Hello everyone!
I've been reading a great number of threads, posts, and flipping through several books this past week as I try to tackle the beast that is "market research," one of the more daunting tasks involved in the early days of entrepreneurship. I had my goal set - I knew that I want to make $3,000/month for myself. So all the week I had been brainstorming different ideas (you know, like an idiot) and desperately searching for ways to validate them on a shoestring budget. Then, several of your comments peaked their ways around the corner of my skull and jumped into the field.
I was given the great advice, advice that made me feel very uncomfortable at the time of hearing it, that I should focus on customers - not dollars. I was told to focus on getting a product that people want - not focusing on "ways to make $3,000/mo." In short - I had fallen astray from the two wisest words in business as all of my energy and focus was spent trying to find ways to accrue value instead of the infinitely more important task of providing value.
Upon this revelation - I knew that I needed to restructure my goals. I spend a good portion of my book talking of goal setting - so it's important to me that I set myself right. As MJ said - we're looking to grow trees here. If you're looking to grow a tree - you want to make damn sure your seed is in the right soil!
So I broke down, big or small, what are my financial goals? Big - $60,000,000 banked. Small - $3,000/mo. net.
Then, instead of looking for ways to directly earn these dollars, I began to ask, how many people do I have to help at what price in order to achieve this goal. I restructured my goal to be customer-focused and look for the exact number of people that I would have to provide value to.
There are several ways you can make $60,000,000. You can provide $1 of value to 60,000,000 people, $2 of value to 30,000,000 people, etc, etc. A little ways down the list with my business in mind - I found a comfortable range. I felt confident that I could either provide $120 worth of value to 500,000 people - or $240 to 250,000 people.
With these numbers in mind, for my monthly goal, I either need to provide $120 of value to 25 people, or $240 of value to 13 people.
Then - to set the goal, we simply smash these two together. We find an applicable range, and our goal becomes helping the highest number of people in that range at the highest price therein. My goal is to provide $240 worth of value to 500,000 people. Those who will be my competitors in the language learning space either offer inferior (clunky, unorganized, or irrelevant) products at high prices. I am absolutely confident that I can provide better content at a cheaper price.
From here - we go on to set our plan of action, and we get grinding! Once I learned I needed to help 500,000 people (though, early on, a modest 25 per month,) I hopped into Google's Keyword Planner tool - and began searching for applicable languages that I could point my focus towards, and begin building a product.
So if you're struggling in the early stages of your business - whether you're unconfident in your idea, or you don't have an idea at all, try setting your goals up to see how many people you need to provide value to instead of directly looking at how much you need to make.
I've been reading a great number of threads, posts, and flipping through several books this past week as I try to tackle the beast that is "market research," one of the more daunting tasks involved in the early days of entrepreneurship. I had my goal set - I knew that I want to make $3,000/month for myself. So all the week I had been brainstorming different ideas (you know, like an idiot) and desperately searching for ways to validate them on a shoestring budget. Then, several of your comments peaked their ways around the corner of my skull and jumped into the field.
I was given the great advice, advice that made me feel very uncomfortable at the time of hearing it, that I should focus on customers - not dollars. I was told to focus on getting a product that people want - not focusing on "ways to make $3,000/mo." In short - I had fallen astray from the two wisest words in business as all of my energy and focus was spent trying to find ways to accrue value instead of the infinitely more important task of providing value.
Upon this revelation - I knew that I needed to restructure my goals. I spend a good portion of my book talking of goal setting - so it's important to me that I set myself right. As MJ said - we're looking to grow trees here. If you're looking to grow a tree - you want to make damn sure your seed is in the right soil!
So I broke down, big or small, what are my financial goals? Big - $60,000,000 banked. Small - $3,000/mo. net.
Then, instead of looking for ways to directly earn these dollars, I began to ask, how many people do I have to help at what price in order to achieve this goal. I restructured my goal to be customer-focused and look for the exact number of people that I would have to provide value to.
There are several ways you can make $60,000,000. You can provide $1 of value to 60,000,000 people, $2 of value to 30,000,000 people, etc, etc. A little ways down the list with my business in mind - I found a comfortable range. I felt confident that I could either provide $120 worth of value to 500,000 people - or $240 to 250,000 people.
With these numbers in mind, for my monthly goal, I either need to provide $120 of value to 25 people, or $240 of value to 13 people.
Then - to set the goal, we simply smash these two together. We find an applicable range, and our goal becomes helping the highest number of people in that range at the highest price therein. My goal is to provide $240 worth of value to 500,000 people. Those who will be my competitors in the language learning space either offer inferior (clunky, unorganized, or irrelevant) products at high prices. I am absolutely confident that I can provide better content at a cheaper price.
From here - we go on to set our plan of action, and we get grinding! Once I learned I needed to help 500,000 people (though, early on, a modest 25 per month,) I hopped into Google's Keyword Planner tool - and began searching for applicable languages that I could point my focus towards, and begin building a product.
So if you're struggling in the early stages of your business - whether you're unconfident in your idea, or you don't have an idea at all, try setting your goals up to see how many people you need to provide value to instead of directly looking at how much you need to make.
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