Unless you are already working in sales, you may not know what it takes to sell a product or service. Regardless of what small business you are in, if you aren't willing to sell, you won't make money.
And you need to develop a tough skin and get used to rejection.
"Are you willing to hear the word 'no'?" says Debra Cohen, president of Home Remedies of NY Inc., a home improvement referral network. "Entrepreneurs need to be determined, persistent and resilient."
Liz Crystal, owner of The LC Group LLC, a bookkeeping and money management service in Green Brook, N.J., sums up this entrepreneurial can-do attitude as "courage."
"It's not easy to handle rejection from potential clients or to tune out the naysayers," she says. But this kind of courage is a prerequisite for small-business success.