Entrepreneurial Skills

The Skills You Need to Build a Great Business

What makes someone a successful entrepreneur? It certainly helps to have strong technology
skills or expertise in a key area, but these are not defining characteristics of entrepreneurship.

Instead, the key qualities are traits such as creativity, the ability to keep going in the face of
hardship, and the social skills needed to build great teams.

If you want to start a business, it's essential to learn the specific skills that underpin these
qualities. It's also important to develop entrepreneurial skills if you're in a job role where you're
expected to develop a business, or "take things forward" more generally.

In this article, we'll look at the skills you need to be a successful entrepreneur, and we'll explore
resources that you can use to develop the traits needed for success.

Defining Entrepreneurship

Some experts think of entrepreneurs as people who are willing to take risks that other people
are not. Others define them as people who start and build successful businesses.

Thinking about the first of these definitions, entrepreneurship doesn't necessarily involve
starting your own business. Many people who don't work for themselves are recognized as
entrepreneurs within their organizations.

Regardless of how you define an "entrepreneur," one thing is certain: becoming a successful
entrepreneur isn't easy.
So, how does one person successfully take advantage of an opportunity, while another, equally
knowledgeable person does not? Do entrepreneurs have a different genetic makeup? Or do
they operate from a different vantage point, that somehow directs their decisions for them?

Though many researchers have studied the subject, there are no definitive answers. What we
do know is that successful entrepreneurs seem to have certain traits in common.

We've gathered these traits into four categories:

Personal characteristics.

Interpersonal skills.

Critical and creative thinking skills.

Practical skills.

We'll now examine each category in more detail, and look at some of the questions you will
need to ask yourself if you want to become a successful entrepreneur.

Personal Characteristics

First, examine your personal characteristics, values, and beliefs. Do you have the mindset that's
typical of successful entrepreneurs?

Optimism: Are you an optimistic thinker? Optimism is truly an asset, and it will help get you
through the tough times that many entrepreneurs experience as they find a business model
that works for them.

Vision: Can you easily see where things can be improved? Can you quickly grasp the "big
picture," and explain this to others? And can you create a compelling vision of the future, and
then inspire other people to engage with that vision?

Initiative: Do you have initiative , and instinctively start problem-solving or business

improvement projects?
Desire for Control: Do you enjoy being in charge and making decisions? Are you motivated to
lead others?

Drive and Persistence: Are you self-motivated and energetic? And are you prepared to work
hard, for a very long time, to realize your goals?

Risk Tolerance: Are you able to take risks, and make decisions when facts are uncertain?

Resilience: Are you resilient , so that you can pick yourself up when things don't go as planned?
And do you learn and grow from your mistakes and failures? (If you avoid taking action because
you're afraid of failing, our article on Overcoming Fear of Failure can help you face your fears
and move forward.)

Interpersonal Skills

As a successful entrepreneur, you'll have to work closely with people – this is where it is critical
to be able to build great relationships with your team, customers, suppliers, shareholders,
investors, and more.

Some people are more gifted in this area than others, but, fortunately, you can learn and
improve these skills. The types of interpersonal skills you'll need include:

Leadership and Motivation: Can you lead and motivate others to follow you and deliver your
vision? And are you able to delegate work to others? As a successful entrepreneur, you'll have
to depend on others to get beyond a very early stage in your business – there's just too much to
do all on your own!

Communication Skills: Are you competent with all types of communication ? You need to be
able to communicate well to sell your vision of the future to investors, potential clients, team
members, and more.

Listening: Do you hear what others are telling you? Your ability to listen can make or break you
as an entrepreneur. Make sure that you're skilled at active listening and empathetic listening.

Personal Relations: Are you emotionally intelligent ? The higher your EI, the easier it will be for
you to work with others. The good news is that you can improve your emotional intelligence!
Negotiation: Are you a good negotiator ? Not only do you need to negotiate keen prices, you
also need to be able to resolve differences between people in a positive, mutually beneficial
way.

