If you are unclear on how to do competitor analysis, start by asking yourself these questions:

• Who are my competitors? Are they a direct competitor?

Typically, it is a company that sells the same products or services as yours or fulfills the same customer needs you meet. This company could be bigger, smaller, or similar to yours.

• What are their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats? This is called a SWOT analysis.
• Are there any gaps in the market that my company can fill?
• Are there any gaps in the products and services offered by my competitors?
• Finally, how can I use this information to increase my company’s market share?

Research your competitors well to get the answer to these questions. 

Why is competitor analysis important?

The benefits of competitor analysis are huge. It can set the rhythm and speed of your business’s success.

Understand your advantages and disadvantages

This is where doing a competitor SWOT analysis helps. Analyzing your competitor’s strengths and weaknesses will help you identify your business’s advantages and disadvantages in the market. 

Determine your past, present, and future business strategies

Analyzing your competitors helps you formulate effective strategies for your company. Knowing where you stand in the market can give you early warning signs of threats and opportunities. Use these insights and foresight to take steps that will lead you to your goals.

Know the objective and profile of competitors

By understanding where your competition stands in the market, you can think of strategies to either beat them or fill the gaps.

Identify what you need to get ahead

You learn from the success and failure of other brands. This analysis establishes the reasons behind the failure of unsuccessful companies, thus helping you identify the key assets and skills needed to beat your competition.

Know your threats to tackle them better

While analyzing your competition, you identify threats and challenges your competitors bring into the ecosystem. It helps you fortify your company’s strategy against the competition.

Leverage category convergence

Brands today are offering products across variant segments. Today brands are competing in segments where they have been historically absent. Hence, consumer perception of your brand plays a prominent role in defining competitive benchmarks.

Sources of information to study competitors while doing competition analysis?

Recorded data: It includes data that is published publicly, such as annual reports, brochures, newspaper articles, and press releases.

Observable data: It is collected from several sources, such as competitor pricing, promotions, and patent applications.

Opportunistic data: This kind of data involves exclusive planning. It is basically derived from customers, suppliers, seminars, and conferences.

Also read – Tips for Launching Successful Mobile-Friendly Online Store.

The post Competitor Analysis: Why is it important for your business appeared first on PayU Blog.

What is brand building?

How people perceive your business is your brand. The brand building process is about creating a unique image for your business. It starts with a strategy to define your brand’s relationship with its customers and how it will get there over time. A brand building strategy will help you be consistent in communication and experience across environments and assets, such as print and packaging, customer service, or social media.

6 Simple steps to build a successful brand

There are different ways you can build a strong brand. But here are six steps to get you started on a successful brand building journey:

Step 1: Determine Your Target Audience

The first thing you need to know when building a brand building strategy is your target audience. You can determine your audience based on age, location, interests, etc. This will help you define what you communicate, where, and how, so your audience can deeply relate to your brand. Depending on your target audience and their needs and aspirations, you can create a brand persona that resonates with them. Over time, your brand will need to evolve with your target audience to stay relevant.

• Pro tip: Start with smaller, specific sets of target audiences. As your brand awareness and loyalty grow, you can expand your audience base to include more diverse groups.

Step 2: Define your brand mission

Your mission and vision statements describe why your brand exists and what it is passionate about. The brand mission is what you promise to do and how you will add value for your audience. It also dictates how you execute your brand strategy daily. It will guide your branding process across channels. All this should help you achieve your brand vision – what you want to be for your audience.

Step 3: Research your competition

Every brand has its unique selling point (USP). Analyze your competition and find out what works for them, what does not, and where your brand can do better than them. The brand building process should focus on that differentiating factor. This will help you define what can set your business apart and use it to your advantage in branding and marketing. Competitive analysis is a continuous process that helps you:

• Define and refine your USP
• Improve your products and services
• Encourage research and development (R&D)
• Benchmark your branding and pricing strategies
• Identify business opportunities and threats

Step 4: Create a strong value proposition

You have studied your markets, competition, and audiences. Use this knowledge to clearly define what your brand offers and why your audiences should only choose you – what makes your brand unique and valuable. Include this value proposition in your marketing communication across channels to create a successful brand. For example, PayU’s scalable and robust platform makes it one of India’s best payment solutions providers.

Step 5: Set your brand markers and guidelines

Brand building is all about making your business recognizable and memorable. And it is done by playing on the human senses, particularly with visuals and sounds. Think Coca-Cola logo or Nokia jingle. Creating such unique and remarkable markers will create a special place for your brand in your audience’s minds. Once you have done that, document how your brand will be represented across channels. These guidelines will ensure consistency and quality.

