The entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in America. Hubs of movers and shakers in New York, Cincinnati, and Seattle, and countless other cities and town across the country are filled to the brim with dreamers and doers, just like you. COVID-19 has disrupted business, but it hasn’t shut down the idea factories that make business boom. Entrepreneurship takes motivation and drive, and now more than ever, it separates those who show up every day, ready to change the world, from those who don’t. In your venture, consider these five winning strategies that build explosive company growth and take you from a fragment of an idea to the boardroom.
1. Work with reckless abandon.
Entrepreneurs are always on the move. Their brains are always churning out new ideas and product designs. If you want to separate yourself from the pack you need to be constantly in motion. No idea is perfect, and the entrepreneurial mind is always battling to improve those tiny little details that keep their business or product from that vaunted perfection that we all seek in our corporate offerings. Working with reckless abandon means keeping a notepad on you at all times to jot down those lightbulbs of inspiration. It means working through the night, and forgetting to eat or shower all weekend while alpha testing the next iteration of your next big idea. No one ever made an impact watching TV all day.
2. Be bold.
Being bold means believing in yourself and your product. When you pitch your idea — whether it be on Shark Tank or in a less televised pitch meeting — you have to convince potential investors or buyers that your idea is a good one. They have no reason to believe you unless you convince them otherwise. You must be your own biggest cheerleader in order to sell buyers on the vision in your head. You understand it, so sell yourself and go out on a limb for the future of your enterprise.
3. Aggressively market yourself.
Part of boldness is marketing, but marketing yourself goes beyond simple confidence in a meeting. You have to aggressively put the word out that you and your product are the next big thing in your sector. Take out Facebook and Instagram ads, plaster park benches with your face, and send out targeted emails. You won’t have any buyers if consumers don’t know that you and your business exist. Put your name out there in a big way, with any medium that resonates with your target audience. Market research into social media habits and geographic data for these prospective clients is a must here. The insights gained from conducting market research are essential to both a successful launch and continued growth in sales moving forward.
4. Take chances
You need to take chances, both on yourself and your product. Take a page out of the playbook of Vivek Ramaswamy, the CEO of Roivant. His company recently raised over a billion dollars to transform the pharmaceutical industry through the development of lifesaving drugs that other firms have abandoned due to budgetary or time constraints. The potential for breakthrough is enormous with a risk like this. Take risks with major upside potential to continue growing your own platform.
5. Listen to your customers.
Customer feedback is essential to continued expansion. The customer is always right, so collecting a quarterly voice of customer report(VoC report) will go a long way to understanding the overall needs and desires of your customers with an easily understood piece of research. Voice of the customer data can shed light on initiatives that are working and others that have fallen flat with your consumer base, helping you to shape corporate policy for the greatest future impact.
Listen to your instincts and customers, be bold and tactful in order to maintain an upward trajectory with each new venture you embark upon.
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