Ethics: Do you deal with people based on respect, integrity , fairness, and truthfulness? Can
you lead ethically ? You'll find it hard to build a happy, committed team if you deal with
people – staff, customers or suppliers – in a shabby way.

Critical and Creative Thinking Skills

As an entrepreneur, you also need to come up with fresh ideas, and make good decisions about
opportunities and potential projects.

Many people think that you're either born creative or you're not. However, creativity is a skill
that you can develop if you invest the time and effort.

Creative Thinking: Are you able to see situations from a variety of perspectives and come up
with original ideas? (There are many creativity tools that will help you do this.)

Problem Solving: How good are you at coming up with sound solutions to the problems you're
facing? Tools such as Cause & Effect Analysis , the 5 Whys Technique, and CATWOE are just
some of the problem-solving tools that you'll need to be familiar with.

Recognizing Opportunities: Do you recognize opportunities when they present themselves?

Can you spot a trend ? And are you able to create a plan to take advantage of the opportunities
you identify?

Practical Skills

You also need the practical skills and knowledge needed to produce goods or services
effectively, and run a company.

Goal Setting: Do you regularly set goals , create a plan to achieve them, and then carry out that
plan?
Planning and Organizing: Do you have the talents, skills, and abilities necessary to achieve your
goals? Can you coordinate people to achieve these efficiently and effectively? (Here, effective
project management skills are important, as are basic organization skills .) And do you know
how to develop a coherent, well thought-through business plan , including developing and
learning from appropriate financial forecasts ?

Decision Making: How good are you at making decisions? Do you make them based on
relevant information and by weighing the potential consequences? And are you confident in
the decisions that you make?

Core decision-making tools include Decision Tree Analysis , Grid

Analysis , and Six Thinking Hats .

You need knowledge in several areas when starting or running a business. For instance:

Business Knowledge: Do you have a good general knowledge of the main functional areas of a
business (sales, marketing, finance, and operations), and are you able to operate or manage
others in these areas with a reasonable degree of competence?

Entrepreneurial Knowledge: Do you understand how entrepreneurs raise capital? And do you
understand the sheer amount of experimentation and hard work that may be needed to find a
business model that works for you?

Opportunity-Specific Knowledge: Do you understand the market you're attempting to enter,

and do you know what you need to do to bring your product or service to market?

Venture-Specific Knowledge: Do you know what you need to do to make this type of business
successful? And do you understand the specifics of the business that you want to start? (This is
where it's often useful to work for a short time in a similar business.)

You can also learn from others who have worked on projects similar to the ones that you're
contemplating, or find a mentor – someone else who's been there before and is willing to
coach you.

Leadership: a Definition

According to the idea of transformational leadership , an effective leader is a person who does
the following:

Creates an inspiring vision of the future.

Motivates and inspires people to engage with that vision.

Manages delivery of the vision.

Coaches and builds a team, so that it is more effective at achieving the vision.

Leadership brings together the skills needed to do these things. We'll look at each element in
more detail.

1. Creating an Inspiring Vision of the Future

In business, a vision is a realistic, convincing and attractive depiction of where you want to be in
the future. Vision provides direction, sets priorities, and provides a marker, so that you can tell
that you've achieved what you wanted to achieve.

To create a vision, leaders focus on an organization's strengths by using tools such as Porter's
Five Forces , PEST Analysis , USP Analysis , Core Competence Analysis and SWOT Analysis to
analyze their current situation. They think about how their industry is likely to evolve, and how
their competitors are likely to behave. They look at how they can innovate successfully , and
shape their businesses and their strategies to succeed in future marketplaces. And they test
their visions with appropriate market research, and by assessing key risks using techniques such
as Scenario Analysis .

Therefore, leadership is proactive – problem solving, looking ahead, and not being satisfied
with things as they are.

Once they have developed their visions, leaders must make them compelling and convincing. A
compelling vision is one that people can see, feel, understand, and embrace. Effective leaders
provide a rich picture of what the future will look like when their visions have been realized.
They tell inspiring stories , and explain their visions in ways that everyone can relate to.