Step 6: Market your brand

The last step is to tell the world about your brand! Set a definitive marketing strategy and create noise on channels your audiences frequent to grab their attention. Using your brand guidelines and marketing strategy, you can communicate with your audiences in relatable and engaging ways.

Apply your branding in every piece of communication, from packaging to stationary and website to marketing collateral. Identify new channels such as email, web, and affiliates to promote your brand.

Conclusion

Brand building is an ongoing process; you need to revisit it every now and then to ensure your branding is maintained consistently. The process requires expertise, and it is best to get professional help to get the best out of your efforts. You can learn more about branding in our blog on the importance of brand guidelines.

Frequently asked questions about the brand building process

What is brand building?

Brand building is creating awareness and promoting a business using different strategies and plans. In other words, it is building and displaying a brand identity through different campaigns such as on social media, websites, and events. Branding is essential for a company as it is what people see and think about it. It is your logo, tagline, ads, everything!

Helpful articles related to brand building:

• Social Media Marketing Tips
• Content Marketing Tips
• Quora Marketing Strategy
• Video Marketing Tips

Why is it important to build a brand?

Branding is important to build recognition and trust. This can help you acquire more customers and their loyalty over time.

How to plan a brand building process?

You can start with the six simple steps mentioned above to build a successful brand.

What is a brand roadmap?

A brand roadmap comprises concepts and strategies you can follow while building your brand. It includes goals, objectives, and ways to achieve them within set deadlines.

How can you build a strong brand?

We can build a strong brand with various methods and strategies. To start with, one needs to conduct a brand audit of the company. This includes a thorough competitive analysis and identifying your brand’s USPs. Make sure you are original and authentic across communications. Re-analyze your strategies regularly so you can maintain your brand identity.

How does advertising help in brand building?

The motive behind branding is to build recognition and attract more customers. Advertisement plays a great role here. It helps businesses remind their consumers of their presence. Advertisements help build brand salience. It reminds people of the product or services offered by a business by looking at its logo or advertising campaign.

What is brand reputation?

As the term suggests, brand reputation is how people see your brand. Do they see your brand as fun and quirky? Or do they see your brand as an authority in your industry? A good brand reputation means consumers trust you and like your offerings.

The post 6 Simple Steps For A Successful Brand Building Process appeared first on PayU Blog.

Entrepreneurship is a growing trend, especially among millennials and generation Z. That is because it allows people to be their own boss, work from any location, generate high income, gain financial freedom and, most importantly, create an impact. 

But being an entrepreneur is not easy because it is not just about generating entrepreneurial ideas. Becoming an entrepreneur involves a lot of work behind the scenes, including strategizing, planning, preparing, toiling, reworking, editing, and then doing it all over again. 

So if you have been thinking about establishing yourself as an entrepreneur, you need to start working towards those dreams today!

Being an entrepreneur means learning from experience and from your mistakes. Entrepreneurship requires a long-term vision, persistence and belief in your dreams. It is one of the most exciting and motivating ways to live your life. 

Sounds thrilling, right? But how can one become an entrepreneur? 

Want to find out? Okay then, let us talk entrepreneurship!

Simple Steps to Becoming an Entrepreneur

Here is a step-by-step breakdown of the process of becoming an entrepreneur that’ll help you start working on your business plan and create a pitch deck for your investors:

1. Finding the Right Business 

Ask yourself, is there any problem you are facing that you think you can solve? If yes, there is a good chance that others might face the same problem. Alternatively, passion-driven ideas lead to sustainable businesses. However, there are multiple other forms of business entrepreneurship wherein you do not need to create your own outfit. You could be a professional turned entrepreneur, or you could be a freelancer. 

So finding the exact fitment is crucial. Find a venture that excites you and has the potential to become profitable. 

To start your entrepreneurial journey, you need to create business ideas. The investment, infrastructure, technology, etc., can follow. Ideally, you should focus on a cause that is close to your heart to be able to follow it with absolute passion.

2. Education

You did not go to Harvard or Stanford? No worries! Being an entrepreneur doesn’t always require a degree. However, formal education is always handy, so you shouldn’t disregard it. Experience in management, computer programming, and marketing is helpful if you want to launch a tech firm. 

Additionally, some professions, like running an accountancy firm or legal business, will need a relevant degree.

3. Create Business Ideas

Before you launch a company, you need to establish a business strategy. Your goals and methods to reach them are essential to a business plan. These entrepreneur business ideas are crucial to attracting investors and gauging your organization’s performance.

