Take the decision and stick with it........Bills Bills Bills

2010..... Final exit Dangote

"But Dangote is not stressful, you can combine it with your business and be collecting your salary, don't resign!" This was the advice I got from almost everybody around me. Someone even promised to get me a book, "things you must do before you resign", it had something about saving at least 6 months of your salary before you quit, not that this is a bad idea though. She had a business by the side too and was saving to resign (she is still saving three years after, I don't blame her, taking the leap is not easy). My hubby was skeptical too, but I got his buy in by promising that I would dust my CV after 2 years and look for a job if it didn't work out. I pleaded, please don't let me go to my grave with the regret of wondering what could have been because I never tried.

How did I get to this point of no return? When I started the business, I joined every entrepreneur association I came by, Wimbiz (women in management and business), Spirit of enterprise, other groups and fora on facebook. I was attending seminars, reading online material and partaking in as many networking opportunities possible. The climax was the Wimbiz annual conference, I attended all the seminars and break out sessions at the conference, listening to and meeting people like Bukky George of healthplus, Funke Bucknor of Zapphire Events, Tara Fela-Durotoye of House of Tara, Ibukun Awosika a serial entrepreneur. It was electrifying, not that they painted a picture of a life of affluence or no work, but there is this joy that comes with walking in your purpose and they all had it. I wanted this too and it was at this conference that I made up my mind to take the leap and run with Trezorlandia. 

My friend and co-entrepreneur, founder of The Jobmag center, Maureen Iyasele was one of the most excited people about my decision. She hadn't taken the leap at the time, but she encouraged me and gave me a soft landing with a business development project at the center. That soft landing was great because building a business my people is not a joke! You would go through many phases, from motivation to despair, to "what have I done" to ......... Persistence is the key, no matter what happens, once you have made that decision, you must stick with it if you want to succeed.

Slowly but surely you will get there.......

Life Skills Learnt

If you didn't like reading before, now that you are considering entrepreneurship, you better imbibe the habit. Information is power. It will save you from making mistakes that others have made. Reading is not restricted to print material, the internet is a fantastic resource center, a word of caution though, not everything you read there is true or right.

2013...... 28th June

This is the week of bills. I found the perfect picture to show the way I feel! 

God help me!!

www.bills...... #dazall

Inside the mind of a startup Entrepreneur by Irfan Ahmad

I found something that I can't resist sharing.Trust me it's good material. I never really knew about info graphics till I found Irfan's blog http://www.digitalinformationworld.com. When you have a minute, please have a look at the info graphic about the mind of an entrepreneur. Here's the link below;

http://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2013/06/inside-mind-of-startup-entrepreneur.html

Notice all the things founders should be able to do, ideally? Hahaha!! It's funny, but that is the truth. I think I am in the bootstrap stage. What stage are you at?

Hope is not a strategy......

2010...... Dangote+Trezorlandia+Family

The year 2010 was a busy year, I was juggling a full time job, a business and family. I tried as much as I could to keep a balance and not have any drama. Lucky enough the valentine's day in this year (one of Trezorlandia's busiest days) fell on a weekend. There's a small story for the first one which was in 2009 and for every single valentine's day actually. I will share those of the other years in separate posts.

Valentine's Day 2009, never was. Here's why. A cousin of mine told me I could get items from the states delivered in Nigeria in three weeks, so I gathered my savings and ordered teddy bears (red ones), some keep sake items and other things I thought would be nice. A week to valentine's day, I started to panic because there was no sign of the goods nor could my cousin give me a specific date for when the goods would arrive. She said the shipping company had some hitches. A day to the d-day, she calls to say she's sorry that the goods would not be in till the next week! Omo!! See crying (told you already that I like to cry, we just start o). I was stuck with goods that had valentine written all over them. Gbese!