Here, leadership combines the analytical side of vision creation with the passion of shared
values, creating something that's really meaningful to the people being led.
2. Motivating and Inspiring People

A compelling vision provides the foundation for leadership. But it's leaders' ability to motivate
and inspire people that helps them deliver that vision.

For example, when you start a new project, you will probably have lots of enthusiasm for it, so
it's often easy to win support for it at the beginning. However, it can be difficult to find ways to
keep your vision inspiring after the initial enthusiasm fades, especially if the team or
organization needs to make significant changes in the way that it does things. Leaders recognize
this, and they work hard throughout the project to connect their vision with people's individual
needs, goals and aspirations.

One of the key ways they do this is through Expectancy Theory . Effective leaders link together
two different expectations:

The expectation that hard work leads to good results.

The expectation that good results lead to attractive rewards or incentives.

This motivates people to work hard to achieve success, because they expect to enjoy rewards –
both intrinsic and extrinsic – as a result.

Other approaches include restating the vision in terms of the benefits it will bring to the team's
customers, and taking frequent opportunities to communicate the vision in an attractive and
engaging way.

What's particularly helpful here is when leaders have expert power . People admire and believe
in these leaders because they are expert in what they do. They have credibility, and they've
earned the right to ask people to listen to them and follow them. This makes it much easier for
these leaders to motivate and inspire the people they lead.
Leaders can also motivate and influence people through their natural charisma and appeal, and
through other sources of power , such as the power to pay bonuses or assign tasks to people.
However, good leaders don't rely too much on these types of power to motivate and inspire
others.

3. Managing Delivery of the Vision

This is the area of leadership that relates to management .

Leaders must ensure that the work needed to deliver the vision is properly managed – either by
themselves, or by a dedicated manager or team of managers to whom the leader delegates this
responsibility – and they need to ensure that their vision is delivered successfully.

To do this, team members need performance goals that are linked to the team's overall vision.
Our article on Performance Management and KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) explains one
way of doing this, and our Project Management section explains another. And, for day-to-day
management of delivering the vision, the Management By Wandering Around (MBWA)
approach helps to ensure that what should happen, really happens.

Leaders also need to make sure they manage change effectively. This helps to ensure that the
changes needed to deliver the vision are implemented smoothly and thoroughly, with the
support and backing of the people affected.

4. Coaching and Building a Team to Achieve the Vision

Individual and team development are important activities carried out by transformational
leaders. To develop a team, leaders must first understand team dynamics. Several well-
established and popular models describe this, such as Belbin's Team Roles approach, and
Bruce Tuckman's Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing theory .

A leader will then ensure that team members have the necessary skills and abilities to do their
job and achieve the vision. They do this by giving and receiving feedback regularly, and by
training and coaching people to improve individual and team performance.
Leadership also includes looking for leadership potential in others. By developing leadership
skills within your team, you create an environment where you can continue success in the long
term. And that's a true measure of great leadership.

Note:

The words "leader" and "leadership" are often used incorrectly to describe people who are
actually managing. These individuals may be highly skilled, good at their jobs, and valuable to
their organizations – but that just makes them excellent managers, not leaders.

So, be careful how you use the terms, and don't assume that people with "leader" in their job
titles, people who describe themselves as "leaders," or even groups called "leadership teams"
are actually creating and delivering transformational change.

A particular danger in these situations is that people or organizations that are being managed
by such an individual or group think they're being led; but they're not. There may actually be no
leadership at all, with no one setting a vision and no one being inspired. This can cause serious
problems in the long term

Taking Initiative

Making Things Happen in the Workplace

"There are three types of people in this world: those who make things happen, those who
watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened."

– Mary Kay Ash, American businesswoman

"Initiative is doing the right thing without being told."

– Victor Hugo, French writer

Defining Initiative
Researchers Michael Frese and Doris Fay define initiative as "work behavior characterized by its
self-starting nature, its proactive approach, and by being persistent in overcoming difficulties
that arise in pursuit of a goal."

