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| Business Coaching and Venture Capital |
By: Santi Chacon
Business Coach
Introduction:
The purpose for the Mr. Venture Capital Series is to help you to have a holistic perspective and an intimate relationship with your business. It's only when you know what your business is truly capable of that you will witness high performance.
Red Flags
Just like any new relationship if there are too many red flags you should be concerned. Red flags in this case are the fact that you can't answer any purposed question with ease and clarity. Red flags mean you need to go to work to find out the answers.
The Business Game
The business game is about maintaining a certain posture and confidence. The more you know about what you are doing the easier it will be to maintain this mindset. The more you know this the easier it will be to put together effective marketing and business strategies. Regardless of your interest in receiving a round of funding. The questions you need to ask yourself is:
Would you invest in your business?
Wherever your business is at the moment; whether it is just a plan or you have had funding before, are you really that impressed?
Questions in Venture Capital interviews typically fall into several categories; for my intent and purpose here I want to focus just on one:
Your Expertise
The truth of the matter is that you need to have working experience in your industry. Your industry should be well known, it should be what you measure your performance against. If you can't answer the following questions and reference publications and studies done in your industry; with ease, than you have work to do.
A Clue:
Finding information on your industry should be second nature to you. This should be a regular exercise, I hope for your sake you are spending several hours daily reading on your industry; otherwise you are going to make it more difficult than it really needs to be.
Expertise Questions:
(These are all industry specific questions)
- How many years of experience do you have in the industry?
- Explain why your former company took the path they did?
- What projects exemplified your expertise in this industry? and how?
- What is your experience running successful marketing campaigns?
- What is your experience with customer acquisition?
- What is your strategy for customer acquisition?
- Do you have any customers currently? why or why not?
- What are the major trends in your industry?
- What are the industry challenges?
- What are the industry opportunities?
- Explain how familiar are you with your industry?
- What is your plan to explore both the opportunities and challenges?
- How does current economic conditions affect your industry?
- Who are your top 10 competitors?
- What are their strengths and weaknesses?
- How do they compete in the market place?
- What are the prices of your top competitors?
- What are ten major publications in your industry?
- Where can you locate studies regarding the latest industry news?
- What business model is going to be the most effective? and why?
Based on your ease in answering these questions:
Would you bet on your expertise?
The key to answering these questions is experiential knowledge. You should have years of experience in an industry before beginning a business. If you are having difficulty with these questions, review each question and brainstorm by asking the questions: where can I find this information? and who can I ask for help? Failing to learn to answer these types of questions and to gain the experience, is a reason for the high failure rate in businesses today.
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