Successful Entrepreneurs start with a “WHY”?

“The hardest part about being an entrepreneur is that you’ll fail ten times for every success” –Adam Horwitz

The above statement indicates the true hardship of being an entrepreneur. But the real entrepreneurship venture succeeds only if it has a clear inside out view of its product and customers.

As per Bloomberg, 8 out of 10 entrepreneurs who start businesses fail within the first 18 months. There can be various reasons like out of cash, no differentiation,failure to communicate value proposition,leadership crisis.....But the biggest reason to failure is that the venture is not able to justify its existence..i.e WHY does it exists ?

Researchers have shown that there is a clear difference between the normal companies and successful companies.

What normal companies do?

They develop products and services that solve the purpose of “WHAT”,know a little about “HOW”, but the “WHY” is missing?

What successful companies do,differently?

They focus from inside out, i.e. from “WHY to WHAT and taking care of HOW”

"The Golden Circle" a concept by Simon Sinek, explains the existence of successful companies.

These companies exist in order to satisfy the needs of their customers with the sole objective to provide value,monetary gains on the other hand be just the consequence.

Apple, became enormously successful and is one of the world’s most valuable brands with a brand value of $104 billion as on Nov 2013, but how?

For those who have ever heard the speech of Steve Jobs, during the first I-Phone launch,it would have been evident what does, WHY to WHAT means.

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“People wanted a music player, a phone and an organizer in a single device [WHY], we at Apple with our capabilities and innovation [HOW] have brought these technologies together and developed a beautiful music phone with inbuilt organizer, the I-Phone [WHAT]”

The way Steve has communicated the real purpose of the product, was Inside out (From "WHY" to "WHAT")

This differentiation in communication was a way to indicate the real purpose of the product.

Someone rightly said,

“If your product requires advertising or sales people to sell it, it’s not good enough.”

If an entrepreneur is able to make the customer realize “WHY” the product/service has been developed, “HOW” it will solve a purpose and “WHAT” exactly it looks like, the job is done.

Understanding the “WHY” by the customer will have a deeper impact and it becomes a “need satisfying product” and not much of selling is required and the product sells by itself.

During an TV interview of a Senior Executive of a company, the interviewer asked a question ,why does your company exist?, the answer was plain orthodox, from the textbook reply "to make money". Though we can understand that the company is there to make money but at what value proposition.?

Not only for the entrepreneurs, its for the companies,to make their employees, customers and stakeholders realize "WHY" they exist.

Most entrepreneurs/companies fail because their focus is on "WHAT" and sometimes on a "HOW" but ,the "WHY" is missing.

--Paramount Business Solution