The sister duo Lisa and Jessica Kistermann, also known as Kistermann sisters are influencers and entrepreneurs and have been voted as one of the fastest-growing fashion influencer pages according to INC.com.

Lisa and Jessica have a diverse and impressive background having founded a number of successful online ventures. Born and raised in Florence, Italy, the twin sisters come from multicultural roots that go back to German and Greek ancestry. Having studied at London International Business and Russian, they never thought about running a successful fashion company until founding CrimeLondon. With a strong entrepreneurial and creative side, they have built the digital side of the business to be one of the top sneaker brands in Europe – @crimelondon.

Lisa and Jessica Kistermann share a few tips for the spunky individuals who are willing to walk the extra mile for that taste of elusive success:

1 Base your business on a balance of passion and knowledge

Building a start-up from scratch may seem like a rosy prospect but in actuality, it is quite a grind. Therefore, it is important that it excites and motivates you as this will keep your interest and investment buoyant even when things don’t seem all peachy. Yet, basing your venture purely on gumption is not a wise move as a great deal of knowledge should fuel your steps. Avoid businesses or industries that you don’t already know a good deal about as certain mistakes can raze your fledgling business to the ground.

2 Make Initial Funding Round Count

Funding is always on tricky grounds and hence should be capitalized with full-fledged plans to expand and prosper. This ensures that you have a cushion for all the product development and marketing expenses to be incurred in the process. It is prudent to have sufficient capital for operations to break even without any shade of debt/bankruptcy looming around. At this point, you should leave aside unfounded fears on diluting your percentage ownership in the company.

3 Emulate Leading Entrepreneurs

For every business, it is important to emulate a market leader in order to find success in the cut-throat scenario.  Seek out pointers and advice from them in order to understand the intricacies of the market better. Find mentors who can give you advice on hiring, product development, marketing, and fundraising‎ yet don’t forget to implement your brand of marketing. A personalized touch, paired up with time-tested procedures creates a business model that is a cut above the rest.

4 Research the Competition

A successful entrepreneur always keeps his eyes and ears open as the wind carries powerful information to capitulate on. Keep yourself thoroughly abreast through researching competitive products or services in the marketplace, alongside having tabs on new developments and enhancements from your competitors. ‎This will keep the onus to deliver unique offerings, on a constant flame, and help you push yourself to create fresh solutions to age-old problems.

5 Get Comfortable with pitching

The ability to lucidly communicate can be critical in bagging visibility, inspiring competition, and pitching to raise capital. In fact, pitching turns out to be a sore point and many entrepreneurs harbour baseless fear around it. To witness prolific success, you must let go of inhibitions and work to overcome this fear. Hire creative people to help you harness the pitching mindset, get professional feedback and proactively have the zeal to improve.

6 Never say never to Networking

Networking is a valuable tool as it can help you land a new investor, a great employee, a new customer, or even a great mentor. It is, therefore, essential to attend industry and start-up events, to scope out new talents and opportunities. LinkedIn has been proved to be a powerful tool in aiding the tryst to network, so ensure that you and your company have a LinkedIn presence and that you are constantly updating the same.

7 Always be eager to Learn and Unlearn

This is perhaps the most important tip that has proved to be worth its weight in gold, time and again. Rigidity is a deadly move against profit and the mark of a valuable entrepreneur is his/her ability to learn. Always be on your toe in keeping up with new developments but don’t mindlessly implement it. Strike the perfect balance through unlearning practices that can be polished by the incorporation of fresher ideas. This way, you end up creating a niche category where the ruling power lies in your grasp.

Conclusion

As seen with the Kistermann sisters, the life of an entrepreneur is incomplete without a heady dose of guts glory so savour the lessons and proceed with a clear vision in mind. After all, the market is a playground and those who take calculated risks, win.