Business team celebrates success in a meeting
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Do you have a promising business idea? You may want to take a break before you start tinkering with marketing plans and working your way to seed funding. Of course, you shouldn’t oversleep your vision for a startup. But you should take a moment to study what has made other founders successful.
It’s understandable if there isn’t much appeal in taking a page from someone else’s book. Most entrepreneurs end up getting into the game because of a desire to carve out their own niche. However, you could gain strategic insights to boost your momentum. With that in mind, here are some lessons from some of today’s exceptionally successful startups that have taken an idea from scratch to IPO.
1. Simplify a difficult process
Consumers crave simplicity. If a product or service is too complex, they tend to think twice about using it. Suppose it is a service that markets consider essential, such as buying or selling a house. The U.S. real estate market may have slowed recently, but 5 million transactions were still completed last year.
Despite the necessity of buying and selling a home, most consumers agree that it is a complicated ordeal. You’ll need to find an agent, break your routine for showings or open houses, and – if you do eventually find a suitable agent – go over all the legal jargon. A lot about the process can slow things down. And if you need to buy or sell quickly, the traditional route may be too much.
Opendoor is an example of a startup built on the idea of simplifying an overly complex but necessary process. Its business model leverages technology to make it easier for buyers and sellers to conduct these multi-faceted exchanges. Opendoor’s idea has been well received by homeowners who want to avoid the hassle of viewings and sell their properties quickly. The company’s services also streamline the process for those who buy and sell at the same time. Goodbye, stress and inconvenience.
2. Connect the dots
Profitable startups sometimes start with the idea of uniting groups of businesses and consumers under one roof. Take gastronomy as an example. Some restaurants may offer delivery services, others may not. At the same time, hungry customers don’t always want to dine in or do curbside pickup. And in households with different tastes, calling multiple restaurants to host a family feast can be a hassle.
Sometimes a brilliant business model starts with building bridges between unmet needs. This is something Doordash has done by providing a service that both restaurants and guests find useful. By expanding food delivery services, the company is creating an opportunity for more restaurants and consumers to connect with each other.
Restaurant owners benefit because they don’t lose out on sales and don’t have to cover the overhead costs associated with deliveries, including staffing. Consumers also value the convenience of being able to order from multiple restaurants on a single platform. The key to the success of this model is finding the overlap in market needs and offering practical, centralized solutions to both sides of the transaction.
3. Discover the real need
It’s hard to believe that streaming giant Netflix was once a startup. The founders of the company known for revolutionizing the video rental industry did so by closely studying the market. Consumers were looking for home entertainment – the more on-demand, the better. The reason video rentals became so popular was that they brought the cinema into people’s homes. This was easier and more economical than going to the cinema, but consumers’ choice was limited to the films that the video stores had on their shelves at the time of their visit.
Netflix knew it needed access to seemingly endless video content. Through extensive market research, the company was able to reshape the way consumers met this need. The fact that they didn’t have to leave their home to do it made it even better. The Netflix model of delivering DVDs directly to your doorstep was born and continued to evolve with technological changes.
By uncovering the key drivers of your audience’s behavior, you can find ways to introduce disruptive, high-growth solutions. Listening to what the market says and analyzing consumers’ actions lead to improvements they are eager to adopt. Uniquely fulfilling the identified need will help your company stand out from the crowd and achieve market leadership.
Learn from the lessons others have learned
Founding a startup comes with risks and opportunities. You choose an entrepreneurial path because you want a different life. They see a way to do something better and want to get that out into the world. You also want to experience the freedom to take your career into your own hands.
Knowing what makes a startup work before your own business takes off will help you determine whether your business idea is viable. You may find ways to serve markets with simplified solutions, fill gaps in the market, and/or identify what consumers truly want before they do. By applying these success strategies to your individual offering, your startup could become the next big success story.
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