When you show initiative, you do things without being told; you find out what you need to
know; you keep going when things get tough; and you spot and take advantage of opportunities
that others pass by. You act, instead of reacting, at work.

Most of us have seen initiative in action. Maybe you've seen a young manager who fills her
boss's shoes when she's sick and the rest of the team is unsure what to do; or perhaps you've
seen a team member proposing a process improvement plan to the executive board.

Initiative has become increasingly important in today's workplace. Organizations want

employees who can think on their feet and take action without waiting for someone to tell
them what to do. After all, this type of flexibility and courage is what pushes teams and
organizations to innovate, and to overcome competition.

How to Develop Your Initiative

The good news is that initiative is a skill that you can develop. You can do this by following
these steps:

1. Develop a Career Plan

Research* has shown that people who have a long-term career plan are more likely to take
initiative. Professionals who know what they want and where they want to go are far more
likely to show initiative at work, especially when the action or decision will help them further
their career goals. Develop this plan .

Also, make sure that you understand your job, and your team and your organization's purpose,
so that you know what you should be achieving. See our articles on Job Analysis , Team
Charters and Mission and Vision Statements for more on this.
Once you know what you want to achieve, integrate your career goals with your personal goals,
so that you have something to work towards. (In your personal life, the key to developing
initiative is to set clear personal goals , and then to work steadily towards achieving them.)

2. Build Self-Confidence

It can take courage and a strong sense of self to show initiative, especially if you fear that
people may disagree with your actions or suggestions.

First, take our quiz, How Self-Confident Are You? The results will give you a good idea of your
confidence levels right now. Then, if you need to, take steps to build your self-confidence .

For instance, set small goals so you can achieve some quick wins. And push yourself to do
(positive) things that you'd otherwise be scared to do – this will not only help you build your
self-confidence, but it will help you build the courage to accomplish bigger, scarier tasks later
on.

You might also want to read our article on Positive Thinking . This, along with Visualization ,
can help you build your self-confidence even further.

People who show initiative often do so by spotting and acting on opportunities that their
colleagues or leaders have not noticed. They're curious about their organization and how it
works, and they keep their minds open to new ideas and new possibilities.

You should always be on the lookout for areas in your organization that could use improvement.
To spot opportunities and potential improvements, consider the following from the problem-
finding stage of the Simplex Process :

What would our customers (internal and external) want us to improve? What could they be
doing better if we could help them? How can we improve quality?

Who else could we help by using our core competences ?

What small problems do we have that could grow into bigger ones?

What slows our work or makes it more difficult? What do we often fail to achieve? Where do
we have bottlenecks ? What is frustrating and irritating to people on our team?

Get into the habit of looking for these things – perhaps set a repeating appointment in your
diary to remind you to look for them; and, when things go wrong, think about how you can fix
them.

Tip:

For more on implementing your ideas, see our articles on the Simplex Process and on turning
your idea into reality .

4. Sense-Check Your Ideas

Imagine that you've come up with a creative way of breaking through a bottleneck in your
customer service process. Before you head straight to your boss with your idea, stop and do
some homework. Think about the costs and risks associated with the idea. (Tools like
Cost/Benefit Analysis , Risk Analysis and Impact Analysis will help here.)

Where the cost of the project and the consequences of something going wrong are small,
consider going ahead with your idea directly, while keeping your boss "in the loop" (how far
you should do this depends on your relationship with your boss). Where risks or costs are more
significant, consider preparing a business case , and ask for authorization before you go ahead.

You've already shown initiative by coming up with a solution. Make sure that you follow this
through by doing your homework on the idea. The more you have researched and considered
your ideas, the higher your chances of success will be.

5. Develop Rational Persistence

Persistence is the art of moving forward even when you encounter inertia or difficulty. People
who show initiative often encounter difficulties and setbacks along the way, so resilience and
rational persistence (where you listen to, consider, and appropriately modify your direction
depending on other people's input) are essential if you want to achieve what you've set out to
do.

