5 Key Essentials Required for a Successful Startup

Today in this competitive era, more and more entrepreneurs and ambitious professionals are entering the market with the aim of building a big name through their unique concepts and offerings.

Unsurprisingly, a number of such aspiring startups tend to fail even if they have the needed funds and a truly good outlook. On the other hand, some do achieve their goals through a highly competitive brand in the market. But the success doesn't come overnight as there are a number of considerations you need to be aware of.

As for this blog post, we're going to discuss the key elements required for a successful startup running with your name on it.

1. It's 'okay' not to be best at everything

Especially during the infant stage, business owners are excited and driven by the impulse to be best in all the functions and operational procedures of the company. What inexperienced owners or newcomers in the market should understand is if they are to become genuinely powerful and attract a large target audience, they need to provide value added elements, and the feat is quite hard to achieve in all the business areas.

What business owners fail to understand is that rather than by investing their effort and time on all the items listed in their product portfolio, they should choose some specific products that call for their competitive and true recognition in the industry. Eventually, the product or service of any business should answer the following question, "What uniqueness do we offer to our customers unlike others in the business?"

For instance, you may be a highly creative and successful UI/UX designer, but not necessarily you could be equally versed in coding and development tools too. The point is, if you are good at your primary skills and output, then it's enough as is.

Agreeably, small businesses tend to be engulfed with a number of minor to major issues for communicating their message to the right audience. However, at the end you must clearly identify your competencies as your main focus, it could be digital marketing, web development, content marketing, or other aspects in case you operate in the digital industry. The point is to identify your areas of interest, the business aspects in which you can invest the most value and deliver the best offering to your customer.

2. Appreciate talent, but it must align with your work philosophy

Today companies are aggressively fighting to hire the best talent at the lowest possible costs. Well, easier said than done, as the prospect of finding the right talent is a challenging task for most HR professionals, let alone hiring at low costs. The task becomes even more critical when you clearly realize that the hired talent should comprehend well with your organizational philosophy. Regardless of a professional's qualifications, experience, management skills, etc., blending with your organizational culture and environment is a totally different thing.

As a new business owner, you're obligated to a number of operational procedures, routine tasks, and other correspondences. However, your core focus should remain on protecting your company's value and culture-the elements that add the human touch to the business. Your business philosophy is the aspect that allows your customers to distinguish your business and offerings from the rest in the industry. As for the intra-company portion, the philosophy serves to create cohesiveness among the employees and different teams.

3. Customers that are mentally and financially ready

It may sound exaggerated but is commonly said, businesses act as a reflection of their customers. The best life-saving resources a business, more importantly, startups should rely upon is the customer base that is matured and financially stable. For example, offering a cheap product on a discount will create a sense of withdrawal in the customer. The product will create uncertainty, negative perception, and no distinct favoritism by the user, hence, the business cannot expect to gain favorable score from the product's review.

Every business is required to have an individual in each team that is well-versed in different competencies, has ample contacts, and the ability to attract valued customers. Customers do not mind paying high prices for any product, provided the item is genuinely unique, exclusive and most importantly, their perfect problem solver. The point is to stop targeting customer that do not fulfill these criteria.

4. Applying LEAN approach to the offerings

A startup must be solely concerned with offering the best value to the customer base within the minimum necessary resources. In this regard, the best workaround is to bind an agreement with the customer to acquire an altered product at lower price, even if the customer would have been willing to pay more for a larger product. This approach allows the startups to focus all their development team’s effort in the product’s major attributes, at the same time avoid overproduction and waste-induced product.

When companies successfully remove this layer, it becomes easier to acquire quality value and shorten the company-to-market delivery time. Such are the primary principles of LEAN techniques with the purpose of providing optimum customer service and value with minimum wastage.

However, it can be argued that this approach contradicts with the 3rd pointer in our discussion, where it is stated the customers who aren't financially mandated should consider opting large-volume products or services. Understandably, the LEAN approach may be difficult to apply if you have already worked through the above point. In order to conclude the negotiation process seamlessly, it is important to acquire the right talent. This is not a one-time process, but a repetitive one in which the business must make an effort to make the customers realize that less is the best option for them. Simply, LEAN promotes the fact, less is more.

5. A place with happy workforce

Yes, businesses are a reflection of their customers, but even more precisely is that of the workforce. The most potential success killer for even established enterprises are the demotivated and frustrated employees that have no alignment and connection with the organizational value. The emphasis on the fact is never enough, highly motivated and productive employees have a major chunk to contribute to the success of any company, regardless of the industry. Such employees are well-informed taking job responsibilities, expectations, and their work ethic alignment with the overall company's value.

Let's accept the fact, creating a highly productive and friendly atmosphere as a company's ecosystem is a complicated and paramount job. In order to make the task easier, start internally. The concern is to create a healthy and career progressive environment that would serve to act as a potential motivator and driving indicator for top-performing teams, hence contributing to the success of the organization by traveling the extra miles and delivering more than expected.

Author Bio:
Hilda Peter is an MBA (Marketing Expert and have been working with some of the best digital brands worldwide. Besides her passion for blogging and training corporate professionals, Hilda is also an accomplished essay help provider having expertise in a variety of academic disciplines. You can follow her on Google+ as well.

The single biggest reason why startups succeed | Bill Gross