The who, why, and how of your product

Tom Evans, principal at consultancy and training company The Lûcrum Group and creator of the highly-acclaimed From Napkin to Revenue practice

Having long experience in numerous industries, ­technologies, and international markets, how can you help startups and entrepreneurs in Vietnam improve their chances of success amidst stiffening competition?

It’s a fact that over 80 per cent of new products fail. The number one cause for this high failure rate is that startups and entrepreneurs jump into ­creating new products or ­services before they ­understand if anyone other than them thinks they are a good idea and is willing to pay for it.

To improve the chances of success in the market, ­entrepreneurs must ask ­themselves these three ­questions that are most ­commonly asked by investors:

- Who are your ­customers?

- Why will they buy your products?

- How are you going to make money?

From Napkin to Revenue is a practice of The Lûcrum Group, a consultancy and training company that ­specialises in helping organisations and entrepreneurs around the world develop successful products and effective go-­to-market strategies. The Lûcrum Group serves businesses of every shape and size, from startups to Fortune 500 ­companies.

The practice delivers a step-by-step process that helps entrepreneurs discover needs that people are willing to pay to solve, significantly increasing the odds of transforming their entrepreneurial dream into a successful product or service.

From Napkin to Revenue involves a six-hour workshop that teaches entrepreneurs a proven step-by-step process that will increase the chances of product success.

Throughout this highly interactive workshop, participants will have opportunities to apply the principles to their own ideas, ask specific questions, and interact with other aspiring entrepreneurs who bring a wealth of knowledge from their individual experiences.

Not only do we teach practices for successful entrepreneurship, but we also help accelerate entrepreneurs to success by coaching startups in applying the process of successful products. The coaching sessions are conducted one-on-one with the startup companies to guide them in applying the From Napkin to Revenue principles. Coaching sessions are scheduled at regular intervals for 30 to 60 minutes and ensure that participants progress through the process of creating successful products.

Which are the industries and businesses most benefitting from the practice, and could you share some examples of companies achieving success with the programme?

From Napkin to Revenue will benefit any aspiring entrepreneur and small business owner in any industry who want to improve their opportunity for success as they pursue their entrepreneurial dream and create new products and services for their market. So far, companies from across multiple industries, including manufacturing, IT, healthcare, and financial services, implement more effective product and market practices with our help.

In order to create greater visibility for startups and to enhance the skills of entrepreneurs, we conduct a pitch challenge where the aspiring entrepreneurs can refine their business opportunity and practice pitching it to a panel of experts and potential investors. The pitch challenge kicks-off with the workshop, includes acceleration coaching sessions, and culminates in the pitch challenge.

I also have had the opportunity to work with companies across many different industries and one of the chronic issues I saw was that they focus on technology or they focus on creating something that they think is interesting, but they do not really check to see if there is a need in the marketplace for it.

A Brazilian software company I worked with is a good example. They had an idea about this document management product. One customer said this is a product that should be marketed and they started developing it. I ended up living in Brazil for three years, but what I helped them understand is that it is not just building a product, but also being very clear about the problem that the customers have and how we are helping to solve that problem. I spent more time understanding the customers, helping them guide the developers so that they were building products that actually met the needs of customers. At the same time, they need to know how we sell the product and so understand how we communicate the value of the product that we are delivering.

Another example, from several years ago, is a project with a group of companies from Guadalajara, Mexico. In this particular case, they were companies that wanted to export services to the US. I have had the opportunity to speak to many different software development companies in different countries and one of the things I ask them is why I should buy their products. The answer is always because they say they can do everything. That is what everybody else around the world is selling, in India, Vietnam, Romania – absolutely everywhere.

So what I did with these companies in Guadalajara is to help them identify and deliver their value, and how it can be different from other companies, thus helping them gain success.

In terms of the trends of doing business among Vietnamese startups at the moment, how can Vietnam address existing problems to provide a good platform for startups to grow?

I have experience in doing business with startups in Brazil, Mexico, and the US, and a little bit with companies in Africa. Actually, many Vietnamese startups have chosen to set up their business in Singapore and then go back to Vietnam to do business. There are probably three reasons for this. One is the regulatory environment and the difficulty in setting up a company in Vietnam. I expect the second reason is that Singapore offers better access to capital. The third reason would be the size of the market.

The government needs to think about how to break down the barriers for startups to make it easier for them, to enable them to develop greatly in their own country.

The population of Vietnam is around 100 million, so it is not a small country, which means it has a very big marketplace with large possibilities. So long as the economy keeps growing, I think that the third issue will sort itself out.

Could you make a comparison between the Vietnamese market and other regional countries in terms of potential growth and market size? And what are your future plans for Vietnam?

Vietnam holds great potential for us. In reality, our target customers are companies of any size, but I want to focus on the startup community in Vietnam first because startups are one of the top priorities for the government here.

I plan to work with government agencies. We had a recent meeting with the Ministry of Planning and Investment last month. I know that there are similar programmes at the Ministry of Science and Technology and so I am planning to find a line that we can work with different government agencies to help startup companies.

The technology sector, including innovation, is what we want to focus on because it is the investment priority for the government. The application of IT is very deep. It is being used across all sectors, from large to small businesses. I think there is an opportunity for the smaller companies and businesses in Vietnam to start adopting and applying IT.

As for the first part of the question, I see no difference ­between the Vietnamese ­market and other regional countries when it comes to the application of the practice.

I have been training ­companies from the US, ­Europe, the Middle East, and Africa – and the principles are the same, no matter where you are. It always goes back to what problems you are solving, then creating products that solve those problems, and making sure that you are getting ­feedback from your customers on a continuous basis.

I have recently entered the Vietnamese market by striking up a local parnetship. We have just begun working with a Vietnamese company called Stockshinobi, which is developing a portal called Aladin to help analysts and consultants to more effectively share insights with investors and to help investors make better decisions.

The ­Vietnamese partner ­manages the legal and ­regulatory ­aspects of business here, as well as lands whatever training events we want to do, and help promote them here in ­Vietnam.