How to Start a Successful Small Business 🖇️🧸: The Ultimate Guide for 2025 | My Stationery Shop Journey

How do I start a successful small business? I am opening my very own online shop in a few days. We'll be ready to launch. Thank you so so much on the success of the shop update. Sold out on the first day. This has to be my most frequently asked question ever on my channel and my Instagram DMs. Questions ranging anywhere from the very general vague, How do I start? Where do I begin? All the way to the nitty gritty, How do I decide what the price should be for each item? How do I ship things out? I will hopefully cover everything in this video so you are able to get started building your small business for the new year or anytime you may come across this video. There is never just one time that's perfect for starting a business. It all comes down to circumstances, your own motivation, your own budget, lifestyle, etc. I only started my small business about two years ago. I did not study business, finance, marketing, anything related in school. Everything I have learned has been through my own experience, my own research. So I just want to put that out there as a disclaimer to take everything you hear in this video with a grain of salt because everyone's journeys are different. It's enough preamble. I'm going to get started with the very beginning of my own journey. I ran an online stationery shop called On Studio. Initially, it was just called Annika's Leaf Shop. I only officially branded and launched it at the beginning of 2022 and that was the time that I really started getting serious about it. I have always had a personal interest in arts, crafts. My very first videos on this channel were journaling videos. They were bullet journal setup videos showing my monthly themes using stickers, pens, washi tapes. And back around the summer of 2021, I got a Cricut, which is a sticker maker. At the time, I followed artists online who built their own sticker shops, made their own stationery by using a Cricut or a Silhouette to cut their own sticker sheets at home. So I already had some familiarity with that process. But girl, let me tell you, actually making those things in the first place was so hard for me. I didn't have sticker paper. I actually used FedEx printing and sent them a PDF of my sticker sheet design, had them print it there, brought it back home and tried to cut it with the Cricut, messing around, see what I can make for myself. And I was definitely not thinking about selling it. I had this YouTube channel and I was making vlogs about my whole sticker making process just because that's what I was up to at that time. And I received some messages and comments asking if I planned to sell them or saying that they would be interested in buying my designs. That's when I started thinking. I had followed artists and stationery accounts on Instagram and YouTube who ran their own shops from home, made a living doing that sort of stuff. And I just saw that as something I would never think about doing. Like those first sticker sheets I made through FedEx and everything were so rough. But the more I thought about it, the more I was like, you know, why not give it a try? It was so rewarding to create my own stickers and I was just so excited that I was able to put my own artwork in the journal. And the fact that people are expressing interest in it already. I was like, what? What's stopping me? I already have this Cricut. Let's see if I can do anything with it. So I started studying the journeys that these artists and stationery shops would take. Scroll to the very first picture in their feed. Get their very first YouTube vlogs. Figure out how they got their start and made it into something more. Now you can see that whole journey on my YouTube. You've decided you want to start a small business. Now you've got to figure out how to get it going. And I assume that's why you're brought to this video. I've watched so many YouTube videos. How to start a small stationery shop. How to start a sticker business. How to unjam a Cricut. I've already been over the technicalities of my printer. The sticker paper I started with. All of that in a previous video. So I will link them in the description. But here's just an overview. I feel like a lot of us have the creative idea in our mind. But the part that starts tripping people up and prevents us from making any progress towards that big picture is the logistics of it all. So I'm going to go through the nitty gritty and I'm going to try simplifying that as much as possible for you. We're going to do it the 5W approach. As unintimidating as possible. One, what are you selling? What's your product? For me, I was starting with stickers, scrunchies, and beaded rings. This is where I started because this is what I knew how to make. Not only do you need to know what it is you're selling, but how you're making it. How are you getting it? I didn't start outsourcing things until several months into my business. I was printing and cutting the sticker sheets at home. I was sewing the scrunchies by hand because that's something that I learned how to make when I was much younger, actually, in high school. And that was something fun. Then one of my big COVID hobbies was I taught myself how to make these little beaded rings. So those were my starting products. I think you should keep it minimal when you're first starting out. Maybe don't start reaching out to manufacturers yet while you're just getting your feet wet. Because when you reach out to manufacturers, you do usually have to pay a minimal order quantity. And you have to buy things in bulk. That was really scary at the beginning because I had no idea how this would turn out. I had no idea if enough people would buy my things that would warrant ordering hundreds upon hundreds of items. So I stuck with the things that I knew I could make at home. When it did come time to scale things and find manufacturers, I have so many questions about how to find a manufacturer, how to make sure you can trust those manufacturers. The bottom line is research. I really can't give you any shortcuts for doing that. Because you should be researching the companies that are going to be making your products. You should know their values, how they make things, if that ethically aligns with your values. If those prices align with your budget. In the beginning, I simply typed in washi