Three things Anaita wishes she knew before starting a business
Anaita explains why every business needs a dedicated marketing budget, why product type affects how easily marketing works, and why she developed a formula for selling anything online: awareness plus traffic plus optimization plus sentiment. She argues these fundamentals aren't taught in traditional education.
The lessons
Set aside a real marketing budget, not just money for stock and shipping.
Don't rely solely on organic social media to drive sales.
Understand your product's inherent demand and difficulty to sell before comparing your results to others.
Use the formula awareness plus traffic plus optimization plus sentiment to build a sales strategy for any product.
Questions people ask
What do most new founders get wrong before starting a business
They save up for stock and shipping but forget to budget for marketing, then rely only on organic social media. Anaita says you can't grow a business without dedicated marketing spend.
Is it true that anything can sell online
Yes, but the ease depends on your product type and the demand or problem it solves, which affects how far your marketing budget and content go. She still believes anything can sell online if you understand the right strategy.
Transcript
Here are three things I wish I knew before starting a business. Number one, you've got to have a marketing budget. You save up to buy stock, you save up to buy shipping fees, but you don't have a marketing budget. Cannot rely on just organic social media.
Number two, everything sells in the same way. If two friends start a business and one has a product that solves a problem or has more demand, their marketing budget will go further than yours. Their Instagram posts will go further than yours. You need to know what your business type is and you need to know the difficulty of selling your product.
But I do believe anything can sell online if you know what you're doing. Number three, there is a formula to sell anything online. It's not what they actually teach you at university. There's awareness plus traffic plus optimization plus sentiment equals sales.
Each element has strategies and that's what my book is all about. Let me know what you need help with.
