Your goal is to maximize your ability to move potential opportunities "through the pipeline" (from stage to stage). You need to drive the activities at each stage that move your prospects through the pipeline.
People buy emotionally and justify their decisions rationally. Emotions are part of who we are as human beings: we want to feel confident, comfortable, safe, appreciated by others, regarded as smart or good looking,or successful. All these are perfect ingredients for a strong positioning strategy based on emotional benefits.
When we become entrepreneurs, we are creating something we believe in. You hear many of us say, “There are so many customers that need our product or service.” In fact, sometimes we say, “I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t want our product.” While this may be partly our excitement talking, or maybe just the influence of our pressure, passion pleasure or pain, it is also a dangerous path. Don’t get me wrong. Your market, product or service may be new or different. It would seem that the opportunity to attack broad markets, and to have no limits on what markets to chase, would be a good problem to have.
By doing a SWOT analysis, you should be able to identify where you have opportunities and risks. Once you have completed your SWOT analysis, you can then use that information to create an actionable plan. The actionable plan should be based upon the strengths and weaknesses you've identified from your current efforts, take advantage of opportunities in the market and also account for potential threats to your strategy.
Chances are, your idea is safe. Few people have an interest in stealing other people’s business concepts and putting them into action. Be proud of your invention but share it only with those who can help you in your dream of making your vision a reality.
Setting your sales goals is a fundamental step in being able to set up day to day efforts - whether it is just you or a team of people - to take actions that improve your chances of success. There is nothing more indicative of a well run - or poorly run - company than how it sets its goals and manages to these goals. Setting sales goals is not only setting your revenue goals for the year. You've likely already done that in your financial plan. Setting sales goals breaks those annual numbers into goals that drive the activities on a daily basis.
There are areas of the business that we could work at endlessly and never get tired - these parts of the business bring genuine enjoyment, fulfillment and your best ideas. There are other parts of the business that you dislike or even dread. These areas can be as draining and debilitating as others are energizing and enjoyable. Finally, there are parts of the business that need to be done, and while you are capable of the work, you’re just not cut out for it.
When we become entrepreneurs, we are creating something we believe in. You hear many of us say, “There are so many customers that need our product or service.” In fact, sometimes we say, “I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t want our product.” While this may be partly our excitement talking, or maybe just the influence of our pressure, passion pleasure or pain, it is also a dangerous path. Don’t get me wrong. Your market, product or service may be new or different. It would seem that the opportunity to attack broad markets, and to have no limits on what markets to chase, would be a good problem to have. Not really.
Entrepreneurs have plenty on their plate and the last thing we want to do is to learn the law. That being said, there are lots of things that entrepreneurs can do on their own without incurring the expense of a lawyer. However, with other more complicated matters, it is important to turn to professionals that have seen the issues you are facing many times.
That includes your products, recipes, marketing materials, logo, branding, packaging, website, business plan, theme songs, inventions, and more. You need to decide what constitutes intellectual property for your company. Obviously it includes anything co-founders create, relating to the company, during work hours. But what about ideas generated outside the office, such as when someone is on vacation, or a voice recording someone adds to their phone with their "idea". A broad definition related to the business of the company regardless of time or place can be used, but must be balanced with not discouraging employees to be creative in their own right and for their own interests.
Advisory boards can be an invaluable source of insight. Think of an advisory board as a collection of mentors that can provide individual expertise, provide you a sounding board for ideas, give you advice, introduce you to valuable contacts, and tell you when you’re potentially making a mistake.
When your customer gives you the good news that they have decided to purchase your product or service, you usually have to then start the legal process of getting an legal contract signe with the customer. This can take from 30 to 120 days. Using a letter of intent (LOI) can get you a little money upfront while you and your customer work on the real agreement.
Good cash-flow management means understanding every inflow and outflow of cash. In principle, you must delay every outlay of cash as long as possible, while incenting everyone who owes you money to pay it as rapidly as possible. Also, its about being vigilant about limiting any surprises such as unanticipated payment lags and unplanned-cash outlays. So how do you be proactive in managing cash? Here are some basic disciplines that every entrepreneur must understand and practice to optimize their cash:
When you're running about your day with a mile long "to do" list, it's unlikely you have the extra time to figure out how everyone is feeling about everything. To you - you're building a company, developing a product, raising money, trying to find resources and so on. You don't have the time to focus on the emotional state of being of everyone around you. This is where we make mistakes that stunt the progress of our business.
