About Business Development

When your business was created, what was the original idea that created the inspiration? Where was the opportunity that drove that creativity? How much did you research before you started?

When did you last research?
It’s easy to get wrapped up in the day to day grind of running a business and forgetting that your world is changing around you. And you get left behind.

During the last four weeks or so, I’ve been working on a few projects for clients that have involved some fairly significant research. One is a new venture in a vertical market in which the client already has a presence and is trusted by a number of big name customers. In classic business terminology, you might call this a diversification.

There is a big pay-day if the idea works, but a potentially huge investment to achieve that success. The brief was to establish market intelligence; was the idea an original one, or had someone already developed it? Of the existing competitors in the marketplace, who was selling what, and to which customers? Is this a viable opportunity and a sound investment?

Along the way, it is possible to learn a huge amount about the sector from a completely objective position. Without the baggage of years in this particular market, observations aren’t compromised by history. (Recommended reading: 7 Habits of Highly Effective People)

Continued research is critical if your business is to stay ahead of its competitors. If you don’t know what your competitors are doing, or how your market is changing, how can you continue to compete?
The research habit extends to many areas in developing your business, not just the high-level strategy. Take a look at your web marketing efforts: try hard to read the content there from your customers’ perspective, ‘wearing their spectacles’. Imagine you were looking for a solution to your problem: what you might search for, which ad would make you take more notice and click, what you would want to see when you arrived at the site.
Do one thing today, carry out a ‘so what?’ test. Put on your customers’ metaphoric specs and look at your marketing material. How many statements can you answer with, ‘so what?’
(And remember, every customer has a different pair of spectacles)

Here’s a starter for free:

Customer: “I need an impressive cake by tomorrow morning for my daughter’s birthday. I’ve left it really late and I’m really panicking that I’m going to disappoint her.“

Business: “We’ve been trading since 1996”

Customer: “So what? I need a cake by tomorrow“.

I’d love to hear your stories about how the ‘so what?’ test worked for you, please let me know.