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Business team celebrating success in a meeting<\/p>\n
<\/fbs-accordion>getty<\/small><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Do you have a promising idea for a business? You might want to press pause before you start grinding away at marketing plans<\/a> and networking your way to seed funding. Not that you should sleep on your visions for a startup, of course. But you should take a moment to study what has made other founders successful.<\/p>\n It\u2019s understandable if taking a page from someone else\u2019s book doesn\u2019t hold much appeal. Most entrepreneurs get into the game because they have a desire to carve out their own niche, after all. However, you could pick up strategic insights to add fuel to your momentum. In that spirit, here are a few lessons from some of today\u2019s exceptionally successful startups<\/a> that took an idea from zero to IPO.<\/p>\n Consumers crave simplicity. If a product or service is too complex, they tend to think twice about using it. But say it\u2019s a service that markets consider essential, such as buying or selling a home. The U.S. real estate market might have tapered off recently, but 5 million<\/a> transactions still went through last year.<\/p>\n Despite the necessity of home buying and selling, most consumers would agree it\u2019s a complicated ordeal. You\u2019ve got to find an agent, disrupt your routine for showings or open houses and\u2014should you eventually find a good fit\u2014sift through all the legalese. A lot about the process can slow things down. And when you need to buy or sell fast, the traditional route can be too much to handle.<\/p>\n Opendoor is an example of a startup founded on the idea of simplifying an overly complex but necessary process. Its business model leverages technology to make it easier for buyers and sellers to carry out this multifaceted exchange. Opendoor\u2019s idea caught on with homeowners who want to skip the hassles of showings and need to sell their properties quickly. The company\u2019s services also streamline the process for those buying and selling at the same time. Goodbye, stress and inconvenience.<\/p>\n Profitable startups sometimes begin with the notion of bringing groups of businesses and consumers under one roof. Take the restaurant industry as an example. Some restaurants have the capacity to offer delivery services, while others don\u2019t. Simultaneously, hungry customers don\u2019t always want to dine in or pick up curbside. And in households with different palates, calling multiple restaurants to deliver a family feast can be a pain.<\/p>\n Sometimes, a brilliant business model<\/a> starts by building bridges between unmet needs. This is something Doordash did by providing a service both restaurants and diners find useful. By expanding food delivery services, the company creates a way for more restaurants and consumers to connect.<\/p>\n Restaurant owners win because they don\u2019t lose out on sales or have to maintain the overhead, including personnel, associated with deliveries. Consumers also score because of the convenience of ordering from multiple restaurants under a single platform. The key to success in this model is finding the overlap in market needs and offering convenient, centralized solutions to both sides of the transaction.<\/p>\n It\u2019s hard to believe streaming giant Netflix was once a startup. Known for disrupting the video rental industry, the company\u2019s founders did it by closely studying the market. Consumers were seeking home entertainment\u2014the more on demand, the better. The reason video rentals were popular was because they brought the movie theater into people\u2019s homes. This was easier and more economical than going to the theater, yet consumers\u2019 choices were limited to the films video stores had on their shelves when they visited.<\/p>\n Netflix knew that access to seemingly endless video content was what mattered. Through extensive market research, the company was able to reshape how consumers fulfilled this need. The fact that they didn\u2019t have to leave their homes to do it made it even better. Netflix\u2019s model of delivering DVDs to people\u2019s doors was born, and it continued to evolve with changes in technology.<\/p>\n1. Simplify a Difficult Process<\/h2>\n
2. Connect the Dots<\/h2>\n
3. Uncover the Real Need<\/h2>\n