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22 Sep 2015, 05:01
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| FROM LBS Current Students Blog: #LifeAtBusinessSchool- Four Steps to the Epiphany (Intro) |
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After reading my previous series “”How to Start a Successful Business” I hope to have introduced you to some key concepts and ideas required in a start-up. In this series we will take it a step further – look at the traditional method start-ups used where most failed, and then a more successful approach to turning ideas into successful businesses. This more successful tweak to the existing model allows you to spend as little cash as possible and minimises your risk  The key ideas and frameworks we will talk about in this series are from Steven Gary Blank’s award winning book The Four Steps to the Epiphany. The Traditional Model:  1) Concept and seed: This is the first thing business usually do and includes everything from the company vision, what the product is , how it will be built, what research is required, who the customers are, how it will reach its customers, pricing, costs, budgets and schedules. This information is generally all collated together in a spreadsheet which becomes known as “The Business Plan”. This is then combined with some creative writing to lure some investors into the business. 2) Product Development: The next stage is where: Engineering focuses on building the product which includes designing it, estimating delivery dates and development costs and hiring staff to build it. The marketing department refines the market size, begins to target its first customers, builds a sales demo and hires a PR agency. Traditionally, companies sometimes hire a VP of sales at this stage. 3) Alpha/Beta Test: Now, engineering works with a test group to find bugs. The Marketing guys develop a complete communications plan, the PR agency polishes the companies positioning and investors are happy to start to thinking about injecting more money into the business. The CEO then refines his pitch and starts to look for some more capital/investment. 4) Product Launch and First Customer Ship: At this point, the company has a large press event, manages to sell some units and as a consequence goes into “big spend” mode, where it scales up its marketing and sales team. This is the traditional model, but there is something wrong. Something is missing. I mean at first glance, it pretty much seems all good right? Plenty of start-ups used this prior to the dot com bubble and they managed to make a lot of money. Actually they didn’t make as much as they could have – hence the word “bubble”. Expectations were greater than the targets these companies met and as a consequence the bubble burst. See if you can think of any reasons why most start-ups failed using this model. We will discuss the answer to this and introduce The Four Steps to the Epiphany in my next post. Watch out for it and follow me on social media: Twitter: @umarahmed12 Instagram: @umarahmed122 |
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brobeedle
Joined: 01 Aug 2013
Last visit: 15 Feb 2022
Posts: 93
Own Kudos:
Given Kudos: 10
Schools: LBS '18 (S)
23 Sep 2015, 07:15
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Submitted for round 1!
xyeek
Joined: 18 Jul 2015
Last visit: 21 Aug 2020
Posts: 175
Own Kudos:
Given Kudos: 14
Location: New Zealand
Concentration: Strategy, International Business
Schools: Insead July'17 (WA) LBS '18 (M)
GMAT 1: 740 Q50 V40
GPA: 3.88
WE:Marketing (Consumer Packaged Goods)
Products:
24 Sep 2015, 07:53
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Submitted my application for Round 1 
Good luck everyone!
Good luck everyone! 