About my talk in the the first paragraph concerning juggling three areas of my life with no drama, I lied, of course there was drama! Are you kidding me? One time I had to package a surprise for a client's anniversary. I booked a table for the pair at southern sun, got fresh roses and had them placed on the lady's seat, bought and signed the cards and arranged them on the table, got the cake and arranged with the waiters to bring it in at an agreed time, you know now all the works to create an ambiance. I was running back and forth between my office and southern sun, just to make sure everything was set. Of all days, this one was a really busy one at Dangote, I had a few reports to turn in. Still, I managed to set it all up and then rubbed my hands together and waited for feedback from the client. They were booked for about 7, so I was surprised when around 7:30 my phone rings and its my client. Here's the conversation that ensued,   "Sade, what is my name?" Oh oh, where's this going? I answer him and he goes "then where should my name be on the card?"!! Shucks! I had signed the card wrong, with his name at the top and her name under *Opens crying tap*, I stuttered a little, confused and completely ashamed of myself. How could I have? I apologized profusely and offered a discount, but he was too angry to even answer and just went like whatever. Chai! I called the next day after crying at my cousin Bimbola's desk, while she consoled and tried to calm me down, she was like haba egin (ondo for addressing an older relative) it is not that bad now. He wasn't as mad as he was the day before, whew! The thing about such mistakes is, you never, ever make them again! Unless you have screws lose in your head. At least not the same mistakes.

During this period, my brother Kehinde and partner Emy were so helpful, I will forever be grateful for the roles they played in building trezorlandia. With her crazy busy schedule, Emy would take time to have phone meetings, take care of offshore orders and was just there to listen to me whine and lament about this supplier and that supplier. She invested her time and money. Kehinde was there for me at every call, attending meetings on my behalf, reviewing documents and looking for new clients to convert. We hopped on okadas (motor bikes) to do out first interview with Lara George on gifts because I had to be back at work on time.

Interview with Lara George

I borrowed my friend Ayo's video cam for this and stayed up all night to learn how to use the video cam software to do the edit. When there is no money, you have to work extra hard. Use your brain, nothing is rocket science. In my uncle's office back in the day, he had this message on his wall that went something like " Lord somebody (I forget the name now) tried to replace a bulb in his house and got electrocuted, serves him right, you should learn to let professionals do their job". This may be true for electrical engineering or maybe medical sciences but to work a software, especially when resources are scarce? Naah!

I cannot but mention Happiness Enweremadu, who is my full time staff till date. She was more than a blessing, very smart and never complaining. I would send her from one end of Lagos to another and she would not miss a thing. When I was leaving Dangote, with no office, no guaranteed source of income, no nothing! I asked her if she would like to work with me and without much thought, she agreed.

At the pace at which it was all going, I reached a point where I had to ask myself, Sade are you doing this or are you doing this? I had to make a choice, a choice to leave my guaranteed income in the comfort of Dangote and pursue my dream of building a business that I know will outlive me. I  use "know" now because I can't be hoping at this stage, #hope is not a strategy.

Of course making this decision is never an easy process and it wasn't for me. I will tell you about how I made the final move in the next post.

2013........25th June

I have been a bit lazy, aside from the fact that I was down with malaria. I am in that place where I just don't feel like doing anything. Imagine that. Somebody that is looking for money o. One major challenge with this journey is the ability to stay motivated, in the face of all the challenges and struggles. Motivation is so important. Like the artists you need to find your muse and hold on to it.

I haven't been to the hub in almost a week. So much for my strategic positioning near the Budgit guys. It must not go to waste! I started the Abraham Lincoln book finally, but the first few pages have been a bit of a drag, efiko style writing, booooring! I am under pressure to finish it though, as I have opened my big mouth, more like used my big fingers to type it for the whole world to read that I am going to read it (I hope this makes sense? lol!). So boring or not, I will do my best to finish it, so help me God.

It's gone quiet again. No birthdays, no anniversaries, no weddings? People! Where are you at? Oluwa, connect me by fire!

Start from your sphere of influence........

While some sit and wait for the government to transform the nation, others are getting involved in creating this change that we all seek. Which group do you fall into?

I got in contact with a group called the generation for societal change last week through my friend Ikenna (my chemical engineering family!). He was booked to speak to some of the engineering students of the university of Lagos but was held up, so he called me and asked if I could fill in for him. Why not, I love getting involved in things like that, its my own little way of being a change agent. Besides, I didn't have anything booked for that time, so I checked it into my schedule.

