9 Tips for Succeeding in Business

The material in this blog post is thanks to Scott Savitz, a very successful entrepreneur and founder of Shoebuy.com. I attended Foley Hoag’s Emerging Enterprise Center Tech Talk Tuesday this week and Scott was one of the speakers.

Scott’s talk was geared towards entrepreneurs, but these tips can apply to anyone wanting to succeed in business.

Scott’s tips for succeeding in business:

1. Remember why you entered the business in the first place.
What attracted you to this business or industry? Did you see an unmet need and build your business to solve that need? Do you have a passion for something? Whatever it is, keep it in the forefront of your mind. This will help you during those tough times when you’re questioning everything.

2. Be totally disciplined to your value proposition.
Of course, this implies that you have a good, strong value proposition. Take the time to develop your value proposition. For those of you wondering what the heck is a value proposition, it’s a statement clearly articulating the tangible results a customer gets from using your products or services. The more specific your value proposition is, the better.

3. Focus on your customer.
If you aren’t really listening to your customers and following through on their suggestions, you won’t win.

4. Don’t ever stop innovating and building value.
Sure, you may have some early successes, but don’t rest on your laurels. Keep innovating!

5. Spend every dollar as though it’s your last.
Scott reiterated that he was able to grow Shoebuy.com even during the last recession because he had no debt. You should plan your business strategy so that if you need money, you can get it, but that the decision to take that money is a choice, not forced upon you.

6. Build your business to be scalable and adaptible.
How will you know if you are doing this? Use metrics to gauge your results.

7. Be in it to win it.
Your employees should feel the same way too. Their enthusiasm for the business should shine through everything they do.

8. Build a good company and good products. THEN focus on your exit strategy.
If you concentrate on your exit strategy before you’ve build something good, then you won’t succeed.

9. Have fun!
Per Scott, this is the most important thing.

These tips for succeeding in business are common sense and they sound so simple to do. A lot of businesses may focus on one or two of these

What other tips do you have for succeeding in business?

Photo is courtesy of Search Engine People’s Blog Flickr photostream, under Creative Commons Licensing.