What road-map should the Indian start-ups follow to be sustainable and competent ?
Framework of start-up ecosystem has been changed since last 5 years as investors no longer putting their money on ideas but target start-ups with validation. This changed scenario evolve due to improvement in start-up ecosystem in terms of right mentor-ship and support of government or/and loss of their investment at the early stage in 90% of start-ups. India is no longer limited to software products, players are emerging in hardware start-ups as well which is considered to be most difficult especially in B2C model and on the other side, application bubble is soon to be in decline phase periodically.
1) Market gap & Research
Gaps opportunities are what the market wants but isn’t getting. Gaps can range from a need for new products or technology to requiring different services to those currently available. “Gaps will not hit you by chance, you have to be at right place at right time in order to identify it” by listening and responding to surrounding space. The key is to speak to people who can be your potential customer. Find out how their needs are and aren’t being met and WHY? You will get a glimpse of viability of your idea. There is various way to observe answer to your question necessary for your product/services such as questionnaire, vis-a-vis interview or focus groups. It is highly advisable to conduct research in focus group, as it will explore dimensions which are not penned down by you and can be great opportunity to perceive the product through customer’s mind rather than drooling in vacuum. Analyse and prepare a unique solution to satisfy their need. Decide which pyramid you will target and model of expertise your product will fall e.g. quality, service etc.
2) Building a team
People are important resource for start-ups. The founders are responsible for building a strong and flexible team in terms of intelligence, rapport within the team which play vital part in streamlining the flow process of work. Persistence is the quality which make start-ups successful. Ideal initial team should have only one expert person in a department, that helps in reducing the metal diarrhea and liability. During growth period it is duty of founders to discuss with employee about the direction at which the company is heading and what are their goals. “It is OK to admit what you know and what you don’t know”
3) Prototype development and final solution.
Based on research data, Penn down need/want of the potential customers and merge them with your idea to develop a robust and reliable prototype of the product. Perform a test run on few potential customer and collect their feedback. Iterate the product as per the feedback and your instinct because in most of the cases the initial test run performed on people who are tech oriented and give you hundreds of improvement scope which can be irritating sometimes. Think in a perspective of tech laggards rather than concentrating what techie’s perceive, as their population are less and are not your final reach out. Intellectual property is an important criterion in terms of competence. Investors are more tend to invest on original and in demand product rather than a copy-paste business model.
4) Crossing the Chasm — Marketing and positioning.
Most of the start-ups dies before reaching to target audience as a new technology might attracts early adopters because mainly they are from tech background. There are chances that your product is innovative but not require by the common people where actual sales lies. Positioning of product in existing distribution channels are difficult to penetrate due to presence of player with deep pockets. Start-ups vision of too ambitious can backfire sometime. Suppose your forte is product/solution development so go for licensing the product to, who is good in manufacturing or/and have vertical integrated facility as you cannot do it all by yourself.
5) Building Customer relationship
Building initial customer relationship prove to be stagnant growth in sales if your product satisfies customer needs as it acts as fission reaction in generating more customer and create a chain. Guiding to customer on usability of product, Data analyzing on previous year sales/users such as which service/product are best sellers, which is the price range in which major share of customers exist, so that you can prepare better strategy for future/next season.
6) Continuous Improvement
Continuous Improvement is about continually improving your business, processes and way of working by encouraging a philosophy of constant, logical, and sustainable improvement throughout your organization e.g. “PD-CA Wheel”. Start-up need to move out of comfort zone to reach to their destination quicker as humans tend to park themselves in between the journey, if feels comfortable. “It isn’t something you add to your work- It becomes How you work.”
credits — Ajay Sangwan
