Ten Lessons for Building a Winning Business

Building a Winning Business

Three years ago, I started the strategy consultancy – Afdonex. To mark the occasion, here are ten lessons I’ve learned about building great companies – derived from client work and a 30-year business career:

1. Have a clear vision of your long-term destination. People best achieve when they know where they are going. Work backwards on a route map, starting from a big 10-year visionary goal. Then define the 3-year goal, 1-year, 3-month, and 1-month achievable goals. Keep it simple and concise. And stay focused.
2. Surround yourself with great people. There isn’t a straight line to success. A strong team can adjust on the fly and come up with and execute winning strategies. It takes many shoulders to carry the weight of a rapidly growing company.
3. Do the deep work to really understand your ideal customer and the competition. This knowledge is critical to developing competitive positioning for your products and business.

4. Position your product/business as distinctly different (and better) than the competitors—no “me-too” products. Instead, occupy commercially valid white space where the target buyers can easily see the value. Don’t invest in marketing until you get this right!
5. Document the required strategies, tactics, deadlines, and responsibilities for delivering short-term goals. This keeps you on the path to your big goal. Be disciplined in your execution. And eliminate non-priority activities.

Be disciplined in your execution. And eliminate non-priority activities.

6. Know the business by the numbers. Have a critical metrics dashboard. Review this regularly with your managers. Understand what’s happening and if action is required. Don’t leave the success of your business to chance.
7. Collaborate and communicate. Actively align with your team on business vision and goals, so they buy into and commit to what’s required to succeed. Ensure that staff down the line quickly hear the correct information. And listen. Your most innovative ideas can come from your employees and clients.
8. Test, test, test. When validating innovations, expect failures. However, learn quickly from each attempt and build a better solution for the next test. Trust your gut too. User feedback can’t always tell you the best breakthrough idea.

Sustainable growth takes time, repetition, clever creativity, and sound design.

9. Commit long-term to quality marketing and brand. There’s no shortcut to building a prospect and customer funnel – especially for e-commerce and SaaS businesses. You must create awareness and build trust first before sales conversion. Sustainable growth takes time, repetition, clever creativity, and sound design.
10. Value your people and keep it fun. Enshrine positive core values in the company DNA – such as trust, respect, autonomy, hard work, collaboration and having fun. Acknowledge the efforts of your people regularly. Happy employees are effective, committed workers.

What tips would you add to this list?

Does your company need better results? Let Afdonex be your guide.

I’m currently booking limited consulting times for Autumn 2022. Contact don@afdonex.com.

Afdonex helps businesses innovate, pivot and grow.

Don Wieshlow | CEO | Afdonex