the blog and building a readership for it. Now that the wheels are finally starting to move forward on the Palisade Posh endeavor the key role of this blog will be to document and tell the story in real time – this being one of those moments!
The other consultant I met with was Nancy Barrett who is a business consultant. I really liked working with her as she was A) a woman and thus understands the challenges to women who are trying to start their own business and B) she was incredibly supportive of my vision, never condescending and gave digestible advice for someone (me) who is a visual learner! We’ve met twice thus far and prior to our last meeting she recommended I pick up a book titled Business Model Generation Written by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur. I swear it is totally geared toward visual learns and visionaries! I’m still reading it and getting a ton of information out of it as I make the connections between what it is teaching and getting my head around the business plan for the Airbnb.
This then leads me to the next event I attended, also through zoom, which was an Info session for an upcoming 10-week class called Leading Edge for Entrepreneurs. I signed up for the class after attending the info session. It started on May 26th and goes to July 28th. In this class, I am learning how to write and implement a solid business plan for the Palisade Posh Airbnb, aka Posh Cottage. As I progress through the program, I will share what I learn on the blog so that any of you who are thinking about starting your own business can benefit from the information I’ve gathered and the knowledge I’ve picked up along my journey… until then, stay tune!
Postscript: as I’m writing this blog post (I always write two weeks ahead of my posting date) I’ve not yet started the class – it starts this coming Thursday.
