How to Always Be Ready to Adapt Your Business to Change

If you've achieved some success in your startup's first product, how do you keep growing?  What should you do if an upstart gives your customers a product that delivers more bang-for-the-buck than yours?  How do you know when the needs of your customers are changing and adapt to those changes effectively?  How should you alter your startup's business strategy to take advantage of new technology?

 

Why Your Customers' Cravings Are Your Key to Success

Your Secret to Hiring a Kick-Ass Team

How to See Your Startup Through The Eyes of Investors

Why Big Brands Want to Be More Like Your Startup

 

Both of these approaches have their benefits -- providing motivation to move forward and a clearer vision into the future.

 

But what if your vision of the future is not the best one for your startup or your current customer doesn't represent your future target customer?

 

To tap into the strengths of some of these approaches while overcoming their weaknesses, I developed a six-step process to help entrepreneurs grow their business without boundaries.

 

1. Create a forward-thinking team. 

2. Map your startup's value network. 

3. Choose who you listen to. 

4. Generate a business model hypotheses. 

5. Get market feedback. 

6. Refine based on feedback. 

 

Let's talk

 

Piece is by Mr. Peter Cohan is president of Peter S. Cohan & Associates a management consulting and venture capital firm.  He is the author of Hungry Start-up Strategy: Creating New Ventures with Limited Resources and Unlimited Vision (Berrett-Koehler, 2012).