Looking for NZ’s Best Start-Up Business Ideas?

There’s nothing quite like Kiwi ingenuity when it comes to identifying the best start-up business ideas. A quick look at Taupo’s tourist attractions (and those across New Zealand) demonstrates this perfectly! Who would have thought people would pay money to jump off a bridge with a rubber band attached to their legs? They do though and by the thousands! Bungy jumping is a fabulous example of one man’s ideas becoming a viable business through hard work and planning. We wish we’d thought of it!

However, we digress. What we’re trying to get across to you is that New Zealanders are incredibly talented when it comes to identifying start-up business ideas and then building a business from the bottom up. It does take commitment, time and plenty of due diligence to pick the right one for you though.

Here at MBP Advisors + Accountants, we like making things easy for business owners. That’s why we’re going to walk you through the process on how to narrow down your start-up business ideas, plus share some of our favourite ideas to get you thinking about what would work for you.

Identifying the Start-Up Business Ideas Which Best Suit You

What’s key here is that you pick a business idea or ideas which you like the sound of (unless of course, you’re not having any part of the business at all!). That’s because as a start-up business owner, for the first few years you’ll be living and breathing your business. The number of hours you’ll put in cannot be predicted, but hopefully, the amount of cash can (and we can help with this – so give us a call!). Therefore, it makes sense that you only investigate and follow through with ideas which resonate with you and which are viable. This means you’ll need to do a few things:

Know Yourself

You know yourself better than anybody else does, but what we’re asking is for you to do an in-depth self-analysis. This means sitting down and answering the tough questions about yourself, such as:

• What are you good at doing?
• What things do you like doing?
• What do you hate doing?
• What personal traits do you have which you know would help you grow your new business?
• Why do you want to start up a business in the first place?
• What are you prepared to risk to make your new business a success?

Complete Due Diligence

It’s not enough that you love the idea – your potential clients or customers also need to! Someone has to want to (or need to) buy your products or services. That requires your business idea to:

• Solve a problem,
• Be worth paying for,
• Be at a price point which people will pay, but which covers your costs and gives you an acceptable profit,
• Have its own niche market,
• Be one you are passionate about,
• Be tested first upon your target audience, before you go into full production and promotion. After all, it makes sense that your idea receives a great response before you start pouring time and money into it,
• Be easily marketed.

Due diligence also involves checking for trademarks and copyright, looking at the competition, forecasting your financials, creating a business plan and having it checked, and identifying the tools or/and knowledge you’ll need to organise.

Seek Professional Advice

This may mean talking with others in the same industry as your idea or working with a professional business advisor. We offer a business advisory service where we’ll sit down over a coffee (or via Zoom video conference) and chat with you about your business ideas. We’ll help you pick the right business structure, assist with any due diligence, and walk with you from the planning through to launch and beyond.

All this information is great, (we hear you say), but what if I don’t have any start-up business ideas yet? Then read on, because we’re about to give you a comprehensive list of ideas to get you started!

NZ’s Most Comprehensive List of Start-Up Business Ideas

Not everyone finds it easy to come up with new business ideas. If this is you, don’t stress because we’ve made a list of some great ideas to get you started. It’s important to remember though, that you will still need to investigate each idea fully first and find a way to ‘make it your idea’ too.

• Social media management – almost every successful business has a great social media presence. Often small to medium-sized business owners are too busy to manage their social media, giving you the opportunity to do it for them – for a fee.
• App creation – if you’ve got the skills and knowledge to create and then sell apps, go for it! They’re in hot demand at the moment.
• Chatbot creation – like apps, chatbots are also popular products for medium to large sized businesses to purchase.
• Virtual assistant – if you’re able to type, get things organised and like helping people, then being a personal or virtual assistant could be a good option for you.
• Cleaning service – if you have an eye for detail and enjoy keeping fit, then why not offer your cleaning services to homeowners and businesses?
• Dog walking or pet minding – many pet owners don’t have the time to give their pet as much attention as they’d like. This means they’ll pay you to do it for them!
• Craft or clothing making – if you enjoy sewing or making things, then why not set up your own business where you sell what you make! Find an area to specialise in, such as wedding jewellery or baby clothes, set up a website and get selling!
• Wedding planner – you love all that romantic stuff and keeping up to date with wedding trends. Why not use this to become a wedding planner and take the load away from stressed brides?
• Online teacher – whether you’re a primary or secondary trained teacher, or someone with a Masters in a high-interest subject, share your knowledge with others for a fee.
• Influencer – this is a relatively new business opportunity. You grow a large following on social media, and then charge other businesses to share their products or services through your channels. This could be on Instagram, Facebook or even YouTube.
• Voiceover artists – if you love to talk, have a great voice or can pretend to be multiple characters, become a voiceover artist! You’ll need to have a professional set up at home or work, but you can ‘work’ all over the world.
• Stock photo photographer – if you love to travel, take photos of people or stage photos.  Set up a business selling a subscription to your stock photo website.
• Course creator – this could work in two ways. You could create and sell courses in your speciality, or you could create courses for others to sell. Either way is a win-win.

There’s nothing quite like being your own boss. We’d love to help you do just that too! No matter whether you’ve got an idea and need help moving forward or have run your own business for a while and need a push to get back on track; we can help! Get in touch with our friendly team today and let’s give your business the attention it needs to succeed.