The word ‘solopreneur’ and ‘socialpreneur’ appeared between 80s and 90s. Both of them came from the variation of ‘entrepreneur’. These kind of entrepreneurship are trending in the society nowadays, pushed by trend of work-life balance and the awareness of climate change. But both of them are in different terms of work.
Definition of solopreneur An individual works in person as freelancer or sole proprietor. They could be a micro-team, provide service or personal skills to company in the way of agreement or partnership. Eg. illustrator, video editor, podcaster, project manager etc.
Definition of socialpreneur An individual or team that provide service that solve problem of a community. They gain profits while providing solutions of environment or social change to make the society better. Usually, it meets with the criteria of Sustainable Development Goals.
If you wish to be a solopreneur or socialpreneur, there are 5 points to think before you start.
1. Why you choose to be an entrepreneur
This is always a simple but hard question to start an entrepreneur life. The most answer I heard is I want to be free to my life instead of working to somebody. If you want to go further and higher of your business, the motivation of starting a business is important. The threshold of starting a business is easy if you have money, but go further and higher in your career life is hard if you don’t have the right motivation.
2. What kind of service you provide
Service is a product that you provide to earn profits. As mentioned above, starting a business is easy, and it means you will have many competitors that will takeover you. A Unique Value Proposition(UVP) that will help you to move on and attract the right audience. It is a clear statement that you tell your audience how you help them to solve their problems(the product or service you provide). If you clarify yourself with right motivation, somehow your UVP is appeared.
3. What type of company you start
There are different forms of company that you can set up. There are various type of company you can set up, but choose the appropriate for current situation and think how far you want to go. One of my suggestion to make a choice quickly is think about the questions of ‘Do you need funds from others’ and ‘Do you have loans’. It will lead you to choose among ‘limited’ or ‘unlimited’ and ‘sole’ or ‘partnership’. Look more in Type of Business Entities in Malaysia.
4. How much fund you will need
There’s always initial fund to start a business. Such as product costs, equipments, various registrations fee for company, trademark and so on. If you starts online and virtual, you might be only need some registration fee, but the disadvantage is you earn less credibility, especially lots of internet scam nowadays. On the other hand, a calculated fund make a choice of the type of your business entity.
5. Who is your target audience
Target audience is who may pay for your service and product. It seems to be assumed before you started and make it clearly on the process of your business. The right target audience let you make profit constantly and hold longer of your business.
Last but not least, a person works efficiently in a team but it seems to have another problem coming. This is a life of entrepreneur. Moreover, solopreneur can work as a socialpreneur to make more social impact with your skills.
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