In today’s business environment, there are many business ventures to invest in. For this reason, it is important to be particular about the one you choose to invest in to avoid devastating losses.
Jumia Travel, the leading online travel agency, shares four signs a business venture is going nowhere.
- Lack of focus
This is especially the case with start-ups. If a business venture is focused on one thing this month, then next month the focus has changed again to something else, and it’s the same a month or two after that, it’s a sign you need to take note of. Weak and inconsistent focus is one of the number one business killers, and any business without a focus or with one that keeps changing or expanding is a venture you need to careful with.
- All income comes from a handful of customers
The Pareto principle says that 80 percent of your sales will come from 20 percent of your customers. That is, 80% of the results stems from 20% of the input. Therefore, if you find that with a business venture the number is less, then you must start to find ways to increase this number through actions like marketing and networking. This will help to enhance the sustainability of the business.
- Little or no excitement among early users
Especially for a business ventures that is service or product based. it is important for early users of the product or service to return again and again. If new set of users keep coming in without you being able to sustain their continued patronage then it’s a sign you need to be concerned about. Your service or product should be able to create that buzz or effect to sustain the patronage of early users to help validate your business idea.
- Plenty visionaries but not enough doers
Visionaries are great for conceiving a potentially viable business idea, but it’s important to work to bring these visions to reality. For this you need to have doers on your team, people that can work and strategise to get things done effectively and efficiently to help bring your ideas to life. Typically, there’s more programming and technical work to be done within the first 6 months of a business (when you’re trying to lay the groundwork for the business) than marketing or business development work. After all, you can’t exactly market a product or service that isn’t fully functional, that’ll be putting the chicken before the egg.