tape manufacturers, sticker sheet manufacturers. Sticker sheet manufacturers in the U.S. Literally just type that into Google. You can find reviews, you can find other artists, blog posts. You should get samples from each of the manufacturers before you decide on which one you want to go with. It's a little like dating, you know? You gotta shop around a bit before you settle on the one. Once you have your products, where? Where are you going to sell it? This most likely is an online storefront. I started on Squarespace and that is what I have used my entire time. I chose it because it was very user-friendly. And I didn't want to use Etsy because I had heard a lot of complaints. People who have used Etsy were not liking the direction it was moving. The argument could have been made that it would be easier to market yourself through Etsy because you have related shops and everything. And the hard work of setting up a storefront is all right in for you. Personally, I would recommend setting up your own site. Whether that be through Squarespace or through Shopify. Because eventually, you probably would want to move off Etsy, right? Have your own domain, establish your own brand. Not only does it look more professional, it makes your brand more unique, its own entity. And you're probably already putting in a lot of time and effort into your own social media marketing. Even now, from my consumer experience, it seems like Etsy is kind of being taken over by larger brands anyway. So I would recommend setting up your own storefront. When I set up my Squarespace, I went with the smallest plan possible, the cheapest monthly plan. And then you can always scale up from there. I do know that looking at this plan, $23 a month seems quite expensive. Especially if you're just starting your business. I actually have a 10% off code, Anika's Leap, that you can use at checkout. This is not a sponsored video, but I partnered with them before and I think this code is still valid. You have your products, you have your site. Now, you're putting your products on the site. How are you going to price things? And once an order is placed, how are you going to ship it? The way I price my items, I break it down to the price it costs to make it, if I'm getting it manufactured. How much does it cost per unit to make? Or back when I was making everything at home, all the materials that go into making it. Also the cost of labor. How much time are you putting into each of these products? And then the packaging. How much does all the packaging up of these products cost? I find a lot of small businesses, especially stationary ones like mine, we put a lot of time and effort and thought behind the packaging. We want it to be cute. We want it to have our branding. We want to make it a whole fun experience for the customer. And I think that's something that customers really do value. Whenever I order something and it's packaged all cutely like this, and you can see the time and effort, it makes me so excited to buy and order another thing from them. Something like packaging can kind of add up. Here is where you need to be realistic with yourself and make sure you're not going overboard, which I personally have definitely done. You want your packaging to be something that is, you know, nice to look at, but also you don't have to include 10 million freebies. You don't have to get all custom designs. These are things you can focus on when you are scaling up your business. We're just getting started. A simple, really well-designed business card can go so far. Or even if you want to use just colored tissue paper. I use pink colored tissue paper, but it doesn't have my brand's logos or anything on it. In the beginning when I was printing my stickers, I was even printing my own design seal stickers. So that was still something that I was making at home at the time, until I came to a point where I was able to outsource that. And I look at the time it takes to package the product, because now that I do have an assistant, I'm also paying her to help me package all these orders. But even if you don't have an assistant, you want to be paying yourself fairly for that. I'm just gonna provide a very quick sample, and these are fictional numbers. These are not the exact numbers I use for my products. Say you're making a keychain and it costs $3. To package that keychain, you use tissue paper, a seal sticker, a mailer. All that comes out to around $1.70. Then the cost of labor, say you're paying yourself $18 an hour to pack orders. And it takes on average 3 minutes for you to package a keychain. Add that all up and you have $5.60. That is what you need to price it if you only want to break even, which I assume you don't. So you want to multiply it by a profit margin, and that becomes your cost of the product. What's really helpful for me is I look at other small businesses that are selling similar products. And I use that as a guideline for how I price my products. Once you've made that sale, how are you shipping it out? If you are able to invest, I would highly recommend getting your own label printer at home. I use the Rolo Thermal Printer. Rolo. Rolo. Thermal. Printer. And I started by using ShipOut to buy the shipping labels. Once I started getting way more orders, I made the transition to ShipStation. Something you may want to keep in mind when doing shipping, you may want a P.O. box. Because I'm on the internet, I obviously don't want to use my home address when I was shipping from my home. So I had a P.O. box set up. But again, that's also another cost. I got a lot of questions about the taxes and the financial and legal side. I'm not going to go really into that because that's stuff that I'm not well-versed in myself. It's kind of scary for me still. Like, I don't want the IRS to come for me. So I'm not going to be giving that type of advice. But there are definitely resources out there for you to look into. But for you when you're getting started, make sure you're keeping a log of all of your expenses, all of your monthly subscriptions, like for the website, for the P.O. box, how much each material costs, all of this stuff. Make sure you're keeping records of it. Managing your money from the start and budgeting plays a huge part. Because of course, it does cost money to start a business. That's why I did want to highlight creating digital products. So you don't have to worry about