It was nice to be there again, surrounded by students with hopes and dreams. Nothing much has changed, I could spot the efikos, the cool guys and all the groups we also had back in our day. I was called up first, to speak on the benefits of hard work. I didn't have anything planned per say, but I tried to make it as interactive as possible and here's a summary of the points from the session;

• Start with identifying your purpose, only then can hard work truly be beneficial and it wouldn't even feel like work. 
• The benefits of hard work go beyond money, you also want fulfillment at the end of the day.
• You can work hard and have all the money in the world but not be truly wealthy. A wealthy man has "Access", he has touched so many lives and as such has access to benefits that money cannot buy. There are some places you cannot get into even if you had all the money in the world.
• In the end, it pays to work hard.

Next up was Tayo Bamiduro, he spoke about building your reputation and career and here are a few of the points he made;

• Your integrity is your most valuable asset.
• Building a good reputation requires consistency, you are only as good as your last performance.
• Be passionate about one thing at least and follow it through.
• Be interested in things that are happening around you and not just your vocation.  
• Learn the art of reverse engineering. You do not need to re-invent, rather think next level.

There was a lot more that was said at the program, but these are the few points I can remember. I am positive that we managed to get through to at least one person that day, if not more.

http://www.facebook.com/generationforsocietalchange

Health is wealth.....

I think I have been struck by malaria, I have had this headache for two days that is persistent. Since even the panadol adverts say, "if symptoms persist, consult your doctor", I am going to do just that. Before I head out though, I wanted to leave a quick note.

When you are passionate about something, you can so easily get carried away. You need to do this, you need to do that and you need to do all of them now! Calm down. It's a pity that we do not have many good examples of fully Nigerian owned companies that have crossed the 50 year mark (what am I saying, 20 even!) but here's the thing, think of your business as a going concern. It's not a project you need to start and finish in a given time. You are building an institution, hopefully it will outlive you. Take one step at a time.

I once had a chat with Bukky George of health plus and she said something that stayed with me. She said she kept taking what she calls "baby steps". It's easier said than done, I know, because even I let pressure set in a lot of times, but if you let stress get to you, you can't function optimally nor can you make informed decisions. I know there's so much you need to do, but if you're in this  for life, you have enough time to perfect one thing at a time and to take care of yourself!

Slowly but surely, you will get there........

Have a great week ahead. 

This girl is tired!

It's been a busy weekend, from the GSC (Generation for societal change) event to the Owambes' ( typical Nigerian party) plus work. I need to write about the GSC experience, but not tonight. I am completely knackered. In the meantime, you can read about them at www.generationforsocietalchange.com.

Were you at any wedding this weekend? Did you notice any lady in an orange lace dozing in her seat? Yea, that must have been me! hehe. I almost fell off my chair. I hope the paparazzi didn't get a shot of me. This Lagos city life is a hard-knock life!

Goodnight.

Here's the reason why I am just uploading this post. 

The foolhardiness of Entrepreneurs……..Supplier management

I remember I mentioned that the website story was a whole post on its own. Today, I’ll tell that story.

Me and my fancy website.........

A couple of people say oh I want to start a business but I need capital before I can start, hmmmm. Let me tell you something that might shock you, over-funding for a start-up is more of a problem than lack of funding. In fact, when you have no money you are forced to be more creative with your decisions and actions. So rather than sit there and wait for that lump sum of money to fall on your lap before you move, why not sit down and think deeply about what you need this capital for. This word “Capital” is highly overrated. You’d be surprised how much you can do with so little.

The buzz was up on facebook and I was feeling really good about Trezorlandia. It’s time to get my own website I thought, a full e-commerce website for gifts. From the start I had a picture in my head, a picture of a world class website and I was determined to get it. I engaged a company owned by a family friend. This guy was very professional and unlike many other techies I had met he was also a very practical business man. This is someone who has never worked for anybody; he started running his company as a student. When I told him my grand idea, he drilled me, asking me all sorts of questions. Have you optimized the use of your facebook page, have you tried the facebook adverts, are you sure you want to do this now, what is your client base and the questions went on. What is wrong with this man sef! Just get me my world class website already! This was all I cared about. I wasn’t having none of this talk about reconsidering or settling for a static website! Bleh!

