STOP! Is your business missing it's mark-et?
Written by Aaron Colman
info@ibasics.biz
http://www.ibasics.bizI've seen a lot small business go under in the last few years. Most of these were founded by good, well-intentioned people that wanted nothing more than to take something that they enjoyed and make it a successful business.
This can be a good way to find business ideas, but it's before you dedicate your life's savings to creating your business dream you really should think about it from the perspective of a business executive.
Sometimes, the fact is, you're just not positioned well enough to get into the market. This doesn't mean that you should abandon your dream, it just means that you need to take a new approach.
When evaluating different approaches, here are some of the things you should consider:
1. How much are customers willing to pay?
If you customers aren't willing to pay for your product or service offering, you're going to be fighting an uphill battle.
While it's possible to succeed with low-ticket sales... you should be prepared to focus your business on a quick, high-volume sales process as opposed to a more lengthy sales process. This works especially well on consumables like food or clothing, but wouldn't work at all on major
contracts.
2. What does it take to satisfy those customers?
Customers can be very demanding. What does it take to make them happy? Are standards for a new product so high as to price it out of your range?
3. How much does it cost to satisfy them?
The ultimate conclusion to the question above. How much will it cost to make your customers happy?
4. How big is the customer base?
If you've only got a dozen customers in the country, you'll clearly want to take a very different approach. Take for instance commercial airplane manufacturers. The cost of each product combined with the small number of customers makes it difficult to penetrate this market.
5. Is it growing or is it shrinking?
How many horse and buggies have you seen lately? Obviously some markets are shrinking, while others are growing. Getting involved in a shrinking market will make it tougher to succeed since you're going to be competing with the already established "big fish." On the other hand this places extra value on established market share, so if you have strong enough competitive advantage it could become especially profitable.
6. What kind of competition is there?
If you've only got a few small name competitors then your branding efforts will be greatly leveraged in your favor. However if you're competing against large name firms, then you're fighting against the grain. For this reason a large number of companies have found it profitable to commoditize the market by flooding it with a large number of generic alternatives.
The best example of this is your local supermarket. How many brands of toothpaste do you see? While it's likely that this'll reduce the price point per item, if you can gain the trust of an established distributor or find another way to efficiently market to a consumer audience then you'll be able to turn the tables against the established brands and gain market share.
7. How big are the barriers to entry?
So you've got this great idea. The only problem... there are a dozen other companies just like the one you plan to start. USP (Unique Selling Proposition) or not, you're going to find it very hard to break into this new arena.
Not only should you find out how much it's going to cost to get in, you should be find out if this entry is sustainable. Your competition is going to react... the question is how. Can you keep up the fight? Can you turn the tables somehow or will you find yourself outmaneuvered at every turn?
Furthermore, how quickly can you get in? If you can get your foothold quickly enough then you may be able to establish your niche before anyone notices.
8. Do you have any kind of unique resources for this market?
A resource is:
* Anything that you own or can control
* Something that makes you stand out from the crowd
* Something that can be counted on, is reliable and sustainable.
* Something that helps you satisfy the customers.
Some examples:
Distributor channels
Cost advantages
Business relationships
The Public's perception
Licenses or rights
Technology or patents
Unique skills
Conclusion:
Now that you've had a chance to look over the questions and hopefully evaluate your own ideas... you've had some new thoughts on how to make your business unique. It's time to put those thoughts to the test and go forth with a new perspective!
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Aaron Colman, helping business make money online.
Web design, custom PHP scripts, MySQL databases and more.
Free e-Course:
Mastering Internet Lead Generation
http://www.ibasics.biz/leads-----------------------------------------------------------
About the Author
Aaron has been doing this web stuff since '95, back in the days of Gopher yore.