4. Target Audience 

Before starting work on your business ideas, you need to determine your target audience and their demography, including their age, gender, budget, ethnicity, culture, etc. This data will be a great starting point for your business and entrepreneurship journey, especially in designing marketing strategies.

5. Network 

Meet, shake hands and repeat! 

Believe us, it can be a game changer for you. 

Although networking is necessary for many professions, entrepreneurs may find it particularly important. You can meet people with abilities you might employ in your business via networking. It is a great way to identify possible investors to pitch your business idea to. 

Once your firm is up and running, your network may aid by referring new clients your way. 

6. Sell Entrepreneur Ideas 

Customers are constantly looking for quality products. As an entrepreneur, you are responsible for showcasing your products and convincing people to buy them. To market your product, you will need to determine what makes it unique and how much value it offers and put forth the same to potential buyers.

7. Market 

Marketing should be your primary concern before, during, and after the launch of your company. Even if you own the best restaurant in town, no one will visit it if they are unaware of its existence. So targeted marketing specific to your audience is critical. 

For instance, millennials might be more inclined to view an advertisement on online platforms than on a billboard.

In a Nutshell

There is no sure-shot way to become an entrepreneur. The best advice is to treat it as a journey, not a destination. Entrepreneurship is about facing problems and solving them while steering to the path of success. It is definitely not an easy ride but a worthy one.

As an entrepreneur, you might face problems like customer acquisition, retention, payments, etc. However, your biggest problem can become your strength if carefully attended to. 

For instance, many startups face payment problems in their businesses, especially for international transactions. However, investing in the right tools can not only solve their problem but can convert it to an advantage.

PayU allows businesses to offer 150+ payment methods to their customers. Further, accepting international currencies is as simple as accepting INR. PayU has been revolutionizing and streamlining payments for businesses and budding startups. So how are you accepting payments?

Frequently Asked Questions

The post You Can Become An Entrepreneur Too! Find Out How? appeared first on PayU Blog.

• Atal Incubation Centre (AIC): The Atal Innovation Mission was started to encourage the ethos of innovation and business entrepreneurship in India. AICs are greenfield incubation centres that promote innovative startups in India. These centres give focus on making these startups grow and become sustainable. For this purpose, AICs are provided grant-in-aid of up to Rs 10 crores for five years. 
• Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Yojana (PMMY): Launched in 2015, PMMY provides up to Rs 10 lakhs as a start-up loan to small and micro enterprises that are non-corporate and non-farm businesses. These startup India loans are classified as MUDRA loans and are offered by commercial banks, regional rural banks, small finance banks, NBFCs etc. 
• NewGEN IEDC: The New Generation Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Centre (NewGEN IEDC) is a five-year programme implemented through an educational institution and plans to support twenty projects per institution in a year. Funding includes a one-time non-recurring grant of up to Rs 25 lakhs. Besides, a five-year recurring grant mechanism is available for selected projects.
• Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP): WEP is one of the Niti Aayog that has initiated govt schemes for women’s business in partnership with SIDBI. Its aims of motivating, enlightening and guiding women entrepreneurs in India are highlighted by its three pillars – Iccha Shakti, Gyaan Shakti, and Karma Shakti. WEP provides free credit rating, mentorship and loan schemes for women, as well as incubation and acceleration support to start-ups founded/co-founded by women entrepreneurs.
• MSME Market Development Assistance: Through this initiative, registered SMEs are guided to participate in international exhibitions and fairs, receive funding for global barcoding standards, and avail of purchase and price preferences from the government. Financial assistance will also include international travel costs, producing publicity materials for studies, and contesting anti-dumping cases. 
• Swarojgar Credit Card: Close to two decades old, this scheme issues credit cards and passbooks to businesses for their working capital and block capital needs. It also offers a composite loan of Rs 25,000. Even self-help groups can avail this scheme.
• Credit Guarantee Scheme: The credit guarantee fund trust for small and micro-businesses has been providing guarantee cover to credit facilities for over twenty years. In recent years, this scheme has covered partial collateralised loans and retail trade and facilitated credit facilities from scheduled cooperative banks and small finance banks.
• Refinancing by NABARD: The short and long-term refinance plans of NABARD are implemented by the Department of Refinance. It covers credit activities that generate food security, boost private capital formation in agriculture, and lead to asset creation and alternate employment generation, among others.

Also read: Little Known Financial Assistance Programs for Women Entrepreneurs

Conclusion 

These government schemes and initiatives are looking to tap the potential among small business owners, budding innovators, and students, notably with women entrepreneurship schemes in India. If you are a business owner, you should identify schemes that can help your business grow and avail of the same at the earliest opportunity.

FAQs

The post Government Schemes that Every Business Owner Should Know About appeared first on PayU Blog.

