Entrepreneurial Fundamentals Part 05

Hello Everyone, This is the 05th installment in : "Entrepreneurial Fundamentals" Article Series

"Entrepreneurial Fundamentals" Article Series, will help you as an Entrepreneur to understand self and other’s desire to contribute or withhold your business success.

Today we are going to learn these …….

04 Entrepreneurial Core Traits, Absolute Musts Tips & Ways.

Timing Is Everything For….

Your Market (Size) Counts

Financial Naivety Is Not An Excuse

Growth Mindset

Timing Is Everything For….

Starting any business or venture has lot of dependency on market conditions. When you consider the markets, you have to understand the demographics & psycho-graphics and that is totally dependent on your acumen of timing your intended market.

Timing is important factor in a business plan, a negotiation, a customer relationship, a product launch, a presentation, a marketing campaign, a proposal, a career/job, or an entire corporation.

Timing can make or break it; We find that it happens all the time.

Now, the market is based on demand and supply plus market conditions.

There are good tools to help you to enter the market with less frictions.

One of the tools that I have found incredibly valuable in this context is change factors analysis, which is sometimes called PESTEL analysis.

PESTEL stands for political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental factors that can impact your market.

The other I know is Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter, is Industry Structure Analysis, also known as Porter Five Forces Analysis.

Regarding the timing to start the venture, these two tools will be assisting your ultimate goal. These are the external market timing factors and tools.

Let’s understand the internal factors those affect your existence of as an 'Entrepreneur.'

Timing matters in aligning yourself with these 04 pillars / beams of the business venture….

• Your Business Partners
• Your Investors / Venture Capitalist
• Your Management Team
• Your Clients and Customers

Your Business Partners

Timing of all the business partner/s entering a partnership with you matters very much. You have to take stock of your assets: tangibles or intangibles. The time to have a partner is very much dependent upon what they bring to the table. You should favor those, who have some form of experience in the entrepreneurial fields. Most of the time it is better to be a second mover as…

You Can Recognize Pioneers By The Arrows On Their Back 

Your Investors / Venture Capitalist

Investors / venture capitalist, who wish to have a slice of the profit pie of your profits, have some way of predicting your growth trajectory. They are timing their jump onto your profitable venture/bandwagon. Your job is to create a right time for them to back the venture. An Investor/VC brings a lot of experience along with their money.

Your Management Team

Your entrepreneurial business will be in good stead, If you have the ‘A Players’ on your team BEFORE your venture takes off from idea to prototype phase. Second best time is NOW (if you have read this article today).

Your Clients and Customers

Being in the right place at the right time matters. Your clients are not the exception to this rule.

Your product or service is in place to solve some issues, that are bothering your client / customers. If you fail to capture the client’s attention, who has some problem that your product or service can solve, you just lost a sale. As pointed out earlier, be in your customer's presence with the help of positioning in Social Media, Print, TV Or Radio.

Be In A Constant Communication With Your Client/Customer.

Your Market (Size) Counts

Your venture’s reach is only limited to the market you are targeting and dominate it in the way forward.

A vigilant entrepreneur makes sure to know that their numbers are solid. You either share a slice of a pie or you create one to own the pie.

While assessing your market size/s, you have to get strong understanding of these parts and parcels while starting out….

• Will You Create/Target A Market Niche?
• Will The Market Afford To Pay You?
• Regional /National/Global Markets
• Become The Shark For Your Venture

Create/Target A Market Niche 

Selecting and creating your niche market will help you because,

1. It’s less competitive: the smaller your target market is, the less competition there will be for the same audience.
2. It’s more affordable: with niche marketing, you can get more value for every penny and save on your marketing campaigns.
3. Your customers are more loyal: niche marketing is all about nurturing a base of true believers. These hardcore fans will make up the bulk of your business.
4. Your audience is easier to segment/target: when you run a niche business, you’ll get to know your customers inside-and-out.

Will the Market Afford To Pay You?

The thing to consider after the niche creation is that, will the market pay you for the product or services?

The answer is, Yes and No. Yes, if they find the solution in your product/services and No, if your product is short on promises.

