5 reasons why your business may fail in 2017
1. Your Business Lacks a Business Plan One of the main reasons that numerous businesses are hindered from achieving the success that they desire is that they lack a business plan. Most of you are familiar with the saying that goes along the lines of, if you have no idea where you are going, how are you really supposed to get there? All too often, businesses will start without a clear, concise plan. The business may have certain goals, but absolutely no direction or details on how to accomplish those goals. Before starting a business, it is imperative that you develop a detailed and solid business plan. This very important tool is critical in identifying the accomplishments that you want to achieve and outlining the various strategies that will need to be utilized to achieve those goals. If you fail to create a business plan, your business is sure to fail. 2. Lack of Differentiation in Your Market The second reason why a business may fail in 2017 is that it does not offer unique value or differentiation within the market that it represents. You must ensure that your business will bring customers something that is considered to be unique or different than they have experienced or may experience with similar businesses in the marketplace. Once you have established that you offer something unique to the marketplace, you should advertise that uniqueness to your customers. In doing so, you are sure to avoid failure because of your innovative edge. Failure to offer something unique and advertising that creativity could result in immediate business failure. 3. Lack of Understanding of the Industry and Your Customers To succeed in a business in 2017, you must have a complete understanding of the industry in which your business is part of, as well as the customers that you want to target that are attracted to that industry. By researching the industry trends, the industry opportunities, the industry threats, and marketing techniques within the industry, you are sure to achieve some degree of success; however, it is also imperative that you develop a solid understanding of the customers that you desire to target, as well. You should have the buying demographics outlines, the details of the customer psychographics; understand what motivates your customers to make a buying decision, how they buy, and the types of items that they purchase. You must even know where your targeted customers usually make their purchases. By failing to gain a complete understanding of the industry that you are part of and the customers that you desire to attract, your business is likely to experience complete failure in 2017. 4. Ineffective Marketing Techniques In 2017, it is absolutely critical to ensure that you have an effective marketing strategy in place to advertise the products and/or services that your business offers. It is not enough to simply open a business. This usually does not attract customers. While it is true that a few customers may discover your business with no direction, it is not true that you will achieve your highest potential with those customers. You must make it known to potential customers that you are now open to serve them and you must inform them on why they should do business with you and not others within the industry. By gaining a complete understanding of your customers, you will know how to quickly reach them and attract them. There are numerous marketing techniques that are considered to be effective. These include – but are not limited to – offline advertisements, billboards, brochures, direct mail, networking, social media pages, websites, blogs, cold calls, sales letters, workshops, seminars, trade shows, and emails. Engaging in ineffective marketing techniques or failure to market at all is sure to result in the failure of your business. 5. Failure in Tracking and Measuring Marketing Endeavours The final reason why your business may fail in 2017 is that you fail to effectively track and appropriately measure your marketing endeavours. By simply utilizing products such as web analytic programs, you have the ability to obtain highly valuable market research and in-depth insight to determine the activities that are generating the highest level of traffic to your business website, information about the customers that are browsing your website and even making purchases there, as well as information on those that are not displaying interest in your business. Tracking and measuring your marketing endeavours will help you determine what is working and what is not. It will allow you to improve the customer experience, as well as your company – as a whole. Failure in taking the time and putting in the effort to track and measure the marketing tactics that you elect to utilize could be highly detrimental and could result in the failure of your business in 2017. Conclusion It is common for a business to deal with adversity on a daily basis. The chances of experiencing failure due to these complications are much higher than achieving success. The odds are stacked against you right from the word “go”. By knowing why and how businesses fail, you have already increased the likelihood that you will experience success. In addition to avoiding the 5 pitfalls outlined in this guide, it is essential to ensure that you offer high quality in the products and/or services that you offer, that your customers are extremely satisfied, your employees are highly motivates, and that you have a way of identifying and coping with weaknesses within your business. By ensuring that all of this is done, you will not be the next business to experience failure in 2017. |