Being a Woman Entrepreneur

The lack of female-owned property and access to funds

Most property is handed down to the sons. It means that women rarely have the assets they need to apply for a substantial loan. While there have been changes in the associated laws in recent years, this is still a limiting factor.

The highly biased finance industry felt that women were less creditworthy. However, how this conclusion came to be is a question.

Education

While this is improving, traditionally, less importance has been given to women’s education in the family. While this may not tie a woman’s hands, it can be a limiting factor in terms of access to knowledge and information.

Furthermore, parents still find it hard to let young women decide what they want to study and where.
Finance is something that can be solved with a few grand schemes from the government.

Government Initiatives and Programs for Women Entrepreneurs

Annapurna Scheme

If you are looking at starting a small-scale food catering service, this scheme provides loans of up to INR 50,000. While this isn’t a lot, it is a great start, and you can purchase some much-needed equipment.

Bharatiya Mahila Bank Business Loan

This program offers a much more substantial amount. The banking scheme gives women up to INR 20 crores.
This is ideal for women who are venturing into large enterprises or looking at expanding their businesses. This scheme helps small entrepreneurs begin a start-up for women.

Mudra Yojana Scheme

This loan, an initiative by the Central Government, has an upper limit of INR 10 lakhs. The loan is deposited into a person’s Mudra account, and they are given a Mudra card, which allows them to withdraw 10% of the loan at a time.

Orient Mahila Vikas Yojana Scheme

If one woman or a group of women own 51% share capital or more of a business, they are eligible for this scheme. The loan offered adds up to INR 25 lakhs with a low interest of 2%. While it allows entrepreneurs seven years to repay the debt, it also does not require collateral. This is ideal for women who are looking to expand their ventures.

Dena Shakti Scheme

This is a program for women entrepreneurs who run businesses in agriculture, manufacturing, and retail or have small enterprises or microcredit organizations. The loan limit is set at INR 20 lakhs and can help boost business.

Pradhan Mantri Rozgar Yojana

It is an ideal loan for aspiring entrepreneurs as the loan enables women entrepreneurs to improve or acquire skills and encourages self-employment. The loan is available across industries, and business loans of up to INR 2 lakhs are available. Those in the service sector or industries can apply for up to INR 5 lakhs.

Cent Kalyani Scheme

This is a scheme for women entrepreneurs looking to start a new business or expand an existing one. It has a substantial offering of up to INR 100 lakhs. The loan does not require collateral and does not attract processing fees. There is an eligibility criterion, and those involved in retail, education, training, and self-help groups cannot apply.

Mahila Udyam Nidhi Scheme

This loan aims to enable medium- to small-scale enterprises and small-scale industries. It helps to revive small-scale industries that are on the verge of collapse or have already collapsed but could be revived with a bit of financial injection. The loan limit is only INR 10 lakhs. However, the repayment period is ten years.

Conclusion

There are a host of other programs for women entrepreneurs and states with start-up policies for women. The main concern is that there is a lack of transparency. It means that while these programs exist, they aren’t necessarily empowering women entrepreneurs as they should.

Numerous organizations are working to create awareness and enable women to access these loans and schemes. Many states are proactive in offering these loans and schemes. The State and Central Governments have also placed guidelines for banks to follow when these loans are inquired about.

The information is available. Ask your bank manager about these schemes and go with as many questions as you can to make sure you find the scheme that best fits your needs.

India has come a long way, and women are becoming more involved in the world of business. People must be aware of these programs for women entrepreneurs.

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The Making of Policybazaar.com

Like most developing countries, India does not have great social security. Most people are unaware that insurance can support in living through sudden losses easily. Policybazaar.com marched ahead with a purpose to educate the Indian public about the importance of insurance along with creating awareness about the wide range of insurances available canopying all possible scenarios in mind. Today, in just a decade the strong insurance provider has become a marketplace leader!

Challenges Faced By Policybazaar.com

Policybazaar.com is primarily an insurance aggregation portal where, customers can compare and buy insurance policies directly. With the Indian digital space, especially the digital payment space, still in its early years processing online payments for insurance policies bought on the portal was a challenge that the company faced. This is when the insurance giant decided to tie-up with a payment gateway for processing its digital financial transactions. Although payment gateways are highly regulated, most of them shy away from extending themselves to support business partners.

The company’s  another major concern centered around the complex models needed to enable vendor payouts. In the insurance sector each payout is critical. While the solutions were available, incorporating them into the organisational structure usually resulted in problems with the vendor. The company holds its vendor partners in high regard. All they needed was a payment gateway whose ideologies aligned with their need to put the Marketplace Model and Net Settlement Models into effect.