When you're persisting with your idea, you'll find things much easier if you learn how to
manage change effectively – this can often make the difference between success and failure
for a project. It's also helpful to learn how to open closed minds , since people may already
have an opinion on a subject before you even start presenting your idea.

6. Find Balance

While it's important to take initiative, it's just as important to be wise in the way that you use it.
In some situations, it can be inappropriate to take initiative, and people who generate too
much extra work for other people can upset others.

For instance, you might have worked with a colleague who was "gung-ho" about every idea. He
was constantly pushing the team, and your boss, to lead the next project or to implement a
new idea. However, some of his ideas were naïve, his persistence in taking the initiative often
crossed the line into aggressiveness, and perhaps the team felt that he "rocked the boat" too
much at a time when other team members were overloaded.

This is why it's so important to learn good decision-making techniques. The more you enhance
these skills, the better you'll be at judging when an idea is good, and it isn't. This way, you can
develop a reputation both for initiative and for good judgment – an invaluable combination!

You'll also want to develop your emotional intelligence skills. It's helpful to know how to read
the emotions of others. This sensitivity can help you further decide when to take initiative, and
when it's best to let things be.

Key Points
Initiative has become increasingly important in today's workplace. You show initiative when you
act without being told what to do, persist in the face of inertia and difficulty, and see your idea
through to a successful conclusion.

There are six steps you can take to develop your own initiative.

Develop a career plan.

Build self-confidence.

Spot opportunities and potential improvements.

Sense-check your ideas.

Develop persistence.

Find balance.

8 Types of Marketing Strategies and Definition

Types of Marketing Strategies and Definition

Marketing strategies are used by businesses to promote their products and services. Let’s have
a look at the proper definition.

Marketing strategy definition

Marketing strategy is used by different companies to collaborate with their consumers. It is also
employed to aware the customers about the features, specifications and benefits of company’s
products. It is basically focused on encouraging target population to buy those specific products
and services. The marketing strategies might be totally innovative or they can be previously
tried or tested strategies.

Effective marketing strategies help to get ahead in the competition.

The marketing strategies might be totally innovative or they can be previously tried or tested
strategies.

Points to ponder for marketing

There are different types of marketing strategies available. You have to pick one as per your
business requirement. Before choosing the right marketing strategy for your business, consider
following points.

1. Define the target population

Defining target population is main and necessary step in choosing your marketing strategy. It
gives the proper demographics which help in selecting the most appropriate marketing plan for
your business.

2. Test your audience

Create a hypothetical process of buying to test your audience. Once you know the buying
behavior of your target audience, you can select more appropriate marketing strategy.

3. Consider marketing strategies

Once you know the demographics; their knowledge, attitudes and behaviors. You can select
more appropriate marketing strategy.

4. Evaluate those strategies

Once you have considered the marketing strategies and found the applicable ones. Asses them,
apply them and evaluate them. This process must be for testing purposes and the most suitable
and productive strategy must be applied.

Types of marketing strategies

There are different types of marketing strategies available. Picking up a marketing strategy
includes analyzing the needs of your business, your target audience and specifications of your
products.

The two main types of marketing strategy are:

1. Business to business (B2B) marketing

2. Business to consumer (B2C) marketing

The most common form of marketing is business to consumer (B2C) marketing. Let’s explore a
bit more.

Following are the different types of marketing strategies available.

1. Paid advertising

This includes multiple approaches for marketing. It includes traditional approaches like TVCs
and print media advertising. Also, one of the most well-known marketing approach is internet
marketing. It includes various methods like PPC (Pay per click) and paid advertising.

2. Cause marketing

Cause marketing links the services and products of a company to a social cause or issue. It is
also well known as cause related marketing.

3. Relationship marketing

This type of marketing is basically focused on customer building. Enhancing existing

relationships with customers and improving customer loyalty.

4. Undercover marketing
This type of marketing strategy focuses on marketing the product while customers remain
unaware of the marketing strategy. It is also known as stealth marketing.

