So you've got this idea for a business--whether a side hustle, a full-time gig or somewhere in the middle, but you just don't know what to do with it, how to get it going, where to start, right?

Can your brilliant business idea make money? - belong magazine blog - female entrepreneur, creative women, lady box, woman in business - profit, revenue, all about the numbers and the bottom line

Maybe you dream of being a entrepreneur, maybe you just want to be a crafter, maybe you just want to earn a little extra money being a lady boss or maybe you want to follow your dreams.

Let's be honest for a minute.

Your business idea is only as good as its profit potential. So you need to really think good and hard about how (or maybe if) your idea can make money because there is nothing worse than putting tons of time, energy and money into an idea to have it pan out to nothing--and you've actually lost all of those resources in the process. It can be defeating and discouraging to say the least. So let's go in with our eyes wide open.

Take a moment to figure out if your brilliant idea could be profitable before you dive in.

1. What are you going to sell?

2. What resources will you need to start your brilliant idea and the costs associated with them?

3. What are the ongoing costs of "production?"

4. Who will buy your brilliant idea?

5. What quantity of your brilliant idea do you need to sell in order to generate profit and is this realistic?

Want to dig a little deeper? We created a worksheet to walk you through these questions and more so that you can do a thorough analysis before you start on your brilliant idea.