Journey with PayU

PayU provided support to Policybazaar.com by implementing a seamless payment gateway through the development of a mechanism which did not affect any of the three – vendors, the payment gateway and the organisation.

“PayU has provided extensive support in making a customised end-to-end solution for us with super-fast routing which has led to better success rates for transactions.” – Harsh Vardhan Masta

Harsh Vardhan Masta, AVP – Product Development, Policy Bazaar

Today, most of the organisations transactions are routed via the company’s payment page itself.

Future

Planning a different future for the whole country’s security is a huge and urgent responsibility of the insurance leaders! Apart from insurance, the Policybazaar group seeks to address all aspects of people’s well-being; it has recently launched a new venture – a technology platform in the healthcare space called Docprime.com. It is an aggregator of medical services and consultants. The group of companies continues to trust PayUmoney at every step to provide secure payment solutions for all its business needs.

At present, more than 4.5 lac Indian businesses prefer PayUmoney as their payment solution provider. What are you still thinking about? With all your marketing efforts for your business in place, it’s a good idea to have an all-in-one payment solution in place as well. Now to enjoy the best payment gateway experience and grow your business effortlessly!

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From Shrijay’s trunk of expertise….

When it comes to getting the work done – swift and smart, it boils down to being a super ninja who has it all to combat everything that is thrown in the way. Here are the 5 proven ninja techniques to be a successful entrepreneur when followed cautiously.

1.Building An A-Team

Building your ‘A-team’ involves finding those who are equally crazy and passionate about your idea. The role of an entrepreneur in getting the A-team ready lies in, pumping more and more like-minded people that help to create a sense of startup community. These are the ones on whom you would rely on.

In return, it will help you start a marketing chain reaction without any monetary bet, building the confidence and revenue. From placing the right personnel at the right place to evaluating performances on the basis of their strength, is the key to get the work done.

2. Groom Your Persona

The true value of any successful entrepreneur lies in his or her persona. As an entrepreneur you can structure a persona which is approachable, easy going yet hungry for success. For a perfect balance, entrepreneurs need to keep an image, streamline it with the face-value of your company and shape it towards a brand. This is something which will offer a value proposition to your company or startup.

Here are a few things that an entrepreneur needs to indulge in for grooming an ‘all-arounder’ persona:

• Ambition: It is best to lead a vision with the passion that blends with burning and gut-wrenching need to see it come alive.
• Self-confidence: Keep believing in yourself even if you waiver a bit here and there.
• Adaptability: To changes and to things that happen unplanned. Groom yourself to be able to think from your feet.
• Smart working: Don’t be a hero. Share your work and split the tasks. Monitor, analyse and evaluate with the utmost scrutiny.
• Be at ease with risk: Take calculated risks and be responsible for everything that falls apart.
• Stick to the ground: Burn ego to go far and hit that milestone that you’ve set up for your startup.

Take risks and tap the opportunities that unfold by leading the startup as a dynamic leader!

3. Know Your Customer Right

Most of the time startups fail because there are not enough customers to buy the idea. If you aren’t sure of who is going to benefit from your service or product then it definitely means that there are no potential customer that exists.

So the first thing to do even before planning the budget, raising the capital, or even registering your business, is:

• To ensure that there exists a customer; the one who is willing to buy your product or use your service.

There’s no business without a customer and every successful entrepreneur will know his/her customer from the very beginning. Once you have known your customers in the right manner, you could also identify the quality value that you can offer to solve their problems.

4. Value & Use Time Wisely

Thinking that we have enough time is a trap of fallacy. Human beings are procrastinators and entrepreneurs are no different. The biggest misconception of having time by your side leads in delaying the most important tasks. Keep all distractions such as social media, texting and so on at bay for more productivity and hence results!

It’s a fact that you don’t have enough time to let go. Therefore getting the priorities set is the only option to make the most out of what you have. Remember: There are high chances that a big idea in your head is seeding somewhere else too.

Pro-tip: Break your bigger goals into smaller chunks that you can manage. Being an entrepreneur is not that taxing as it seems if you keep finishing tasks based on the fixed deadlines.

5. Networking Is Important

Enough has been said about this and I can’t really insist on how much networking matters for the early success of your company. The key lies in balancing both – business and networking activities. With more organized networking, idea exchange with other entrepreneurs initiates deeper business insights and connections. Join as many startup networking events happening in your town during the weekend and catch up with fellow entrepreneurs around to have a short chat.

