All successful enterprises are built around the art of selling, and learning this art is essential for any entrepreneur's success. Having good products may be important, but the trick is to make those products attractive and available to all people irrespective of their financial capacity.
Here's the wake-up call, the majority of entrepreneurs are leaving plenty of money on the table and not knowing it. They are restricting their potential earnings by having their products bound to restricted numbers of buyers, usually based on traditional packaging or presentation methods. The remedy for the incremental revenues is to "think beyond" the factory package norm, specifically for products used like beverages and food items.
Let me illustrate with a recent example from real life. My nephew had opened a wine shop and a place that sells a variety of beverages recently. His initial business plan concentrated exclusively on carton and wholesale sales, a good but limited plan. There's nothing really wrong with the plan in itself, but he was denying himself a substantial opportunity staring in his face.
The positioning of the shop also created a prime opportunity to move beyond simple wholesale. The area attracted naturally to itself people looking for a place to sit and drink a cold beer or enjoy wine with friends in the evening. This hidden potential was huge untapped income ready to be reaped. Timing is everything when it comes to business, too much waiting and someone else takes advantage of the opportunities.
Operating on this understanding as I shared with him, my nephew shifted the strategic direction of his business venture. He acquired a new refrigerator and set up an inviting area with plastic chairs and tables outside his store. His friendly personality turned out to be an added asset, since visiting friends were now able to purchase and consume cold drinks on site, from mineral to bottled water to wine.
The brilliance of strategic selling lies in its adaptability. Wise business owners understand that products can be dismantled, reshuffled, and rebranded to better serve customers and enhance profit margins. This ability to adapt often is the distinction between average and exceptional business performance.
His mundane but efficient rearrangement illustrates the potential of altering product presentation and sales methods so that several revenues are created out of one base inventory. With the addition of an on-site consumption option for his wholesale business, he basically doubled his customer base without increasing his inventory costs by half.
The lesson here is applicable more broadly than for retail or drinks business. Any success in business includes thinking innovatively about how things can be packaged, branded, or presented to appeal to different customer segments. Most often, the best opportunities require no new products whatsoever, simply new means of bringing existing ones to market.
Remember that it's not only about having the right products in order to maximize revenue in the business, it's about seeing and grabbing opportunities to serve customers in a lot of ways. The best business people are always looking for new means to get their products on the market and in demand among more customers.
For any would-be entrepreneur looking to add to their top line, the message is clear, examine what you are doing now and find untapped potential. Your next huge source of revenue may be right before your eyes, just waiting for you to modify a couple of crucial elements of your current business model.
The image used is AI generated.