things like shipping and even just handling physical inventory. That's something that I want to do more coming up in the new year. At the beginning of the year, I made a calendar, which was a digital print-out. Because I didn't have to factor in the cost of shipping and actually making it, it was like a one-time make product. I was able to price it a lot lower and I found that it had so many sales. Because it was also easily accessible for customers. They didn't have to pay the shipping fees. They were able to print it at home. It was kind of a win-win for everyone. I have a digital planner on my site as well, but that's very outdated. So I do want to make a new updated version of that soon. But digital products are definitely something you may want to look into. If you're trying not to spend a ton of money, especially in the start of it all. When are you going to launch your business? Once you do a lot of research and you start making your products, you need to set a deadline for your launch. If you're anything like me, you're going to get caught up in all the little details. You're going to be a perfectionist, wanting everything to run smoothly. Do your best work right at launch. It's not realistic. You're going to learn things along the way that you can only learn from making the mistakes. Because when you make them, you're going to realize, oh, there's a better way to do this. I think that's one of the biggest things holding people back. They want everything to be perfect. And that's just not going to happen. You have to set that deadline for yourself to make sure that you actually start it. I think it's easy to get discouraged before you even begin. But you have to realize that at your very start, that's not your peak. You're nowhere near the biggest potential it can be. You're most likely not going to have thousands upon thousands of customers right at your launch. It is okay to make mistakes at the beginning. But you need a start. And having a hard deadline will motivate you to work towards that time. And the last part, the why. Why should people buy your products? Why should people follow your brand? What sets you apart from everyone else? This is where I'm going to get into the whole marketing of it. You need to identify your target audience. Who are you selling these products to? Do you have a specific aesthetic that your products fall into? Or is it a certain category of stationery types? Like, do you want to make journaling-specific stationery? Do you want to make personalized cards-type of stationery? Identifying and defining your brand is so important for growth. I think I've always had a pretty specific aesthetic. I like pink, I like cozy things, I like warm tones. So that is what my brand started focusing on. By having this aesthetic, people should be able to recognize your products without even knowing that they're yours. And sometimes it takes time to find and develop your brand's aesthetic. This is where posting on social media comes into play. I get so many questions on how I made those first sales. As I went over at the beginning, I started with the YouTube channel. People saw the very start of my stickers! So I was in a bit of a unique situation where I already had an audience and people who wanted to buy these products before its launch. I think that goes to show the power that social media marketing has and why you really need to tap into that. I know Instagram and TikTok, a lot of businesses use these for marketing. Personally, I'm not too into the TikTok sphere, but I do focus on creating a very cohesive Instagram feed for my shop. With all the same filters, I take the same warm, sunlight, grainy photos. And I keep consistent with that. And that word, consistency, is the key. Even if you don't have a specific aesthetic in the beginning, as long as you keep posting, and sometimes forcing yourself to post frequently enough, you'll start to find your own rhythm and develop your style. You'll also see what works best with an audience. And by using hashtags, trying out different types of reels on Instagram, or audios, you'll slowly start to build an audience over time. But you do have to be consistent with it. If that means posting multiple times a week, then you really got to stick to it. Like, there's no way around it. That's how the algorithms work. What you can do is you can create a bunch of photos at once. Like, usually I'll do photoshoot days where I'm taking product photos for an entire afternoon. And then I'm saving them, editing them, and scheduling them to post on Instagram. I've heard from a lot of other creators, too, is what really develops the most loyal audience. Because you're getting longer-form content than, say, Instagram or TikTok. People get really invested in the people behind the businesses. And they want to see the stories, they want to see where you came from, how you do it. The behind-the-scenes that a lot of big brands don't show. It makes you personable and relatable. And the audience feels connected to more than just a brand entity. At the end of the day, you know humans connect to humans. And not to be biased, but I also like consuming content on YouTube the most. It may take more time than posting on Instagram a few times a week. This is how I developed a loyal customer base. I can make a whole different video on how to start becoming a content creator on here. But I think people want to see transparency and personality. They want to get to know who you are and who your brand is. I get excited for shop launches of people who I've followed on YouTube or Instagram for such a long time. Because I want to see that person's success. It's not just about the products. I mean, of course, I like the products that I'm buying. But I also want to support who these people are and their whole journey. Supporting people who are also doing the same thing as you. Who may be an inspiration, who you look up to. There's like a real sense of community there. Like on Instagram or something, you can make friends with other people who are starting up their small businesses. In fact, if you've reached this part in the video, like girl I've been rambling for I don't even know how long. But drop your small business social link in the comments and reply to some people. Maybe you can connect with other aspiring small business owners and help each other grow. If you're worried about consistency in terms of