Starting a business takes a lot. A lot of time, a lot of energy, a lot of money, a lot of sacrifice, and a lot of guts. Anyone who tells you that a new business is a cakewalk is either pulling your leg, or is just downright lying to you.

Is starting a new business something that you want to do? Let’s find out as we explore the 12 strategies it takes to be a successful entrepreneur.

1. If you love it, make money doing it. If you lie awake at night and dream of a world where you are raking in the cash selling your homemade bird houses (and you’re already good at making bird houses), you’re on the right track.

2. Instinct tells you it’s what you want. Successful entrepreneurs will tell you, without gut instinct, they’d still be slaving away at their old job. If you’re ready to take the leap, your gut will be telling you from day one.

3. You choose your company. We aren’t always defined by those around us, but it’s a fact of companionship. So remember, successful people are always inclined to situate themselves around other successful people.

4. Money IS everything. This isn’t the whole Gordan Gekko “Greed is good,” thing from the movieWall Street. But you need a basic understanding of finance to be successful. It’s a fact.

5. The people you cater to, you must like. Notice it doesn’t say love. That’s because there’s no folly in embracing your clients/customers, being close helps you help them. But loving them will just end up hurting you. Business can be a cold mistress sometimes.

6. Stray from the beaten path. Sometimes on the far side of the Yellow Brick Road you find the Emerald City. But sometimes around back is the deed to the building.

7. Doing more can sometime mean doing less. It’s not as tricky as that. Simply, those who volunteer gain themselves volunteers. So in the long run, your initial efforts reward you with more time to do what you need.

8. Write something. Not a novel… okay, you can write a novel. But the protagonist has to be a successful entrepreneur who gives lessons on being successful. What’s important is the part where you’re published. It implies you are an expert.

9. Researcher’s research pay off. Keep up with that is going on in your niche. When something new comes along, own it.

10. Make valuable, inscrutable connections. With other successful people who will help to augment your status, or just regular people who want to help. Either way, the more networking you do, the better you’ll be for it.

11. Synchronicity will win your heart. “The coincidental occurrence of events and especially psychic events (as similar thoughts in widely separated persons or a mental image of an unexpected event before it happens) that seem related but are not explained by conventional mechanisms of causality.”

12. Never stop moving. You’re a shark. Never stop reinventing, founding something new, taking risks, shaking things up. Complacency is your enemy.

For more information on how I can help you, don’t hesitate to contact me any time.