The pandemic came with a lot of trends affecting entrepreneurship operations and most of these are not entirely new as people had no choice but to jump on board. Some of these trends increased the activities of some businesses, while others became nonexistent.
The pandemic directly affected the business sector as it brought new shape, priority, and taste to the entrepreneurship world. First, let’s address some important aspects of entrepreneurship. What is entrepreneurship? Types of entrepreneurship, its importance, and the biggest trends.
Table of Contents
What is Entrepreneurship?
At a basic level, entrepreneurship is the willingness to establish, develop, and manage a business to make profits by enduring and taking several risks that will benefit and improve the business.
Entrepreneurs are creative individuals continually looking for new ways to accomplish things. It could be finding a better product, service, or business model, and various new technologies can increase their revenues while making their lives easier.
Types of Entrepreneurship
You must first understand the many types of entrepreneurship available before deciding which is best for you. Most types of entrepreneurship are classified into:
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Small Businesses
This type of entrepreneurship can range from restaurants to grocery stores, including hairdressers, carpenters, dry cleaners, and plumbers. They are mostly self-employed people who use their money to get started or borrow money from friends and family. Their main goal is to support their families and live a decent life.
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Scalable Startups
In this type of entrepreneurship, entrepreneurs look for a problem and find a solution by launching a business plan with a unique idea. They are mainly funded by venture capitalists who recognise the uniqueness of their idea and plan an exit strategy to maximise the return on their investment on time.
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Large businesses
Unlike small or scalable business entrepreneurs, large business entrepreneurs cannot work with a small amount of money as the scale of their operations requires huge sums of money to grow.
In most instances, these businesses would develop new products, merge or acquire a business, or establish a subsidiary within an existing company as part of their operations.
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Social entrepreneurship
This is an exciting type of entrepreneurship. Unlike other people, social entrepreneurs establish a career out of their interests. They identify and address societal issues, and we have a number of them here in Nigeria. Their areas of focus can be related to community service, human rights advocacy, female child awareness, conservation of the environment, climate change awareness, etc.
Importance of Entrepreneurship
The importance of entrepreneurship goes beyond being beneficial for the entrepreneur; it is a system that goes as far as stabilising a country’s economy. Recognising the impacts of entrepreneurship is crucial because it involves talented entrepreneurs who have taken the responsibility to thrive in their businesses despite the challenges they may encounter.
These are five importance of entrepreneurship:
- Stimulation of employment opportunities and contribution to social welfare
- Innovation development
- Creation of a framework for other entrepreneurs to follow
- Increase in productivity
- Provision of a better standard of living
7 Biggest Trends in Entrepreneurship
One thing the COVID-19 pandemic influenced and prompted was the courage and motivation it gave people to pursue their dreams and passions rather than becoming stuck in a traditional career path.
As a result, the number of new small businesses and startups skyrocketed (the technology niche, in particular, experienced a massive shift). Several innovations and market developments have spurred this surge in entrepreneurship, and it is predicted to last until 2023.
Here are the seven (7) most interesting and biggest trends in Nigeria that will assist you in growing your business to a profitable and sustainable level.
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Work From Home (WFH)
Before the pandemic, 17% of US employees worked from home five days or more per week, which increased to 44% during the pandemic. According to The Guardian, remote work in Nigeria increased to 62 per cent. The epidemic increased the remote working trend, as the lockdown made it difficult for employees to commute to and work from their offices.
Many employees now prefer to work from home more frequently. Upwork also predicts that by 2025, 22% of the workforce will be working remotely. After all, not having to pay for office space significantly reduces expenses.
On the other hand, many firms do not rely solely on working from home because not all enterprises can survive on that mode of operation. And rather than dismissing it entirely, most businesses are embracing the hybrid work culture as it allows for more physical cooperation and collaboration. This way, employees would enjoy working from both their offices and homes at intervals.
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Content Marketing
Content is king, and you should treat it as such. Marketing is now becoming increasingly digital due to the effectiveness of content marketing. As a result, many businesses that have correctly implemented this model are thriving in the digital space.
Content has become an essential component of sales campaigns, ad strategy, lead generation, and brand awareness. This is so because content forms have evolved far beyond the written text. Business brands and enterprises now use podcasts, creative videos, reels, animations, and the like to attract a bigger audience on media platforms such as Tiktok, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and even LinkedIn.
