81% of small businesses fail because of cash flow problems. EIGHTY ONE PERCENT (just to be clear).
So what mechanisms are you building to avoid the cash flow trap?
Product or customer centric ?
Ask yourself the following 2 questions and figure out what type of start-up you are.
Q1: Are you building products for your customers?
Q2: Are you looking for customers for the products you have built?
The answer lets you determine if you are
- customer-centric or product-centric
- considering marketing as the start or the end of the process
- comfortable with individual and changing customer desires or have wet dreams of uniform eternal customer tastes
The answer may be a mindset or it may be a phase.
Either way the answer will bring perspective that can help you deal with challenges and opportunities ahead
.
7 Questions to assess your business model
To make sure you are going somewhere, you better start by knowing where you are.
In order to look at your business from all sides and then map where you are I strongly recommend to use the following checklist. It can be a harsh confrontation but truth brings insight if you face it head on.
This insight will help you to move beyond mere differentiation of products or services and craft superior business models instead. Just having a product or a service people want is simply not enough anymore.
Great value propositions need to be embedded in great business models. Start building yours today.
Business models
I use the Business Canvas Model app frequently. It cristallyzes my thinking when looking at businesses and opportunities, while at the same time empowers design thinking* as I move forward with some of my ventures.
Highly recommend to take the online training modules (or study rather than read the book): Because as with all lightsabers you have to know how to use them if you want to be effective.
When discussing business strategies and models have a go at using the canvas as a common language to avoid confusion or getting stuck. And try to look for relationships between elements. Pretty sure you will enjoy the clarity it brings and key questions it raises.
*more on design thinking in a later blog post.