Any old iron

The other week, I accompanied my business buddy to a Trade Fair where his competitors exhibit and where he would exhibit in the future.


I went with hope rather than expectation as I really wasn't sure what would come of the visit. I think my business buddy was in the same frame of mind.


But it was good to see. Good to see all the junk that people sell. Jeez! You name it, this place had people punting it... candles, lingerie, swords, pot pourri, picture frames, garden furniture...

And while we were there we talked to the competitors and gleamed a great deal of information just from idle chat - their levels of distribution (about 1,000 independents and also some nationals); their levels of margin they offer on their products(50%, i.e. double the wholesale price + VAT); their promotions & support (some "show specials" with specific off shelf display point of sale).

So it was quite a good visit just from learning about the competition point of view but also about the clear level of expectation has now been set if he was to exhibit there next year.

We left the exhibition, not buzzing about the opportunity for his idea but for a completely different idea, born from seeing so many other crappy products that other people are trying to sell!

Free and easy...

... and I'm not talking about my last date (I wish!).

My rollercoaster continued today as I researched one of my business ideas.

Surfing the web I came across a number of services that offered something pretty close to what I had imagined I would offer... and my heart sank! They all looked very professional, very sleek and talked about their benefits. Bollox! Why did I think I could do this? They look good, they know what they're doing and they're already up & running (one company talked about being established back in the day of 1988!).

I was up against the proverbial ropes, but I had put myself there. I had allowed my doubt to eat away at my confidence. I felt I had been there before, there was something re-assuring in my doubt... surely I looked into this before I had this idea? And then I remembered the whole reason behind my idea - the opportunity that all these other supplier had conveniently left out though left out a critical element... their price!

My whole point (my USP, as a poncy management guru might say) is my service is FREE! Now I know just how powerful that word is - according to Asda its the most powerful word in a marketeer's thesaurus (and "New" is the second most powerful word, by the way!). Now being free means I have to get scale (i.e. a high number of people to use this service) in order for the business model to work and to get that scale I need to make it remarkably easy to use for all - so easy that my granny should be able to use it. But what the research did tell me was that I also need to offer absolute reliability.

So I need to remain focussed & single minded behind the real power of my idea... free, easy to use and reliable - and ignore any distractions of confidence!