Pretty much every new player in Silicon Valley is “disruptive.” The mushrooming incubator scene in Australia is also spawning plenty of “disruptive” start-ups.
With all this disruption going on, it’s a wonder that anyone gets any time, or peace, to actually run a business. Does any business really “disrupt” the market? Or does it merely fulfil a customer need that previously wasn’t been met sufficiently? If so, what does it actually provide that’s new and different?
Telling someone in a pitch situation that your business idea is “exciting” is the equivalent of those people who say “that’s funny” after hearing a joke, without laughing.
Entrepreneurship is very exciting. Starting a business is a high-octane process that can allow you to follow a passion and create jobs for other people. But other people will decide if your product or service is exciting or not. Leave the excitement to them.
An increasingly common term, to “pivot” a business means to revamp its business model and strategy in response to a failing that you only recognise once your start-up is up and running.
It’s vital to continually assess whether your business is hitting the mark in terms of pricing, marketing and product delivery. So you should be “pivoting” your business, in tiny ways, on a weekly, if not daily basis. You shouldn’t need a buzzword to help you do this.
Your customers are not your partners. They have no invested loyalty to your business, especially as you have little track record. Provide a good service at an appropriate price point and they will come back.
If your “collaborative partnership” is with another business, explain exactly what each does for the other. Throwing around vague terms like “synergy” doesn’t make a partnership.
A banal term that has, thankfully, fallen from grace among the business community in recent years. Please don’t ever, ever use this phrase. Ever. It’s been flogged to death.