Your client/ customer will afford to buy from you for one or all of these reasons:

• Their positive experiences with your product / services
• Your product or service benefits: bigger, better or exceptional
• Your trustworthiness and reputation. (protect it fiercely).
• The value they receive from your service/product.
• Your market/clients consider you belong to their community.

Regional /National/Global Markets

Having the knowledge of your product’s reach in local/regional/national and global markets, will help you the ‘Entrepreneur’ to expand or contract the business horizons.

If your business is local/regional focused, then your research about product and service should include micro culture, micro quirks and micro usage patterns. Be vigilant and focus on the grass-root level trends. Gather feedback & act upon it! before your competitors wakes up and understand the current mood and swing.

Your dependency on national markets will be some what related to: finding a common theme from the various regional segments/markets. Collect the regional inputs for product improvement or regional to national product adoption. Keep vigil on the sales dashboard at least once in three weeks.

If you are in a position to develop a wide range of products, develop a core product for national scale and specific variables for the regional markets.

If your product is unique enough to attract a global audience or a client/customer, then you have to create at least three options for them to choose from. 

• A full-fledged product/service range catering to the deep pockets.
• A medium product/service assisting medium spending client base.
• An MVP (Minimum Viable Product), which will aid the new client/base client, to get the value from your product along with affordable a price.

Use “Identify Your Ideal Client” tool (provided in the earlier articles),along with this market sizing toolkit.

An Ideal and Paying market will assist you to grow and sustain your entrepreneurial venture.

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Financial Naivety Is Not An Excuse

You the ‘Entrepreneur’, definitely knows the power of money. When starting out you might have begged, borrowed and put family’s retirement eggs in your venture. You can't forget your own hard-earned money.

So, if the venture fails because of your financial naivety, who is to blame? None, other than yourself.

Become enlightened at the financial wisdom. Know when and how, either your foolishness and other’s shrewdness can ruin your finances.

I have found out some unpleasant hurdles, which can derail your entrepreneurial venture.

Avoid or circumnavigate these hurdles….

• Toxic business partner (If you have one).
• Unwritten Agreements with: Client, Vendor & Supplier.
• Getting greedy and falling for too-good-to-be true offers.

Toxic business partner (If you have one).

• Taking control over finances arbitrarily
• Poor communication
• Poor collaboration
• Not wanting to get each other’s input.
• Demands far outside of the scope.
• Rude behavior is a huge red flag.
• You don't trust each other to get things done.

Unwritten Agreements with: Client, Vendor & Supplier.

• Poor product rates. (you said your one – and they heard their second)
• Longer project deadline. (client assume you are on their speed dial)
• Unlimited revisions expected. (service level agreement not jotted down)
• Their expectations are magnified. (they take control of your cash-flow)
• Your availability is taken for granted. (small tasks eat up more time)
• Timetable for payment isn't followed (they own you and your product or service)
• Deliverables gets added to initial verbal agreement (scope not defined)

Getting greedy and falling for too-good-to-be true offers: Understand…

• Nobody is going to supply you anything at below market price.
• No one is going to offer you their services for free.
• No one’s past glory / track record can be relied upon in present day.
• All your clients promise is to be vetted and be in written agreement.
• Use the Russian approach of ‘ Trust,But Definitely Verify ’ analogy.

Not being alert regarding your finance is akin to cutting off your own hand, that is feeding you.

Assume, that everybody dealing with you on any financial terms are there to take a bite of your wallet: guard it vehemently.

Growth Mindset

You the 'Entrepreneur's very existence is dependent on a stable market condition and your open + fertile mindset.

The very mindset, which provoked you to start your entrepreneurial journey, gets clogged with the debris from hurdles, that you have demolished along the way to start and run your venture.

It is necessary to constantly remind yourself to keep this growth mindset alive and well on a regular basis.

If you apply this growth outlook to following branches of your venture, you are bound to reap the benefits in the long run....

Hire More Target Driven Salespersons

Create, Innovate & Differentiate

Hire More Target Driven Salespersons (On The War Front)

“The entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.” - Peter Drucker.

Sales and Marketing are the backbone of every business venture. The more you sell, the longer your business will stay in the market and live long to tell your tale.