He gave in eventually seeing how adamant and determined I was. We haggled a bit on pricing and agreed on an amount that I am ashamed to say (because now looking back I can think of a million and one more productive things I could have done with that money). Let’s just say it was over half of my yearly upfront payment from my salary, chai! I paid the initial deposit and he got to work. He was a passionate hard core programmer and was working round the clock to get me the look and feel I wanted. He did tell me before we started the job that he was more a programming person than a graphics person but would try to bring my idea to life. Try as he might though, I wasn’t seeing the picture I had in my head, so I moved on. Half my upfront down the drain! Still this didn’t deter me, I was still with Dangote and next month’s salary was coming, so no problem. It was like I was in a time warp, I was stuck in this place where everything was frozen and the only way out was the website. Crazy!

Ref: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blast/111193

This picture just captures what its like to be trapped in a time warp, your head is spinning and you can't move

I got introduced to Rotimi, a young free lance graduate of Lasu who went to school with my cousin. When he showed me samples of the work he had done, I was wowed! Just the picture I had in my head and he wasn’t even a programmer. With my first attempt, we were trying to re-invent the will, building our own shopping cart and templates from scratch, but Rotimi showed me existing templates that only needed customizing and a few tweaks to get the desired results. Of course this option was way cheaper and I jumped at it. Within three months or so, my fancy website was up and I was super excited

www.trezorlandia.com

Next hurdle was the e-payment platform; I went with interswitch by default. I got this offer with GT-pay where I paid half the price being charged by interswitch to integrate the platform with my site but I had to get my own programmer. I took the offer and boy did I pay for this! Once you go this route you are on your own, all you get from interswitch is support and emails to say, we ran the test, this failed and that failed! It was a horror movie. All the money I thought I saved went from programmer to programmer. In the end I got that final email from interswitch saying the tests were successful and my fancy trezorlandia website was going live!! Yaaaay!! A very brief and short lived yaay, because the anticlimax came next.

All this time I was so focused on getting a website, I had no plan whatsoever for how I was going to drive traffic there or how I was going to keep the website updated (I have a content management system o, but only one me doing everything, na yam!). Above all, I was drained financially and emotionally from the whole exercise. The website is still there, but I can tell you that I have generated far more sales through facebook and twitter than I have from my super expensive e-commerce website. Jibola was so right!

Life Skills Learnt

• Listen to those who have been there before you, it’ll save you a lot of cash. They weren’t lying when they coined the term “Cash is King” In fact I saw somewhere yesterday where someone rephrased it this way, “Cash is King Kong”
• Be passionate, but at the same time rational. Think every step through before you take it. Better still, seek advice.
• Capital is overrated.

At this point I want to give you a challenge. You don’t need to submit it to me, you can if you want though,  it would be nice to see what people come up with and I would share if you let me.

1. If you had say N5,000,000 cash to start a business, what business would it be and how will you allocate the funds.

Please, no long story, I am not asking for a business plan now, just go straight to the point i.e. I would start a fish farm, I would use 1m for this, 500k for that and so on.

Are we game? Mail me at mofolusadesonaike@gmail.com

2013…… 19 June 2013

The anniversary surprise went well. All is well that ends well. I went to another supplier to sort out the balloons and made it in time to set up the recipient’s office table before he got in.

I stayed up till late to sort out my bank reconciliations on Xero and I am still not done with them imagine! I went to bed around past 1. Accounting is no joke.  I also got my promotional gifts website sorted, there’s no story with this one, it took one week and cost next to nothing. I kuku don’t have any money now so I have to give myself brain, hehe. Here’s the link to the site;

http://trezorlandia.mypromohq.com

I need ideas on driving traffic there. I have listed facebook adverts, direct email marketing (that was why I was compiling that list a couple of days back) and twitter as the options for now. What do you think?

Meanwhile, remember my son’s lesson teacher right? Ever since I conceived the thought of firing him, the man has been ill! I haven’t even said nor hinted anything yet, if not I would have assumed it’s a ploy. E ma gba mi ke (help me)! How do I now fire him without looking like a witch?

Entrepreneur Tips

Supplier management 101 J - Use multiple suppliers, categorize them in order of reliability and maybe price.

Listen to your customers..... @thebeat999fm my traffic companion!

Today there is no story from the past. I am barely managing to type this.

