People all over the globe are realizing that “9-5” job won’t bring them joy, happiness, and freedom. We are all trying to do something that will bring us satisfaction in life, but at the same time, better earnings. Because of that, it doesn’t need to surprise us that the number of young entrepreneurs is growing.
Parents are sometimes not aware of how creative a young human being can be. The money-making ideas they have are mostly very brilliant and smart. Besides that, their goals are big, someone would say unachievable. And each teenager that is interested in entrepreneurship wants to become one of the most successful teenage entrepreneurs of the year.
Still, those who want to become successful teenage entrepreneurs need to be ready to change their lifestyle and to sacrifice many things. Therefore, the support of the parents, friends and other parts of the family is crucial. With a proper support, they will be more motivated to work harder and achieve the goals they have.
The common mistake of most teen entrepreneurs is that they don’t want to accept their disadvantages. Statistics have shown that there is only 20% of chance that first-time entrepreneurs will succeed to improve their business. That only means that you need to be well-prepared if you want to be a “one-of-a-kind” entrepreneur.
There are the THREE main disadvantages of entrepreneurship that every teenager and his parents as well, need to know.
Lack of business experience
You won’t become one of the richest teenage entrepreneurs in the world over the night. Even if your idea is the best possible in the world. The business experience is a crucial factor that is going to influence the success of every business.
Even when you are running a small business, there are so many details you need to take care of. It is logical that teenagers are not familiar with them. For example, you will have to know how to make a contract, or how to rent a working space where you will work from.
There are also law requirements which every young teenage entrepreneurs need to respect. And it is hard to believe that a teenage boy or girl is familiar with them.
Besides that, without any experience, business communication skills of every young entrepreneur are not on a high-level. You will look unconvincing and unprofessional, and those two habits won’t bring you the new clients. And without new clients, you won’t be able to expand your business.
It is quite hard to convince people that your startup is the one they need to choose. Because the competition in any business field is tough, especially when you are young.
For example, a client is in need of a copywriter that will make a copy for his website. He got 2 offers, one from an 18-year-old freelancer, and the second from a copywriter that has more than 5 years of working experience. Even if you possess better writing skills, he will believe more in the experience of the other candidate.
You can teach these things in theory through e-books, various blogs, and vlogs, but that won’t help you until you learn how to apply it in the “real world”.
Problem with self-discipline
Young teenage entrepreneurs need to change their lifestyle if they truly want to succeed. More precisely, they will need to sacrifice hanging out with friends, going to a drink, partying, late sleep and many other things.
It is quite hard to keep the entrepreneurial mindset and to stay disciplined when everyone around you is having fun and having a lot of free time. You can’t be focused on the things you were focused on before. You now have your own duties which you need to complete properly.
The teen entrepreneur of the year doesn’t become the one who gets up late, comes home late or comes home only to have breakfast, lunch or dinner. It becomes the one who is disciplined and who is ready to sacrifice everything for a better future.
That’s why you first need to ask yourself – “Am I ready for this?” If you are not sure that the answer to this question is positive, that only means you are not well-prepared.
Problem with hiring other people
Let’s say that you can’t start your own business alone. That is absolutely logical because you are not familiar with every area of business. You also want to find someone who is well-experienced to help you. So the right question is, how are you going to hire someone who is older 20 or 30 years than you?
It is not possible to be the authority to someone who has bigger working experience than you, and more importantly, a bigger life experience than you.
CONCLUSION: How to be better than disadvantages?
Teenagers that are having unbelievable ideas for business are still teenagers. They do not have enough experience to do everything by themselves. They need proper guidance on how to be a teenage entrepreneur. There are two different things that can help them to be better than the disadvantages they have:
• Constant improvement
• Support from people around them
For the beginning, young teenage entrepreneurs should offer their service for free, or for the fewer prices. Making money can’t be the main goal at the beginning. They should connect themselves with people from the industry they are interested in and gain the business experience step-by-step. Hearing teenage entrepreneurs stories would also help.
Of course, the improvement of the knowledge and the skills can’t stop. On a daily basis, teenagers need to gain as much pieces of information as possible. The practice is the key to success, but you can’t ignore the theoretical knowledge. If you are not going to do that, be sure that your competition will. This is one of many ways on how to become a teenage entrepreneur.
Parents can’t wait for their kids to tell them “I need motivation”. They need to support them at every moment. Only in that way, they will be able to become successful teenage entrepreneurs. They should assist them in making decisions because there is a big chance they will make great mistakes because of the lack of business experience.
Of course, if they don’t know how to help them, they definitely don’t have the right to distract them. Parents should also ask themselves – “Am I ready to support my child?” If the answer is YES, there is no need to wait for anything.