Content can be restructured using the right tools, and one method is to convert your videos into blog posts and podcasts. People are spending a lot of time on social media, so the sooner you develop captivating content to capture their attention, the better.
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Mobile Optimisation
Running a successful business entails staying current on technological changes. Many recent technologies are confusing, but there are ways to focus your attention on the ones that are best for your firm.
An excellent way to start is by researching and understanding where your clients spend their time and how they interact once they locate what they need. This would help you avoid wasting money on ineffective marketing and promotional channels.
For instance, if you set up Google Analytics on your website, you will notice that smartphone and tablet users now account for more than half of all internet traffic.
Based on this, if you want your company to thrive online, you must increase your investment in mobile optimisation. Ensure your features are tailored for mobile, tablet, and desktop compatibility. Most importantly, ensure your site is engaging, fast, SEO-optimised, and geared toward the satisfaction of your customers.
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Cryptocurrency acceptance
A few years ago, the average person had no idea what cryptocurrency was as Bitcoin was the only major currency known. At that time, its main users were a techy community of developers and early adopters.
But, because of a handful of highly brilliant entrepreneurs and a strong community, everything is changing, and cryptocurrency is becoming one of the biggest entrepreneurship trends today. It is no longer regarded as a passing trend, as its popularity has grown due to the ease with which it can be bought and sold.
Businesses now more than ever accept cryptocurrency as a form of payment in their online stores. Companies paying their employees in cryptocurrency is a prevalent trend today as well. And this saves them the hassle of changing each employee’s income to their local currency.
Companies have also recently adopted the practice of offering their early employees a portion of their profits through cryptocurrency equity shares.
The e-commerce niche has also benefited from cryptocurrency adoption because it allows e-commerce operators to receive payments from anywhere in the world while helping their online store accommodate more clients.
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Social commerce
Social commerce is when a business sells things through social media. It has been a powerful force in pushing the e-commerce niche by promoting products to targeted audiences and making them available on social media.
You can put your business and brand online on social medial platforms and start generating massive revenue from it. This is the best time to begin marketing on social media, as it has recently grown to a market value of $89.4 billion.
Social media is the new market for millennials and Gen-Z. So, if you’re not using social media or only using it partially, now is the time to start. You’ll be astonished at how affordable and convenient it is.
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The rise of the gig economy
During the global financial crisis in 2008, many traditional businesses were affected, and this same decline happened in 2020. Many people have since become freelance or contract workers.
The gig economy supports flexibility, empowers you to be your boss, promotes work-life balance, encourages multiple income streams, and brings job exposure, more gig opportunities, and career advancements. Gig jobs may not be a new idea entirely, but they have become a popular trend among this younger generation.
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Cybersecurity
One of the most talked-about aspects of cybersecurity is the new risks employees and freelancers face when working from home (WFH). Many organisations during the pandemic were forced to start working remotely, and the urgent need not to interrupt operations after the pandemic did not give them enough time to deploy the required cybersecurity infrastructure for their workers.
Unlike home offices, centralised offices have more secure routers, firewalls, and access management systems managed by IT teams. However, most personal devices used by freelancers and employees in remote locations are less secure than those used in centralised offices. These devices are only protected in most cases by two-factor authentication, which increases the risks of data theft.
To mitigate these security risks, organisations are now looking at implementing security controls for their workers while identifying new security vulnerabilities and ensuring close monitoring and proper documentation.
Conclusion
There you have it! The biggest trends in entrepreneurship today.
Trends like working from home and mobile optimisation may seem familiar to you, unlike crypto acceptance, content marketing, and the gig economy, which emerged due to the pandemic. Regardless, these trends are essential for successfully starting or running a business.
Innovations and tools will still be discovered as time passes, but your focus should be on your customers and target audience. Track their patterns and behaviours, and once you observe a change, figure out how to adapt and move with them.
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About the Author
Chinenye Gladys is a copywriter and Fintech content writer. She writes compelling and creative SEO content/copy for different brands, blogs, and businesses in the language their target audience understands. She doesn’t just write words but also used emotions that generate leads, increase sales and turn readers into loyal customers.
About Author
- Op-Ed are articles published by guest authors. We no longer accept guest posts. However, we are still open to adding long-term content contributors to our team of insightful writers. To write for us, please check out inisght.ng/guest-post.
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