2013…… 18 June 2013

One of the points I always make about gifts was confirmed to me yet again today. When giving a gift or recommending a gift, it is not about you or what you think, it’s about the recipient, you have to put yourself in the shoes of the recipient, ask questions, get to know their likes and dislikes and then make informed choices. I had a birthday cake to deliver for a 9 year old. When I asked what cartoon character he likes, I was told to get muscle man or rigby, muscle man being the preference. For those of you that do not know muscle man, search on google and tell me what you think! Better still I have put the picture here for you to see. Ugleee huh? No offence to the artist please o, muscle man's picture fits his profile, if you watch the cartoon.Just saying, he won't be my first choice on a cake. My cake baker too wasn't too excited about the choice either; she said to me why didn't you suggest the common characters others use, I am not sure muscle man will come out really nice on a cake. Well, that was what the child wanted and that was it, no negotiation. Even when I picked up the cake, she still wasn't too sure about it. However, any doubt that I had in my mind was cast away by the time I delivered the cake, his mum and aunt were more than excited, dancing and singing the muscle man theme song. Bliss! What a good way to start the morning.

The cartoons these days!

The cake

My day was off to a good start until the menace of Lagos traffic showed its ugly face! Demonic tin! It has the ability to cut your productivity in half. I spent almost all the remaining half of my day in traffic, clenching my fists, singing along to all the songs on beat FM and laughing at Douglas and Gbemi's handover jokes, it is no wonder that I know practically every song on air. It’s one of the few ways I manage to stay sane. What would I do without my radio.

 I had a few things to pick up in preparation for an anniversary surprise delivery tomorrow. As if traffic wasn't frustrating enough, I get to the store where I was expecting to inflate my foil balloons with helium and guess what? Little Missy at the store goes “ we only inflate balloons purchased at our store”!  Are you kidding me! After enduring almost two hours of traffic to get here? I tried to reason a way out with her, look I am not inflating this things for free, I am willing to pay, but no, once the oga at the top issues an order, there’s no brain work needed, no work around, no offer of help, no let me call my boss and see what we can do, nothing! Just take your money and go. Naija customer service sucks! Anyway, I then ask if they have a foil balloon with the inscription “I love you”, no! Okay, how about “happy anniversary” no! What balloons then do you have! Mother's day, Ben 10 and one flowery looking "just for you" one, heck no! Aaaargh. How so frustrating considering I had to deliver early tomorrow and this was almost 6pm. I composed myself and left the store, I would have to find another way. In the meantime I needed to survive the traffic home with one important piece of my job left undone.

The icing on the cake is now the Internet expiring at the very wrong time. Mscheew! I am going to sleep joo. You'll read this post tomorrow.

Entrepreneur Tips

LISTEN to your customers. 

Oluwa is involved.......Paying Customers

I forgot to mention in yesterday’s post that I had a business plan.  I assumed that was a given. It doesn’t have to be anything grandiose or overly elaborate and don’t think mine was because I have an MBA, IT WASN’T!

A business plan is meant to be a working document not a one off one, you need to visit and revisit as you go. Things change, customer needs change, technology changes and so on, so if you have that static document that you filed away years ago, you better go and dust it and review it (I feel like I am talking to myself here…. Hehe!).

So back to the Dangote story, where were we? Ah the sharks.

The projects that saved my life…….

Even before Tony’s last day in Dangote Tony’s angels got the memo from camp E* – “You have been redeployed to the office of Mr. K* on the 3^rd floor, with immediate effect!” Lobatan. They were going to have us for toast. What to do now?! You know what though, when the K-switch sang “Oluwa is involved” he must have been referring to me, because just when I was ready to move downstairs Oluwa indeed stepped in.

Everything starts from the 9^th floor, so we were always in the know. We had been seeing this man, Mr O*, hold meetings with the telcos and submit reports and findings to Ahaji Aliko. A few times, he asked me to help with reports (he hadn’t built his team yet) and I did. Dangote was looking to diversify into wholesale fiber distribution, they were about to build Alheri, which later became DANCOM technologies. At the same time, Folake Ani-Mumuney had come on board and was leading a Dangote rebranding project. I had a few encounters with her as well, while on the 9^th floor.