The journey as an entrepreneur is filled with uncertainty and is not an overnight story. One has to deal with problems related to complex government regulations, resources and finances, and plenty of other things. It is, therefore, best to have someone from the same breed around to mentor, to look up to, and even share talks on business. Proper guidance opens new opportunities, especially for getting into the partnership and collaborations. Upgrading yourself timely with regards to the techniques mentioned above is a bonus! Keep going, keep sailing.

The above knowledge, tips, and personal experiences belong solely to Shrijay Seth of LegalWiz. You can reach out to him for any advice related to this topic on LinkedIn (please check the author section below for information). If you would like to write a blog for PayUmoney as a guest please do get in touch with us: marketing@payu.in

With all your marketing efforts for your business in place, it’s a good idea to have an all-in-one payment solution in place as well. Now to enjoy the best payment gateway experience and grow your business effortlessly!

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From Shrijay’s trunk of expertise….

Entrepreneurship is a journey by itself and just like any other journey, it has its own do’s and don’ts. I too, started this journey to provide business professional services a few years back. It’s only then did I realize that it would have been an added advantage for me to know the rule book beforehand! But to make the startup journey easier for all aspiring business minds reading this, here are the 5 things you must look forward to polish right from the beginning.

1. Keep Your Focus & Dedication Intact

Juggling job with a start-up on a part-time basis is a bad idea. The amount of attention, hard work and persistence your entrepreneurial venture requires is 10X vis a vis is a regular job. Eventually, I too had to call it a day at my full-time job and concentrate on my venture.

Take the hard and harsh decisions to follow the dream completely without any compromises.

Being focused on venture demands not only laser-sharp focus towards work but also on various other aspects of entrepreneurship like;

• Unique Value Proposition (UVP): Your prospective customers will have hundreds of other options. You need to work hard and smart towards making your offerings stand out from competitors despite offering the same service or product.
• Market/product fit: Keep your eye on the quality of your product/services and the size of your target market. These two points will easily help you gauge your way ahead.
• Single success metric: When you start a business, how would you define success? You need to shortlist a couple of essential metrics such as conversions, GMV and so on to choose the most valued metric for you in that time.

2. Watch Out For Data Trends

Keep a vigilant eye on your data. To achieve an armor of a successful industry leader, you need to focus on cultivating data maturity from the beginning.

If you are going to be an entrepreneur, you can’t fear failure. You have to develop a tolerance level of measured risk.  – Bernhard Niesner.

Personally, the following steps worked wonders me, you can try them too!

• Enable the current data structure to provide a holistic set of information
• Use various tools to help with data assistance
• Invest in custom data applications tailored to my services and business model

Then, I used that data to gauge whether I can take my business decisions based on the data. And then I took a closer look at how others, especially my competitors utilize it.

Sites like Etsy and Craig’s List, and even local trade shows for that matter is something wherein you can test-market early product prototypes or services and learn from mistakes. Failure is inevitable, it all boils down to how much can you learn and how fast can you pick yourself up.

3. Seek Support: Co-Founders, Employees And Consultants

Quite often, because of the way start-ups are perceived today, entrepreneurs feel shy or reserved to approach others for advice. There are loads of resources available online: blogs, videos, where you can find inspiration. But learning and consulting your own teammates, counterparts and seniors make a lot of difference. Also, the importance of venturing with co-founder enables the simplification of the gap filling process. The right sense of ownership and accompaniment gives a beautiful twist to a traditional equation of 1+1 = 11!

I would tip here with: Just go out there as a learner and implement all those lessons to be a successful entrepreneur.

4. Legal Formalities & Protecting IPRs

Newbies are often trapped in an enigma of whether to register a private company (Pvt.) or LLP in case of co-founders. Legal formalities involve more than just picking the right formation type. There are companies who tasted the sweetness of initial success and later called it a “quit” because of law enforcement. Here are the 5 things that I would like to share:

1. Choose a Right Business Structure
2. Know Licensing Regulations
3. Have legal documents and policies in place
4. Adhering to taxation compliances
5. Manage your Cash flow and Accounts

Given that many new-age startups are tech-based, protecting IP is not a luxury, it is a necessity! In fact, many successful startups enjoy massive evaluations just because of the intellectual properties and proprietary algorithms that they could create.

 It has been estimated that on an average, over 80% of the value of a startup company is based on their IP portfolio. (Shrijay’s sources)

Here are the thumb rules to follow:

• Get a Trademark: Protect your branding – name, symbol, sound or fragrance that creates a recall for your brand
• Protect with Patents: If your product or process is true to the test of the invention and creates a better value and efficiency, consider protecting it with Patent.
• Copyright for Works: If you have created original content, be it musical composition, photograph, write-up, or a sculpture; you must copyright such work.

