You always hear people say entrepreneurship is that eureka moment, when you have an idea and bam.... you are down at your basement (or wherever you chose) creating that unique product that would lead to the million dollar business, or like me have heard that entrepreneurship is an experience which you cannot actually have a road map before you get into that right (Wrong). Now don't get me wrong, I believe action is one of the main means through which you can get feedback. so before you go out and spend some money, and most importantly your time, then realizing that your product or service is not economically viable, or is in a very competitive market and you would eventually be choked out by the incumbents in that segment sooner or later, what if you have the "Entrepreneurial Tools" to take you down that road? that helps you assess your start up effectively and efficiently in the most economical way. I am going to give you three fundamental tools that will allow you grow your business, you should know the 80/20 rule, if you don't its alright i will let you now that 80% of startups fail and only 20% succeed, i would love to put you among the 20 but let’s face it we would want to change that rule if we could as a matter of fact we can if you follow these steps.

Market Segmentation

Market segmentation is a marketing strategy that involves dividing a broad target market into subsets of consumers who have common needs and priorities, and then designing and implementing strategies to target them. This strategy is applied by most large corporations like Apple and Microsoft but it is most suited for start-ups. A customized expression for market segmentation would then be segmenting your market to have homogeneous customers who are willing and have the economic power to buy your product a product can either be goods or services, so as an entrepreneur you would want to find that niche where your solution aligns with the solution of your customers. Reelfruit offers healthy snacks by extending the shelf life of fruits with their range of dried mangoes and pineapples they target the middle and upper class society and among them those that are health conscious. This company found its niche segmented its market and i believe that is what is giving them success in this industry. They segmented their market to those people who want to find ways of improving their health (those gents and ladies wanting to be in shape) are working or have their own businesses and between the 20-40 yrs. of age though they sell their product through supermarkets and other distributors, it is very important that they segmented their market to know the actual customers and end users which is another tool I will explain to you better, instead of creating a product that would not be economically viable.

The old system of making products before finding the market is long gone. The business environment has evolved and you have to evolve with it if you intend to create a successful venture and market segmentation is the first step to getting you there.

You don't wanna be this guy

Beach Head Market

.Remember the colonial nations of old, yep you do when they plan to colonize a territory they first make camp and secure the coast before exploring the hinterlands. You get the idea now, as a startup the first mistake most people make is analyzing the whole market and find they do not actually know which market to start with. In business, particularly startups, the beachhead strategy is about focusing your resources on one key area, usually a smaller market segment or product category, and winning that market first, even dominating that market, before moving into larger markets, this is the market where your customers are and can lead to other markets with potential customers. continuing with Reelfruit they identified their beach head market by targeting supermarkets and pharmacies where they can easily have access to their clients, they could have started with vending machines and putting them in big offices but that would not meet their segmented market and not solve their needs so by supplying through supermarkets and pharmacies they not only reached the healthy conscious middle class individuals but those that would just love a snack or a family going out for picnic of course the health aspect comes as a bonus. This chosen market has given them credibility and now they are going into other market segments supplying snacks for airlines. So as a business “geek” or an entrepreneur, start choosing your beach head market fast that will propel you to success.

End user

The individual (a real person!) who will use your product. The end user is usually a member of the household or organization that is your customer. Analyzing your end user will fall under the decision making unit. Which is explained in detail below

Decision Making Unit: The individual(s) who decide whether the customer will buy your Product, consisting of:

• Advocate: The person who wants the customer to purchase the product; often the end user.
• Primary Economic Buyer: The person with the authority to spend money to purchase the product. Sometimes, the end user.
• Influencers, Veto Power, purchasing department, etc.: People who have sway or direct control over the decisions of the Primary Economic Buyer.

Your focus will be on the end user, because if the end user does not want your product, you will be unable to sell the product to the customer. In this step, you will build a profile of the end user that is specific enough to use for calculating the Total Addressable Market size of your beachhead market. Later on, you will identify one end user who fits the End User Profile to serve as your Persona.

While you could calculate the size of the beachhead market now, you will find that even in your narrow beachhead, the end users are not all alike. You will first need to narrow further by choosing a specific demographic of end users.

Potential Characteristics to Include in Your End User Profile

• Gender
• Age range
• Income range
• Geographic location
• What motivates them?
• What do they fear most?
• Who is their hero?
• Where do they go for vacation? For dinner? Before work?
• What newspapers do they read? Websites? What TV shows do they watch?
• What is the general reason they are buying this product? Savings? Image? Peer pressure?
• What makes them special and identifiable?