having enough things to post about. Say like all you've been doing is designing or packaging things. You can make content out of that. You can make a time-lapse of you just sitting at your desk designing and slap a trending audio on that. Or you can film yourself unboxing a new product. If you're working up to a shop update, you can tease all the new products you've got coming up. Build that interest. Get people excited for the launch. So now you've launched your business. You have a brand aesthetic in the works. You're developing it. You're starting to make your first sales. Whether that be funneled through Instagram or YouTube. Or maybe it's your other small business friends supporting one another. How do we switch mindsets from starting to growing? And how do we stay motivated? Set goals. I love setting goals. I love having a vision of what I want for the future. Whether or not that is necessarily attainable is not a factor I think about. You know, shoot for the stars. And if you miss, you drag your feet in the tips of the trees. Whatever that saying is. I've heard so many times when it comes to setting goals, set something that is trackable. Like a number. Not something arbitrary like, be successful. You need specific and measurable goals. But with that, I would not set goals that revolve around numbers like followers, sales, or income necessarily. I fixate on a number like that. That is not within my own control and power. It is not good for my mentality. Instead, I set goals based on what is within my capabilities. For example, with the consistency. Set a goal like, I will post three times on Instagram. That is something that is attainable that you can achieve. You cannot directly control how many people are shopping from your store. Stuff like that fluctuates all the time and it's easy to get discouraged when there are dips or slow periods. I choose to focus on things that excite me. Like, I want to make ten new products by the end of the month. Goals like that, that are still measurable, that you can track, but are all completely within your own control. Instead of focusing on the number side of it, focus on developing the brand itself. Because there's always more work you can do in terms of upgrading your business and developing its style, its aesthetic. And by proving upon those things, your business will grow for you. It will just become a more cohesive, higher quality brand and people are going to want to buy from it. And it gets easier, it really does. The beginning is so hard and daunting, figuring everything out. It seems like there are a million and one things you need to keep track of, to learn about, to research. It is hard and it's going to be time consuming. Like, I'm not going to sugar coat it. That's what weeds out a lot of people in the beginning and sets other people apart. Because they actually stick with it. You need to find that motivation within yourself to keep going. Even when you're breaking down and crying about things like taxes. I stay motivated with big picture ideas, my dreams of the future. It sounds a little, like, naive, maybe. I don't care! I literally have a Pinterest board. I have a private Pinterest board of, like, all the types of products and packaging that I one day wish to make. And sometimes I'll just look at that at night. And I'll be like, that sounds so far away. I can never imagine actually making those products. But then if I look back to myself two years ago, I would never even imagine being here today. And having a business if I never started it. So though things may seem like a distant dream, I showed consistency. And now I'm seeing the effects of all that effort. Overall, the biggest mistake you can make in starting a business is not starting. Getting bogged down in all these details that you may be trying to perfect. This is only holding you back. It's okay to make those mistakes at the beginning. I swear the world is not gonna end, I promise you. Yes, it's scary. But I am cheering for you. I know you can do it. I was so scared and nervous to do it myself. And seeing how I've grown and how I've learned from it, I know you can do it too. Don't worry about what other people are gonna think when you're first starting out. Like, yeah, it might not be great. I look back at my old designs, my first designs, and I'm like, Girl, I can't believe people bought those from you. They were just being nice. And also, you can be realistic with yourself. You don't need to invest a whole bunch of time and money into starting a business. If that's not within your means, as I said, you can try something digital. I always go back to the fact that I started drawing designs for my business on my phone. I used a little pen stylus. I got like a pack of 20 pen stylus on Amazon. And I used Pocket Procreate. I'm sure it's like $40 in the App Store. You can start by making digital designs on your phone. Selling those on a site like Squarespace or something. You don't have to worry about shipping. You don't have to worry about packaging. That is a very low-cost way to get started. The possibilities are endless, and I believe in you. You really can do it. 2024, it's gonna be your year. You're gonna start this business, and you're gonna stick with it. At least give yourself a few months, you know, like a timeline, and you'll just try it consistently for that period of time. And you'll see if you make any growth. You'll see what you need to adjust. If this is something that you can stick with in your current lifestyle. But you need to give it a chance before you can do anything about it. Oh my goodness, the sun is setting. It is 4 or 7 p.m. What? I hope this answered most of your questions about starting a business in 2024, or whenever you may be watching this. If you have any more things that I did not touch on, or I didn't go over, please leave a comment below, and I will try to reply to it. Thank you so, so much for watching, and thank you, as always, for supporting On Studio, my business. I'm so excited to share with you the next chapter of it, and all the products I have coming for the end of the year. I'm so excited. They're almost here. Like, I swear I check the shipping updates every day, praying for them to get to me faster, so I can list them on my site. But, you know, those are the things that I can't control. So, I will listen to my own advice, and focus on what I can control. Take care, friend.