The Taxonomy of Business Development
Everyone wants to come up with a great idea for a business, but it can be very difficult to move from the initial spark of inspiration to actually implementing a viable product.The good news is that there are many ways to help this process along and make sure you don’t get stuck at one point in the development.
What follows is a breakdown of the process of business development into its eight steps, from coming up with an idea to making it a reality.
The Taxonomy of Business Development
In order to get your business off the ground, you need to have a solid understanding of what kind of product or service your company will provide and how you plan on marketing it so that it will be successful.
Before you can do any of that, you’ll need to come up with an idea and make sure it’s a good one. The following contains everything you need to know about coming up with your company’s initial idea and getting it off the ground.
1) The Idea
There are as many ways to generate ideas for your business as there are people in the world. However, whatever idea you choose is up to you, but there are a few basic guidelines that will help you make the decision.
One of the most important things to keep in mind when coming up with your business idea is that it must be something that both interests and benefits you. If you aren’t passionate about your business, it will be much more difficult to convince potential customers that they should be interested in what you’re offering and then to get them to actually buy it.
Another thing you need to keep in mind is that whatever idea you choose must be something that’s sellable . If there isn’t a market for the product or service you’re offering, it will be much more difficult for your business to gain recognition and make money.
Once you’ve decided on an idea and market, the next thing to do is figure out how best to reach those markets . How you go about marketing your product or service will depend heavily on what kind of company you have and who your target demographic is.
2) Market Research and Testing
After you’ve come up with your idea, the next step in developing a business is to test it out. This part of the process usually consists of researching the market to find out what kind of competition you’ll be facing and how much demand there is for your product or service. During this time, you’ll be looking for possible partnerships and working with investors to get the money you’ll need to build your business.
3) Business Plans and Productivity
The next step in gaining a successful foothold in the market is to create a clear mission statement that establishes exactly what your company will do. While you want something that’s specific enough to be helpful, being too rigid at this point can hurt you by limiting your options later on.
At this point, you’ll need to either hire staff or take care of business yourself until your business is far enough along to be able to support itself. This phase also requires that you begin putting together a solid foundation for the company through things like securing patents and establishing a web presence.
5) Product and Service Development
Once you’ve gotten your business off the ground and gained a steady following, it’s time to start thinking about expanding your product or service offerings. This will likely require more research and development as well as further testing of your products with potential customers to fine-tune them before bringing them to the general public.
4) Securing Funding and Partnerships
Once you’ve established that there’s interest in your product, the next step is to get funding for it. Depending on how much money your business will need, you can either bootstrap or find investors to back your company . This part of the process comes with its own set of challenges, but once you’ve overcome them, it’s much easier to start making money and further expand your business.
6) Customer Retention and Legacy
After all the hard work you’ve put in to building your business and making it successful, the next step is to find a way to keep it going . There are many options for doing this, such as by transferring ownership to your employees or even donating it to a nonprofit organization. No matter what, though, this is an important part of business development because it ensures that your product and services will remain available for future generations.
7) Strategic Acquisition and Liquidation
The final step in the “Business Development” stage of building a company is to decide how you want to get rid of the business. If you don’t have an heir or would prefer not to turn your company over to anyone who works for it or passes it along via donation, then you can choose to sell it . The same goes for if you decide that the best way to move on is by having someone else take over. If you’re doing everything yourself, then this is also an option for getting back the time you’re spending on things that could be handled by other employees.
8) References and Residual Income
When all is said and done, your final step in developing a business should be to set the company up so it can support itself and you in the future. This is something of a twofold process: first, you’ll need to create a secure foundation so your business will stand on its own even when you’re not running it day to day; and second, you’ll want to set up some sort of residual income plan that ensures either that someone else can handle the operation of the business or that you’ll continue to make money off of it long after you step away from the day-to-day operations.
Everyone wants to come up with a great idea for a business, but it can be very difficult to move from the initial spark of inspiration to actually implementing a viable product.The good news is that there are many ways to help this process along and make sure you don’t get stuck at one point…