Right about this time, Alheri kicked off and Mr. O* was building his team. They needed someone on the team to handle the CUG project (Closed User Group; staff members on the CUG could call each other at no charge) that was being implemented across the group. My friend Zainab told me about this and spoke to Mr. O* on my behalf. This was the project that saved my neck! He stuck his neck out for me by presenting a justification to Aliko and submitted a transfer request for me to join the DANCOM team. This was how I left the cement business unit and resumed with DANCOM.  Whew! The project was important to the group and touched every single person, so there was no way “you know who” could kick against my transfer.

On the other hand, Folake stuck her neck out and put in a request for Tony’s angel number two, Utibe to join her team.  She was planning a media reveal for the new logo and needed volunteers from different business units to partake in the planning and distillation of the new brand ethos, I volunteered. There was an intranet project as well that was to be implemented across the group which I got involved in. My hands were full, but I enjoyed every minute of my time on these projects.

There is definitely a God somewhere!!

Life Skills Learnt

• Service Management: We had to do a lot of service level agreements with the Telcos, we sent out RFPs (request for purchase) often and so on. I also got to go for an ITIL foundation training.
• Branding: Working on the rebranding project with Folake exposed me to a lot of new things as well as the importance of branding.

2013…… 17 June 2013

Nothing gives me greater joy than getting feedback from a satisfied customer. Today, I got one of those and I am going to ride on those words for the rest of the week! Yessir!

I can say today was one of those fruitful days, I had an early morning delivery and got a last minute request for party packs to be delivered today. At first I was thinking, it’s short notice, I had plans to go to the hub, yada yada, but I gave myself brain and boned the hub for today. This was a paying customer! Nothing compares to a paying customer.

You won’t believe it if I told you I haven’t started the Abraham Lincoln book *covers face*. There’s just so much to do and so little time. Whenever I get in from my daily runs, my boys latch on to me and tail me around the house.No kidding! Can’t complain though, I am blessed to have them and it’s their right to demand for their own time. I had some cooking to do as well, before my nanny uses indomie noodles to finish my children, I try to fix their lunch as often as possible (all she has to do is warm), but on days when she needs to use her initiative, she defaults to indomie. I cannot understand it. I have to do a timetable and insist that she sticks to it.

I got the most fantastic customer service treatment I have experienced in a while today at the Akin Adesola branch of GTB. The guys there are really courteous and willing to help. I wonder if it is because their banking hall is so large and so the pressure is reduced or their branch manager is really good. I bet it’s a mix of both.

Entrepreneur Tips

• Do everything within your power to keep your paying customers!
• Celebrate your successes no matter how small.
• Your business plan should not be a once and for all document, review it as you go.
• Above all keep calm, Oluwa is involved!

The birth of Trezorlandia.......... Abraham Lincoln and failure

I apologize, I have been MIA, my body revolted against the late nights I was keeping. Seeing as I am not ready to go over to the other side yet, I had to respect my body and take it easy. Plus the father’s Day preparations got the better of me.

I know we are expecting to continue with the Dangote story, but I can’t afford to ignore the most significant part of my entrepreneurship journey, how and when Trezorlandia was born.

The birth of a dream…..

At the interview with Tony Hadley, he asked me a question, it was one of the questions we had rehearsed a couple of times in school, but I could not give him the rehearsed textbook answer, because he had this look that made me feel like he really wanted to know. “Where do you see yourself five years from now?” For the first time, I didn’t just blurt out the textbook type answer, I thought long and hard and for some reason I said, I see myself running an online shopping business. That was the first time any thought about owning my own business had come to me and of all places for that to happen! Lol!

I got the job and carried on happily with it but I always just had this nagging feeling, like I could be doing more. I sold wristwatches on the side, Ankara fabrics too as well as anything sell-able to my colleagues. My office was not too far from the market so once again, most of my break time was spent combing the stalls. Then one day it hit me, I wanted to help purchase and deliver gifts.  This was something I had been doing for fun back in school and even at work. I didn’t know what to call it or if it was possible to build a business around that so I hit the web. Believe it or not, something that sounded like such a novelty idea already existed as Gift consulting! I immediately knew for sure that I wanted to be a gift consultant.

