Business Model Canvas
12/8 — BMC Intro & Review
This session was led by Peter Karlson, EforAll Ambassador. He presented the Business Model Canvas (BMC), a template that we will be using to think through our businesses as the course progresses. The BMC consists of 9 elements — two of which are customer segments and value proposition.
Determining who our customers are and what job they need done are two of the most important questions to be answered in the initial stages of creating a business. As an exercise, class members engaged in breakout sessions, with each entrepreneur identifying 3–5 customer segments and then sharing those ideas with the people at their table.
Peter then discussed the concept of value proposition. To further illustrate the idea, he presented the “milkshake video,” in which Clayton Christensen, Harvard Business School professor and entrepreneur, used the example of a fast-food milkshake to explain that value proposition as a means of helping customers get a certain “job” done.
We then talked about pains, gains and jobs as they relate to customer segments and determining the value proposition. Peter asked class members to choose one customer segment from the prior exercise and list their pains (what annoys customers or prevents them from doing something?), gains (what benefits will customers gain from your product / service?), and jobs (what will your business help customers achieve?). We then shared and discussed in small groups.
Our homework for the following week was to determine our 3–5 customer segments, list the pains / gains / value propositions for each segment, and prioritize them.
Although it was a little difficult to see clearly by the end of class from all of the smoke in the room (lots of minds blown, including mine!) it was all really great information. I was happy and relieved to begin learning about customer segments, as this is one of the things I really needed to work on, and the BMC seems like an excellent and flexible tool that will be extremely helpful as the business takes shape.
The two hours literally seemed to fly by!
