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Make Your Small Business a Winner: What is your winning formula?

by Anna Hipkiss

This is a good test of your business resilience: what do you offer that is special, that stands out from the competition, and meets the market needs? In other words, how do your strengths match your opportunities?

Asking these questions will enable you to focus on what your strengths are, and whether they constitute usps (unique sales propositions), or if they simply compare reasonably well with the competition. It will also show up your understanding of the market, which you will need in order to identify the opportunities it presents.

For example, if you are able to build a website at twice the speed and half the price of your competitors, you will have a great winning formula to sell to other small businesses in poor economic conditions, where a website is a ‘must have’ but cost is a big issue.

Some people have an instinct for the market and where it’s going, others need to work hard to get that information, but when you’ve got it you need to know how best to use your strengths to exploit it. The more tightly your offering is tuned to present and future market needs, and the more it distinguishes itself from the competition, the better your winning formula will be.


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