Yet, there is a consistent disconnect between the entrepreneur’s understanding and explanation of an issue, plan or expectation and the interpretation of the customer, employee, investor, advisor or relationship on the other end. While we may think our constituents have a secret club where together they plan new ways to screw with us, in turns out we are the common denominator in this negative repetition. If, as entrepreneurs, we continue to stubbornly insist that we are the ones communicating clearly, our words eventually will fall on deaf ears. Because, in reality, we are likely the ones not making any sense.
Do not underestimate the negative impact poor communication can have if your company earns a reputation for being diffcult or complicated to work with. Even responding to questions with long, complicated answers wears down your constituents. I recently asked an entrepreneur, “What is the price for the product?” The answer was so long and complicated that I stopped listening. If this occurs on a regular basis, interacting with you and your company becomes a chore. Potential investors not only need to be able to grasp the value of your company, but they also need to feel what it would be like working with you as a leader. Will communication be a chore? Will it be helpful and informative or strain their patience and trust? If everything seems like you are talking nuclear physics, they will likely pass.
The resources that make your company grow and succeed are your people—especially your senior people. Hiring the right people is difficult to do in any business. In an entrepreneurial venture, it is even more challenging. But if you adopt the right perspective, it will become clear just how critically important hiring is. You’ll develop it as a specialized skill, and in doing so, approach building your team with the same purpose and care you devote to other key elements of your business. Every time I failed to prioritize this perspective, the mistake was obvious and far-reaching. But when I approached hiring and recruiting new team members with a deeper understanding of the purpose—and the painful consequences of getting it wrong—we advanced the business and strengthened our company culture. You can’t control everything, but this is one skill you can choose to improve and the results will be undeniable.
Take a look at this list of corporate values: Communication. Respect. Integrity. Excellence. They sound pretty good, don’t they? Strong, concise, meaningful. Maybe they even resemble your own company’s values, the ones you spent so much time writing, debating, and revising. If so, you should be nervous. These are the corporate values of Enron, as stated in the company’s 2000 annual report. And as events have shown, they’re not meaningful; they’re meaningless.
Certainly different investors look for different things when it comes to what they consider to be a good investment opportunity. Is is unlikely you will have all of these, but the more you have, the more likely you are to garner an investment. Here are a few things that most investors look for in any opportunities or pursuing:
Regardless of the type of investor or the stage you are at, the following process should serve you well. You may not need all of the steps, or you may want to add additional pieces over time, but this basic framework will help not only streamline the process but help you improve at how you and your team function in the process. Think of it this way - if you drive to work the same way each day, you get to know where all the potholes and traffic jams are.
But one thing they often forget is that decisions made on day one can have huge implications down the road. You see, it's not enough to build a business worth a fortune; you have to make sure you have an exit strategy, a way to get the money back out. This is for those of you who like to plan ahead and for those of you who don't but should.
When building a company, you don’t have the resources—financial or human—to do things the way you would like to. There will be times when your chance of success with a customer, vendor, investor or employee seem slim. Sometimes you lose opportunities simply because you aren’t established. There are often real reasons why you can’t achieve something. You don’t have the money, resources, experience, capital, partners, team mem- bers, investors, facilities, capacity, technology—the list goes on.
Humility is a trait of strong leaders—the type of leaders employees want to work for and investors want to fund. One of the most important days in the history of my company was when I realized being a CEO was a skill that needed to be developed with the same perseverance, ferocity and willingness to learn that athletes apply to their training.
When we become entrepreneurs, we are creating something we believe in. You hear many of us say, “There are so many customers that need our product or service.” In fact, sometimes we say, “I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t want our product.” While this may be partly our excitement talking, or maybe just the influence of our pressure, passion pleasure or pain, it is also a dangerous path. Don’t get me wrong. Your market, product or service may be new or different. It would seem that the opportunity to attack broad markets, and to have no limits on what markets to chase, would be a good problem to have.
When we become entrepreneurs, we are creating something we believe in. You hear many of us say, “There are so many customers that need our product or service.” In fact, sometimes we say, “I don’t know of anyone who wouldn’t want our product.” While this may be partly our excitement talking, or maybe just the influence of our pressure, passion pleasure or pain, it is also a dangerous path. Don’t get me wrong. Your market, product or service may be new or different. It would seem that the opportunity to attack broad markets, and to have no limits on what markets to chase, would be a good problem to have.