Protecting IP leads to:

• Startup Valuation Based on IP Rights: Startups don’t necessarily have massive goods’ stocks or workforce to start with. Hence, most of the value of a startup is usually derived from its IP rights.
• No Over-Stretching the Finances: It has to be stated that unless your startup offers something that has zero production costs, you will have to loosen the purse strings at times to make money. What most startups don’t consider, are the expenses that may derive from not taking proper care of IP rights. {Need this as it talks of IP – subject specific}
• Impose Control on What You Have: Sure, it is nice to have someone else promote your services or goods for free. But what are you going to do when the quality is not up to your mark? In many cases, the answer is a simple “nothing” if you haven’t taken care of the IP rights. 

By keeping all IPRs and legal formalities in place, you will get the ability to restrict unauthorized use of your owned IP or license for others’ commercial benefit. It also helps you relax and focus on necessary.

5. Balancing Emotions With Practicality

Being an entrepreneur is not a destination, but a journey of constant improvement, evolution, and perseverance. It is a roller-coaster ride with quick highs and lows.

 It has been a long journey for me as well. But, above all, it is important to take practical decisions out of the emotional experiences.

Remember, when you hold that commanding position, by default trusteeship of everyone who signed up for the journey is an assumption. You have to make decisions that are good for the company at large.

Taking care of the employees and people who take care of your business is the ultimate key to grow. There are no shortcuts to valuing people. A compassionate entrepreneur sails the farthest! It is about understanding your customers as well. Instead of running behind clients and focusing on increasing your clientele, cater to a few clients in the best manner and others will follow suit as a snowball effect gradually!

The above knowledge, tips, and personal experiences belong solely to Shrijay Seth of LegalWiz. You can reach out to him for any advice related to this topic on LinkedIn (please check the author section below for information). If you would like to write a blog for PayUmoney as a guest please do get in touch with us: marketing@payu.in

With all your marketing efforts for your business in place, it’s a good idea to have an all-in-one payment solution in place as well. Now to enjoy the best payment gateway experience and grow your business effortlessly!

The post 5 Things Every Entrepreneur Must Consider Before Starting Up appeared first on PayU Blog.

The Making

Netmax Computers, an initiative by Tanvir Singh is an internet service provider company in Delhi. Way into the past, Tanvir started his career in a corporate after achieving a diploma in Computer Hardware and Networking. Along with his full-time job role, he also indulged in part-time computer repairing work back then. Around 2003, he decided to go solo and start his own company where he would work door-to-door repairing computer systems.

The Challenges

With a new business, no workforce and office, things by nature were a challenge to sail through. With immense vigor and perseverance, Tanvir brought his startup on the surface and in full visibility. He set up his office, recruiting efficient resources and providing internet services to households and offices. They hosted their services mainly in the Karol Bagh arena in full swing.

Apart from the initial challenge of getting started, Netmax faced another challenge of collecting payments for the services they provided duly. More often than not, customers would staple all sorts of excuses when it came to making payments on time. Also, payment collection required manual efforts of going to every subscriber doorstep for payments. All these issues caused a delay in receiving payments and hence the company cash flow was disrupted to an extent. Tanvir found a solution for that too!

Why Netmax Feels Secured With PayUmoney Payment Links

With a couple of recommendation and hardcore search, Netmax found its payment partner in PayUmoney payment links.

“With PayUmoney Payment Links, payment collection became very easy. We just send the Payment links to our customers and they can make payment online whenever and from wherever they want” – Tanvir Singh

Payment links helped the internet service provider to receive customer payments online via payment links at any given time without paying any home visits. The tools also helped Tanvir and Netmax to focus on other important aspects of the business which needed attention. Know more about PayUmoney’s payment links now!

The Future

With the payment challenge being resolved because of PayUmoney’s payment links, the company is more focused towards its dream of providing free Wi-Fi to public places and offices in and around Karol Bagh area. The work is already “work-in-progress” mode and the targets lie fulfilling their collective dream of making Karol Bagh a Free Wi-Fi Zone by end of the year 2018.

More than 4.5 lac Indian businesses prefer PayUmoney as their payment solution provider. Why wait? With all your marketing efforts for your business in place, it’s a good idea to have an all-in-one payment solution in place as well. Now to enjoy the best payment gateway experience and grow your business effortlessly!

The post Netmax’s Journey With PayUmoney Payment Gateway appeared first on PayU Blog.

61% marketers believe that improving SEO and growing their organic presence is their top inbound marketing strategy (source: Hubspot)

We have highlighted 6 SEO trends which are buzzing in 2018 and seem to go deeper in 2019 as well!

