Lack of capital is the excuse most commonly cited by people who have never really given the idea of starting their own businesses any thought when confronted. People with some entrepreneurial experience know that unless the community from which you come from is the real-life equivalent of a Shark Tank set (or Dragon Den for those who view different channels), you are unlikely to be showered with funding just for having what you believe is a great idea. The more practical (or so they think) will suggest salary backed bank loans as suitable alternatives but starting a business using money that accumulates interest will just deepen and prolong your dependence on your salary if your business is not the instant runaway success you expected it to be.

Most of the literature around common business wisdom suggests that entrepreneurs with limited funds bootstrap their businesses instead. Bootstrapping is starting your business without external help or capital. In this article we are going to explore strategies which can be used to raise at least some of the required initial capital through the pre-selling of what will be the future business venture’s goods or services.

Get visibility and validation

Even established companies would have difficulties in selling presently nonexistent goods or services with companies whose products have cult followings being the exception. That is why getting as much publicity as possible is an important step in getting your business ready for customers. Directly advertising your barely existent venture at this point, or even worse: inviting your friends, family and other acquaintances to ‘like’ your hastily put together social media account would not be very useful, at the very least you can get what your audience will consider to be an impartial third party to pen an article about your venture.

You can approach any popular newspapers or blogs to write a story about your new company and its products; in today’s world, this has become far easier than many think especially if you have an interesting story to tell. If no reporters or bloggers are biting, this may mean that neither your startup nor its products are ‘interesting’ enough, which is never a bad thing on its own (unless you are in the entertainment industry) – after all the most profitable products in business also tend to be the most boring. Unfortunately in this case you need to generate as much excitement as possible around your future products since this will be one of the main driving forces behind any of your pre-orders (together with trust, incentives and pricing).

You need media and internet awareness to allay the inevitable mistrust that will surround your company and its pitch. The internet has made people distrustful and alert for any scams. These articles will go a long way in proving that you are not a fly-by-night scam. You still have to realize that if you fail to deliver on any of the pre-orders you collect, you would be for all practical purposes indistinguishable from an actual scammer.

Clearly and honestly share your vision

Since you may not actually have the finished products at this stage, you have to be able to clearly share your ideas and concepts. Besides helping you get the attention of the right people, you can avoid any potential misunderstandings when it finally comes time to deliver the final product. Sometimes in an effort to drum up more interest and sales, you may be tempted to overpromise and stretch the truth. Avoid this as there is nothing worse for a new company than a disgruntled (and highly vocal) first wave of customers. In the modern age, social media gives each and every one of your disgruntled customers the ability to end your company in its infancy. Therefore, like always, it is important that you manage expectations.

Offer pre-order incentives

To increase the numbers of people who pre-order instead of those who opt to wait for the final finished product you have to take steps to entice them to do the former. These incentives may range from customizing pre-ordered products to offering discounts on the same. Sometimes the offer can be as simple as letting them get their units significantly earlier than everyone else.

Be transparent

In order to build trust and thus increase the likelihood of people trusting you with their money, you can share information about each and every step of your fledgeling company’s progress; fortunately for you social media was designed for exactly this kind of oversharing. As I have mentioned several times before that excessive secrecy is oftentimes an unnecessary and difficult yoke to bear if your own pocket cannot wholly finance your dreams.

Build a community around the product

There is no better way to generate and sustain goodwill from your future customers than keeping them close. This means abandoning the façade of the all-knowing entrepreneur. The public can prove to be an invaluable source of input and feedback – effectively a free and enthusiastic focus group for furthering your market research. Online communities around certain products have been known to take on a life of their own. This is also one of the easiest ways to get large numbers of early adopters or in this, case pre-orders.