What Makes a Business Successful?

How many times have you screwed in a light bulb in your home? How many times have you got into your car and driven somewhere? How many times have you listened to music? A LOT.

The key to a product or a business is to take something and make it incrementally better.  People like comfort.  Users use Google over the new search engines because they know it, they have used it, and they are comfortable with it. Users really could even care less about how it works, they just know it works.

When I went from Yahoo to Google it was real simple.  I used yahoo, and heard about Google.  I then tried Google a couple of times until I realized that it was much simpler and I completely stopped using yahoo all until about a year ago. Why? Simplicity, Ease of Use, Branding, and a whole lot more.

Here are more examples of making something that was around and making it better:

1. The Light Bulb – Thomas Edison
2. The Model T – Henry Ford
3. Virgin Records – Richard Branson

Lastly, just remember these eight things when you want to make your business successful……..

It must be able to be mass-produced.

It must be able to be scaled rapidly.

It must be easily understood.

It must be simple

It must be hip/unique – otherwise known as Sexy

It must be memorable

It must add value to the user

It must be able to make money

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I think that any person out there who is starting a business or investing in a business wants to know how they can mitigate their risk to ensure the success of their company. This is a very complex question since every company is different.

However here are 3 key fundamentals that will make any business a success:

1. People – This is the biggest since the people running the company and /or team will transcend through the organization via brand, leadership, decisions, etc.  I have worked with entrepreneurs who quite frankly should go back to corporate America and will never have a prayer at being a successful entrepreneur because of who they are and the way they think.  These people are toxic for entrepreneurship and create a large percentage of failures in business.   Being a leader and entrepreneur takes a certain personality and some just wont make the cut.  The people who exude the needed characteristics to be in a successful business is what makes a company work or not.

2. Product – Most people who are starting a new business or product think what they have is the next best thing since sliced break.  Well, let me tell you something  – NO ONE LIKED sliced bread when it first came out.  This one really pisses me off because these types of people who think this way generally are also arrogant and lack objectivity and 99% of the time fail.  There is nothing wrong with being excited about your new idea, but be honest and real about it and you will go a lot further.

3. Simplicity and Doing It Right –This one is really the easiest way to make a business successful. Make whatever you are doing SIMPLE– simple like 3rd grade simple.  And that means ALL aspects of the company, not just one or two.  It’s way harder to make something simple, and take more time and thought.   Don’t half ass ANYTHING.  When you cut corners, things go wrong.  Spend the necessary time, and do what needs to be done right and do it properly.

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