To sell more, your core team must have the best sales strategy and individual sales superstars (refer to earlier article about ‘A-Player’)

Weed out mediocre sales people from sales superstars with following traits & strategies….

• Know how to communicate
• Actively improve themselves and their organization
• Are naturally highly energized

Superstars are very good at communicating with young and old alike. Many ‘A players’ are naturally outgoing, social, and confident, the best salespeople are often those who fall more in the middle of the introverted-extroverted spectrum.

These additional traits make up of a sales superstar…

Conscientious: Conscientious individuals are responsible, organized, achievement-driven, and hardworking.

Ambiverts: ambiverts are likely combining the best of both introvert - extrovert worlds: they are still assertive and enthusiastic go-getters, but they also know when to listen, ask the right questions, and pay attention to their customers’ needs.

Emotional Intelligence: building relationship is the at the heart of any sales superstar’s performance. The emotionally intelligent person is someone who’s empathetic, assertive, self-motivated, adaptive, optimistic, and most importantly someone who can develop relationships.

Learning Orientation: Top sales professionals are passionate about sales and want to be successful. Pros crave and seek out ongoing sales training and development. Be sure to explore this with your potential sales candidates and learn what they have done to develop their professional sales career.

Critical Thinker: Top sales professionals think on the lines of their customer’s business practices, buying habits, stakeholders, competitors, and marketplace trends.

Are Coachable: Coachability – is one of the biggest predictors of sales success at top companies in the world.

Curious/Inquisitive and Resilience: being curious is the trait,which is abundant in your team’s topmost sellers. It has been proven time and time again, that 80% of the sales happens, after the client is contacted, for more than 8 to 12 times by the resilient sales person .

Create, Innovate & Differentiate (C.I.D) (Behind The Scene)

If, the sales and marketing is going to gather steam, in launching and growing your venture on the front-end, you cannot neglect the quality of your products and services.

Your product is only as good as yesterday in current competitive markets.

You might have started at a core product/service, but everyday you must push yourself hard and heed to the market’s whims and fancies as per the profitable trends.

You have to include these core philosophies in your product and services...

• Create and expand your product/services portfolio
• Innovate along the line with market demand
• Differentiate yourself from competitors

Create and expand your product/services portfolio

Every market demands something new/advanced technology at some periods/intervals. Look around you, every top-class brand is pushing something new in the market at an interval of 45 / 90 / 180 / 365 days.

Being in the competitive markets, your ‘ A Players ’ also need to be challenged to excel in the sales and have something fresh to offer to your market.

Your customer/client need to be thrilled in owning a new/latest from your product-line or your fresh services.

Innovate along the lines with the market-demand

Tweak your product to match your market’s feedback. Don’t reinvent the wheel, but you can surely tinker with hub, axle and spokes.

Having innovative outlook, will help you to keep competition at the bay.

Innovation is very easy, if you take analogies from different industries and incorporate it in your product or service, to make it more useful, more efficient and prove more effective for your market.

Other form of innovation is optimization.

Differentiate yourself from competitors

Differentiate or perish. Make yourself Orange among the apples.

That’s it! 

Today we have tried to help the would-be or being 'Entrepreneur' with the gems from our tinker box. These gems are the end result of mining for more than 8+ years.

Those who have utilized /implemented these wisdom paths have benefited very positively.

These nuggets are very much at the foundation of success with my clients and peers. On the way to helping 287 (Plus 02) clients, you will be surprise at, how many of the new and seasoned entrepreneurs lacks or just ignore these entrepreneurial fundamentals.

This is my whole hearted effort to share my journey with you the ‘Entrepreneur’

Dear all, please share this post with 02+ persons, who have the traits and abilities to execute their entrepreneurial ideas with strong foundations.(Quality over Quantity)

So that everyone will benefit from this series for Entrepreneurs.

Even after helping so many entrepreneurs, every day I wake up to a new morning with open mind and spongy intellect to mop up more business juices/insights.

Comments, questions and feedbacks will be entertained at a quickened pace.

Let us grow together and achieve the goals we strive for.

Your encouragement is my fuel to write and educate others

Thank you all for your support

Praveen Uttekar,

Your Business Growth Roadmapper