Hey Friend!

When you start a new business, it can feel super overwhelming! There are hundreds of things people say you should do, but how do you know which order to do things? I’m going to share the first 5 things you need to do so you have a solid foundation and get yourself the brand clarity that will give you the momentum to grow! 
These 5 steps come from my Complete Business Blueprint where I take you through 13 steps to start a new business from the ground up. This guide is free and includes a tutorial with each step to help you move through each stage. But for now, let’s dig into the first 5 steps!

* This post contains affiliate links. This means that I get a percentage of sales at no additional cost to you.

1. Don’t start a new business until you’ve prayed!

Let’s be real for a second here. Deciding to start a new business and leave whatever you were doing before is going to go against everything you know about yourself. It’s going to challenge you in new ways and probably have you feeling doubtful that you’re even equipped to walk this path. 

But this is EXACTLY what the enemy wants! He wants to take you out. This is going to be one of the hardest things you ever do, so before you even begin, armor up! Pray over this endeavor. Pray for strength and resilience and that the Lord would remove distractions from your path.

2. Get brand clarity

One of the biggest mistakes I made in my business was trying to create the things I wanted to sell before I had any brand clarity. I was jumping to chapter 10 before I had written chapter 1. But it’s so important that you start with clarity at the foundation.

I now have a 5-tier brand map that I teach that will take you through

1. The root of who you are
2. Your I help statement
3. The tagline for your business
4. The title of your business
5. The pillars of your business

It’s easy to create the direction for where you’re going, but unless you lock in these pieces of your brand when you start your business, you’re going to end up talking to everybody. And if you want to grow and scale, you need to have a niche.
If you’re looking for more brand clarity in your business, sign up for my free Clarity Workshop. I’ll walk you through these brand clarity pillars so you’ll be equipped to grow and start making a profit when you start your business!

3. Establish your vision and goals for your new business

If you don’t have a big picture vision for what you want your life to look like, you’re not going to have the motivation to make it through the hard seasons of entrepreneurship. A fruitful business that creates impact and income comes AFTER all of the hard work!

Make a God-led vision statement for your life. Write this out in the present tense and get super detailed about what life will look and feel like one year from today. I promise this isn’t new-age garbage. This is partnering with Holy Spirit to create a vision of what God wants for your life so you can begin to take action towards realizing that.

Next, you’re going to reverse-engineer this vision statement and break it down into

• Quarterly goals
• Weekly goals
• Daily goals

4. Set up a management system

It’s important to keep track of activity and begin time blocking from day one in your business. I recommend partnering a task-management system (I use Asana) with a paper journal for this (The Horacio products are my fav!) 

You want to make sure you’re spending your time on income-producing activities. So think about the 3-5 things you need to be doing weekly to reach the goals you set out in your vision in Step 3.

I set up my Asana with different boards for each type of task:

• Urgent tasks
• Daily tasks
• Weekly tasks
• Monthly tasks
• Quarterly tasks
• Special/future projects 
• Important dates
• Brain dump board

I transfer this information into my paper planner so I don’t get overwhelmed looking at all of this at once. Remember: you only need to go one step at a time when you start a new business!

5. Focus on long-form content when you start your business

Hear me out on this one. So many coaches will tell you to focus first on your Instagram, your website, an accountant, or all the other things. But if you don’t have long-form content, you don’t have an audience and you’re not serving people.

You need to build trust and have a solid foundation that you can grow. My recommendation of course is podcasting! It’s the easiest way to create long-form content, and it’s much easier to grow than visual or written content. 

If you’re at step 5 and you’re ready to start a podcast, join me in Podcast Pro University and I’ll walk you through everything you need to know about creating and growing a podcast. 

Those are your first 5 steps to take to start a new business! I want you to have a solid foundation built on stone before you get caught up in all of the moving pieces that come with entrepreneurship. Follow these 5 steps to ground yourself in God’s vision for your business and focus on serving before you even consider selling.

Go grab the Complete Business Blueprint for the rest of the steps and in-depth tutorials that will take you through each part and make sure you’ve got the brand clarity you need to start a new business successfully every step of the way.

I pray this blesses you!

Xo,

Stef

P.S. Also, listen to podcast episode 368 for the full training on The First 5 Things You Must Do When You Start a New Business as a Christian Entrepreneur.

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