Whenever someone gains some fame or enter into the public sphere all of a sudden, people love to call this an ‘overnight success’. The reality is however that beyond winning the lottery or the jackpot at a casino, there is no such thing as an overnight success. I mention this based on the experience of watching my friend Bharat Bhise try to put together his business and especially in reference to when he hit dizzying new heights last year and was branded as an overnight success, something which annoyed us both in truth. If you believe this then you may end up thinking that things will happen for you in an instant, and this just isn’t true.
Embryonic Phase
Back when we were at college Bharat already knew that he wanted to be a businessman of some type and so he began to try his hand at a number of different ideas, to see which he liked most. He decided even at that early stage that he wanted to combine his love of finance and technology, to put together a fintech start-up. It was at this age that he really began putting in the research into businesses which were already successful, how they did things and what challenges they faced.
Making the Plan
Following college Bharat began to formulate the plan for his business, he would design the software himself after spending 15 hours per day attached to his computer. Bharat also used this time to put together a business plan and in order to do that he would research customer trends, finance markets and business needs.
Hustling For Cash
Bharat saved as much money as he could but most of that went into the planning and development stage of his business idea. This meant that he had to go and look for investment or for business loans from the bank, which resulted in him traveling all over the country giving pitch after pitch to investors. Eventually he managed to get enough money to get off the ground and the business was born, some 3 years after leaving college.
Early Years
During those early years in business Bharat was running at a loss, he had a handful of staff who were committed and they would all work incredibly long hours trying to get things off the ground. What they did have at this stage was a great business idea and a fantastic product, the belief in this kept them all going.
The Magazine
Last year a technology magazine picked up on this product idea and wrote a raving review about it, this caused a huge upturn in the business and sales went through the roof. Bharat and his business were then touted as an overnight success because of this explosion of popularity and the media coverage which both the business and the product then received.
As you can see, this ‘overnight success’ was in fact a decade in the making, a decade of blood, sweat and tears, to assume that it happened in an instant is almost disrespectful, make sure that you put in the same level of work for any business idea which you may have.