5. Word of mouth

It totally relies on what impression you leave on people. It is traditionally the most important
type of marketing strategy. Being heard is important in business world. When you give quality
services to customers, it is likely that they’d promote you.

6. Internet marketing

It is also known as cloud marketing. It usually happens over the internet. All the marketing
items are shared on the internet and promoted on various platforms via multiple approaches.

7. Transactional marketing

Sales is particularly the most challenging work. Even for the largest retailers, selling is always
tough especially when there are high volume targets. However with the new marketing
strategies, selling isn’t as difficult as it was. In transactional marketing the retailers encourage
customers to buy with shopping coupons, discounts and huge events. It enhances the chances
of sales and motivates the target audience to buy the promoted products.

8. Diversity marketing

It caters diverse audience by customizing and integrating different marketing strategies. It

covers different aspects like cultural, beliefs, attitudes, views and other specific needs.

Final Word

Marketing strategies have made it much easier to promote products and services. They also
limit the strategy to target audience ensuring the proper advancement of the business

Scarcity Marketing
In some markets it’s important to control how much product is available at one time. In many
cases this is done because of the difficulty of acquiring raw materials or higher quality of the
product. A company may choose to make their products accessible to only a few customers.
Rolls-Royce’s release of their Chinese edition car called Phantom sold quickly. While the cost of
the car was higher than most cars the scarcity drove the desire and the price.

Call to Action (CTA) Marketing

CTA Marketing refers to methods of converting web traffic into leads or sales on websites using
text, graphics, or other elements of web design. Conversion strategies help improve the
percentage of online visitors who become customers or who join the mailing list.

Viral Marketing

Cult Brand marketers are constantly creating new business ideas that keep their products in the
heart and minds of the global consumer. Each time a new product is created, customers have to
be given a reason to dream about their future purchase. Sometimes marketers of Cult Brands
hit on something so great that people can’t help but share with others. Getting your customers
talking about your products and services is very important to growing awareness for your
business.

Mass Marketing

Major corporations need to drive large numbers of purchasing of their products in order to
survive and grow. While mass marketing may seem like a shotgun approach to marketing this is
far from the truth. Big businesses spend big money in understanding big data–thats a lot of
bigs!) This gives them an insight to where to place media for their potential national customers
who buy their products and services. Walmart is an example of an effective mass market
retailer. As the number one retailer in the world, they are very smart about their mass
marketing efforts, often giving their customers a feeling of locality and warmth.

Seasonal Marketing

Seasonal events offers a great way to meet new consumers. Sometimes these events can be
actual changes of weather or national holidays. For a retailer like Hallmark, Valentine’s Day
represents a large portion of their business. By tuning into the various seasons that are
important to your customers you can become more relevant in their lives.

Evangelism Marketing

Develop raving fan customers (what we call Brand Lovers) who become advocates of your
brand or product, and who represent the brand as if it was part of their own identity.
Event Marketing

Creating events is a great way to drive sales. Customers often need a reason to shop and events
can often offer the perfect reason. Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade has become part of
American culture by connecting two events together that consumers love: Thanksgiving and
shopping.

Freebie Marketing

Promote free give aways or sell your products and services sold at low rates to boost the sales
of other related products or services.

Newsletter Marketing

A fun way to promote a business is to write a newsletter that highlights some of the
newsworthy things that have happened for the organization. The Motley Fool have been
sharing their investment insights with their community for many years. These newsletters
create a sense of inclusion and participation with their members and has provided a key driver
for their incredible growth.

Article Marketing

In industries where expertise is highly valued, articles can offer a powerful tool to showcase
your knowledge and expertise. Some innovations are shared in the form of articles or white
papers where technical information needs to be convey to specialized buyers. Amazon.com has
dedicated part of their site for white papers on technical know-how on cloud computing. This is
a very sophisticated form of marketing for specialized buyers.

Content Marketing

Write and publish content to educate potential customers about your products and services.
For the appropriate businesses, this can be an effective means of influencing them without
using direct selling methods.