Countless articles and videos focus on the fantasy of “startups” and their ability to positively change people’s lives. “All you need to do is start” and “Trial and error” are common phrases that gurus use to encourage all those on the fence. The problem for some is – how do you get on the fence? Before contemplating how your company is going to accrue your first million, it’s better to step back and evaluate a few key questions.

What are you good at?
Before you are able to understand the potential of your company you must first comprehend your own. Recognizing not only your strengths, but your weaknesses, is very important when building something like a business. Figuring these things out will motivate you to exploit your strengths while delegating your weaknesses. This will ultimately benefit the initial startup stress that accompanies all entrepreneurs.

Have you done your research?
Find out if what you’re doing is worth it. Do extensive research on your market, market cap, market needs, etc. Understand your market as if it was a close friend. When you do this all of your decisions would be to only benefit that one friend, inadvertently helping all like-minded customers.

Do you have a business plan?
Before you come up with a startup, be relieved to know that a business plan can be very simple. Fulfilling basic needs, struggles, and necessities can be your first step towards a better plan down the road. Research is more important early on as your future decisions will be based off of what you find during that period of study.

Who is helping you?
Always seek help. Professional help preferably. Mentors and business partners are great emotional and educational benefactors when it comes to starting a company. Later on, those helping are for financial reasons, however before a dollar is earned you first need to understand where it came from and why.

Are you leveraging all your assets?
Friends, family, and colleagues are all assets that are unique to you. Does your brother’s friend’s uncle invest? Isn’t your neighbor’s cousin a small business accountant? Questions like these can ignite inspiration towards personal and financial networking that can change future steady growth to a potentially exponential one.