Sometimes an idea is just that – an idea. And sometimes, an idea can bring you your first million. My name is Naomi Burgess and I’m going to talk about what makes a great business idea that can make you a millionaire.
Establishing Good Idea
What is a good idea, really? In the business context, an idea is a thought, or a proposal that either has a lot of money-making potential if realised correctly, or is best currently left alone for various reasons. But how can one tell if the idea has potential, and how does one realise it correctly? How does one even know if the idea can be realised in their chosen geographical area? Is there a market for such an idea in that area or anywhere? What if someone else had the same idea and they have more means and opportunities to realise it? All the questions above, and others, need to be answered before you begin to get excited about the prospects of realising your amazing idea. I’m going to do my best to give you some pointers about how to answer those questions in this post.
Maximizing Ideas
Let’s take online sales of organic hair products, for example. On the one hand, it seems like a good idea, particularly for today’s technologically savvy, environmentally conscious audience. People’s experiences with mass-produced non-organic shampoos, conditioners and hair masks might have shown them that natural products would be a better instrument for maintaining their hair. And if you create a user-friendly website that sells your organic products and build a brand with a lot of goodwill over time, your audience would grow and you would get a lot of revenue.
Prove that the Idea is worth it
On the other hand, however, you need to ask yourself – what would make customers think that this is a good idea to spend their money on? Chances are that a lot of people have a brand of hair products that they’re loyal to and might hesitate to switch, no matter how much better your products are. Some people might be wary about buying health and beauty products over the Internet, and some might not even know how. In addition, there might be other producers of organic hair products in your area that people like.
Be realistic on the Facts
In order to get started on turning your idea into a real business project, draw up on your own experiences. What made YOU switch to organic hair products? Why would YOU prefer to buy them online to purchasing them in a shop? Why would YOU be willing to spend more money on them than on regular hair products? What problems would they solve for YOU? When you get answers to those questions, you would begin to understand what your target audience should be and what you should do next with your idea.
Consider the pros and cons
Consider this – what can your idea bring to your target geographical location (or in case of online sales, target audience)? Creating a local market is tricky when it’s not there, and isn’t always successful. Even if your nearest competitor is far away (or doesn’t deliver to your location), it doesn’t guarantee that there is a lot of demand and not enough supply of your product in your chosen area. Competition is at the heart of the business world, and it’s a very risky venture to launch a brand new product in a location that hasn’t experienced anything like this before from other companies. If people don’t understand what it is they’re being sold, they won’t buy it, and even if they do, why should they spend extra money on something that can be bought in a store? Those sceptics can make or break your business, and chances are, you aren’t ready to take the risk that they would break it. Even if there is a local competitor, it’s possible that they’re quite new too; if they aren’t performing too well, you should carefully consider whether you can afford to take the risk of launching a product in the area where people have already been exposed to one that they didn’t like.
Allow certain changes on ideas
If your line of organic hair products, or any other products or services would only be popular in a small, niche market that carries high risks of disappearing altogether, perhaps your idea isn’t as great as you think it is. A successful business should have opportunities for expansion, and if you’re only delivering to one or two areas, it’s quite risky to think that your audience would expand with time. Even if your market is quite broad in a single location and it’s been working for you well so far, it’s unlikely to be enough in the future. Like all organisms, businesses need to grow and broaden their horizons, and if you don’t have enough markets to do so, your idea isn’t being realised correctly.
Innovate and make amends
Even if you strongly believe that organic hair products are the way forward and they have worked spectacularly for you, it doesn’t mean that the others would feel the same way. It’s great that you love producing organic hair products and want to capitalise on that passion, but you have to be realistic. Launching a business is expensive and you want to make profits to cover those costs and make a living. If you don’t have any sales because people don’t think that there is any point to your products, then I’m sorry to say that there’s no point in having a business like that. At first, you might do it because you love it, but eventually it would get expensive and you would be let down by the lack of customers and profits. For example, if your entire family uses organic hair products that you make, and you want to launch a line of them in a large city like London, you might want to reconsider – most Londoners are loyal to the brands sold in Boots or Superdrug and don’t have time to consider switching to another brand, even the one as good as yours.
Share your passion and make it a need
That’s not to say, however, that your passion for the product should disappear completely and you should turn into a lifeless, money-making drone. Your passion and love for your product is what motivated you to create your company in the first place. Running a business is not easy, and it’s even harder if you don’t love what you do. You need to learn to think like a business owner, and also like a customer. Why would a customer be passionate about your product? What can you do to fuel that passion and how do you establish a link between your business and your consumer to do so?
Strategized don’t dramatized
Don’t be discouraged if your sales are lower than you expected at first. The answer to that issue is to strategise, like I explained earlier. You need to know who your audience is and how to engage with it in order to sell them your product. Strategy is in general very important when realising a great idea – after all, you want to have a solid plan of how you’re planning to run your business and what the main aspects of it are that would make the customers think – “hey, I like this, let’s buy this!” For every industry, every product, and perhaps even every target audience, a separate strategy is required.
Passion+good strategy+good service is equals to success
I’ve attempted to give an overview of the issues that need to be considered before you begin to work on realising your amazing business idea and plan what you’re going to spend your first million on. It goes without saying that all those issues are just the tip of the iceberg and there are a lot of other ones – each industry is faced with unique challenges. However, I can honestly say that if you have the passion and love for what you do, combined with good marketing strategy, your idea has a lot of potential for successful realisation.