1.The Good Old Trends For SEO 2018

We do know that old is gold and hence, the basics of SEO are never running out of stock. Setting your keywords, meta tags, descriptions, images, and more right, is an evergreen formula that contributes to high search engine ranks. Search engines algorithms enhance every fortnight (almost). To meet the minimal requirements of these algorithms, having the traditional SEO system in place is vital. You can quickly run through these techniques in our ‘How to skyrocket your traffic by 500%’ now to avoid any mistakes in the basics.

2. Backlinks

Lately, on social media platforms like Instagram, you must have come across abbreviations such as S4S, L4L, C4C and so on. What are these exactly? These are terms used by prominent personalities or businesses to get more followers, likers, and commenters on their handles.

• S4S – Share for share
• L4L – Like for Like
• C4C – Comment for Comment

For example: if you own an online business and you want to grow your followers. You will identify similar players like yours in the market and ask them to share, like or comment on your post and in return, you do the same for them. This way you are sharing your followers with each other in order to gain more visibility.

Why I am putting this concept forth under “backlinks”? This is because, when it comes to content, backlinks work the same way as S4S on social media. Backlinks are basically, mentions of other blogger or influencers in your blog and vice versa. Backlinks are a big hit in SEO 2018, as it automatically builds brand credibility for your content. It seems easy, but it may get difficult if you belong to a very niche genre of business, where getting readers or visitors to your website is a task. However, do not skip this trend as it will get you places in the longer run!

3. Guest Blogs

Guests are always welcome. Be open and invite them to write for your blog. Guest blogs are basically in sync with backlinks. A blogger or an influencer writes for your blog to reach out something specific to your audience. Guest blogs work best if the person who writes for you or the blog you are writing for has high DA (domain authority), PA (page authority) or credibility in the industry (CEOs, independent bloggers and so on). Because of all the privileges that tag along with guest blogging, it is a mainstream SEO trend and component.

4. Smart Magnet Method

This method is where you need to bid for keywords smartly. The smart magnet method is about identifying the most used ad keywords and using them in your content or copy.

For example: I write marketing and payment blogs for PayUmoney. Here are the smart steps I will take:

1. Get into the incognito mode
2. Type my intended search. Eg: best payment gateway
3. I am sure all the top searches with have 2 letters for sure: AD
4. Now, I will see all these ads and pick the keywords. Eg: payment gateway India
5. I will this keyword in my article and make it strong enough to rank high

So, the smart magnet method is nothing, but identifying keywords from the ads and attracting more visitors by ranking high.

5. Multiple Content On Multiple Platforms

Multiple content connotes, repurposing content. Content is a vast field and carries multiple facades: long form, copy, videos, presentations, audio, gifs, infographics, memes, stories and so much more. But it is not necessary that all forms are consumed equally. Today’s fast-paced, less patient world demands something short and sweet. So it’s another smarter way to rank: create long-form content and break into small content verticals for better results and views. Try this experiment out:

1. Go to Google.com
2. Type “Instagram content strategy” in the search bar
3. You’ll see PayUmoney’s blog + video ranking on top of the second page.

Thus, having multiple forms of content published on multiple platforms is a plus point in the age of SEO 2018! You can checkout PayUmoney SlideShare and PayUmoney YouTube channel for a live demo on how to create optimized repurposed content.

6. Voice Search

This is the future! 2/3 people use their smartphones less often because of digital voice assistants such as Amazon Echo or Google Home (source: CNBC). Also, [bctt tweet=”at least 37% population uses Siri, 23% uses Microsoft’s Cortana, and 19% use Amazon’s Alexa monthly. ” username=””]

These statistics are enough to underline the fact that voice searches are the way to go for marketers. What people say is not what they type. For example: you want to learn “ways to collect payment online” but while typing you might go ahead with “how to collect online payments easily”. Hence, coating content with what people might voice search than write search is brimming up.

These 6 trends may seem very obvious. But it is always recommended to have a close view at it and explore new detailed horizons when it comes to topping up with SEO 2018. Before I close this session up I would like to provide a cheat sheet to the latest SEO tools which all businesses must have!

• SEMrush – for detailed content analysis
• Sumo – for clean email listing and subscriber forms
• Google Keyword planner – for accurate keyword volumes
• Yoast – for crisp SEO content recommendations

With all your marketing efforts for your business in place, it’s a good idea to have an all – in- one payment solution in place as well. Now enjoy the best payment gateway experience and grow your business effortlessly!

The post SEO 2018: Leading Trends and Tips For Marketers appeared first on PayU Blog.