6045 Courses

What are the most effective ways to attract customers to your product or service? This video walks through three key steps in depth: Analyzing the marketing programs your competition is using, choosing a marketing mix for your business, and creating your marketing plan.

How are you going to create demand for your products and services? This two-part Learning Stream examines eleven marketing programs in depth, including email marketing, SEO, content marketing, and advertising, with examples of how you can apply the right ones to your business. Explored in this Learning Stream are tactics for deploying the marketing programs you choose, examples of their use, and their impact on your overall marketing budget.

Time to put pen to paper—or fingers to keyboard. Take a look inside the Prep Worksheet that prepares you to write the pricing strategy section of your business plan. The key to success is taking the time necessary to deeply understand your business and be prepared to run it—use this workshop and Prep Worksheet to do just that.

Gain an understanding of how margins work so that you can choose the right price for your product or service. Having a justified pricing strategy will help you avoid common mistakes such as guessing at price-setting, skipping competitive pricing research, leaving money on the table with a too-low price, or misunderstanding the whole value of what you're offering. Learn how supply and demand for your product or service impact price, how to quantify the level of value you're delivering (don't under-value it!), and how market forces impact your pricing. 

Customers as well as investors want to know that you’re going to be offering new and different products, services, and enhancements going forward. That’s what your product roadmap communicates. This walk-through details the 1-to-2 year plan that documents short term and long term product goals, taking you from product launch to the future incarnation of your product or service. Learn why your product roadmap is both a business planning tool and your rollout blueprint and why it’s so important to focus on benefits to the customer (not features!)

It may seem counterintuitive, but perfection is your enemy when it comes to shaping your product or service strategy. You may want everything to be perfect before you launch, but if you ever hope to start ringing up sales, you need to ruthlessly focus instead on just those elements of your offering that address the core customer need, and build a vision and a plan for development that tests your concept in the marketplace sooner rather than later. This learning stream offers guidance on how to shape a product or service vision, strategies for developing a minimum viable product, ways to create a roadmap you’ll stick to, and responses to questions about market defensibility. With examples of real companies cited throughout and workshop sessions for tailoring your own product or service strategy, this learning stream equips you with everything you need to build a product or service strategy that puts launch within reach.

To communicate value to customers, you need more than a list of features; you must communicate both the practical and emotional benefits customers will derive and create a story that calls out the most unique and compelling attributes you offer. This learning stream will guide you through the process of identifying which business elements to highlight in your unique value proposition. You’ll access tools for brainstorming how your offering satisfies emotional desires, alleviates fears or stresses, and addresses immediate practical needs, including prompts specifically for B2B companies. You’ll learn why your unique value proposition is different than your unique competitive advantage, while also surveying your competitors’ unique value propositions to better understand what sets them apart from each other – and what distinct elements your own business should highlight. Workshop exercises will apply the tactics in real life, so that you can better articulate your businesses most compelling and unique benefits and set the stage for success.

Contrary to popular belief, having plenty of competitors is a good sign – that's what makes a thriving market. This course delves deep into the competition, with strategies for identifying and evaluating competitors and classifying them to discover where opportunities lie to fill gaps in the marketplace.

A nascent trend can be wind in the sails of your company. Identifying trends that are relevant to your business, while steering clear of fads, convinces investors that you’ve done your research. And for your business, catching a trend on its upward swing can speed time to profitability. This learning stream not only identifies specific trends to watch, but points you to definitive sources for uncovering the up-cand-coming trends that are most relevant to your business.

When sizing your potential market, it's tempting to say the sky's the limit – but if your goal is an accurate projection, tighten the focus until you have a clear and specific picture. This course introduces the market funnel framework, a three-step process for defining your target audience and sizing segments in terms investors can use and you can apply to your financial plan.