When you have that aha moment, you best be surrounded by “cheerleaders” or you would never take off. My brother, Kehinde, my friends on the 9^th floor, Utibe and Zainab were my first set of cheerleaders. I shared my idea with them and they were even more excited than I was. I could go on and on about this but I have a note on facebook that captures the story. I cannot say it better now than I did years ago when it really happened.  If you’d like to know please follow the link below;

About the name Trezorlandia

When you start a business, what are the first steps to take? There’s no hard and fast rule, but there should be best practices. In my case I didn’t follow any laid down principles, I just wanted to start and I did what I felt I needed to do;

1. Shareholders: I knew I couldn’t go it alone, I needed a team. I thought of people who I could work with on building the business and involved them, my brother for PR (Public relations), My friend, Emiola for purchases offshore (I also felt she had a knack for selecting gifts) and my husband for IT. This was my own idea at the time. I wasn’t thinking of money, I still had a job and was financing most of the business from my salary.
   
   Another way to go though, would be to get shareholders to finance the business capital (money you need for the business), this is known as Paid up Capital. Paid Up Capital in simple terms is the amount of a company's capital that has been funded by shareholders, it can be less than a company's total capital because a company may not be financed solely by equity (shareholder’s money). Before you go this route however, do a proper analysis of your startup costs, ensure that you only spend money on the important things. 
2. Logo Design: I went through a process of selecting a logo. I engaged about three different people and my partners and I looked through loads of logo designs. As simple as this process sounds, it was not that simple. Making decisions can be tasking. At last one of my brother’s talented friends, Munachi Duru designed the winning logo. I saw it and just knew! There was a connection and my partners felt it too.
3. Set up a facebook page:  This is a free (everybody say “Free”, free is good) and fast way to build your market. I come from a large family and I harassed and harassed every one of them to like my page and suggest to their friends. I owe a lot of the likes I have on the page now to my brothers Adeleke and Kehinde and my sister Tolu. Till date I have never used the paid facebook adverts and I have 1,805 likes.
4. Create engaging content: It is one thing to create a facebook page and another thing to keep it active. My head was always spinning and I read a lot online. There’s so much information out there about anything you want to do. This helped me keep my page fresh. I also realized this was an all new type of business in Nigeria and I had to educate the market on why they needed the services of a gift consultant. I put out a few notes and featured a few videos. 
5. Company Registration: I immediately engaged a lawyer and registered the name Trezorlandia.  This has its good and bad parts especially if you haven’t got your accounting sorted. Now I would suggest you hold out a bit and do a pilot run before you go ahead to register the business. I say this because at the time of registering the business, I did not take into account the tax issues associated with it. And years went by before I really started to trade officially with the already registered name. 
6. Account Opening: It is very important to separate your personal finances from you business finance. I am just getting really strict with this. Ensure that all your transactions, as much as possible, are done through the business account. Nowadays you have to have your TIN (Tax Identification number) before you can open a company account.
7. Website: This I need to dedicate a whole post to, remind me later.

2013…… 16 June 2013

It’s father’s day today. I finished my delivery runs early and still made it to church, especially since I didn’t make it last week. I teach in the teen’s church and feel like I let them down when I don’t show up. A lot has happened since my last post, but I cannot begin to bore you with everything, so I picked one that made me think a lot. First I must thank my cousin Jide Ogungbesan for his feedback on the blog. I am more than proud of him :-) 

On Saturday, my mum asked me about the youwin grant! Omo, I just couldn’t bring myself to tell her I didn’t get it. She would conclude that enemies are after me and ship me off to MFM prayer city camp for deliverance. No way! I mumbled something that made her believe it wasn’t out yet (may God forgive me) and truncated my visit pronto.

On my way home I started thinking about Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison and co. We are told they failed so many times and yet did not give up until they fulfilled their dreams. We are then expected be encouraged by the story of these men and just follow suit, but who has read the story about how they handled these steady stream of failures as they claim? That’s the bit I need to hear about, living through the failures. Thomas Edison, they say made 1,000 failed attempts before inventing the light bulb! I am thinking 1,000!! 1,000!! Haaaa. How did he not run mad, how did he not give up? How?!  I just need to know…….

I have downloaded the biography of Abraham Lincoln; I hope I get some insights to share when I am done reading. In the meantime, I'll continue to cope the only way I know how. (watch out for my entrepreneur's survival tips later)

Entrepreneur Tips

Please refer to the top on steps I took when starting my business. They may not be the gospel, but you can get some insights as to what to do and maybe what not to do.