Three of our recent guest speakers, Evan Adams of NoWait, Sam Weber of ProfilePasser, and Jim VanEerden of various companies, have all said something very similar about entrepreneurship: Great entrepreneurs create the world as it ought to be.
Evan Adams and Jim VanEerden both said this explicitly and almost verbatim to one another, while Sam Weber exemplifies it through her passion for her industry and the problem that she is solving within the soccer recruiting world.
What’s so special about this concept that three great entrepreneurs would mention it?
It emphasizes the imperative for entrepreneurs (and salespeople alike) to start with a problem. One can note that it would be quite nice if every day everyone in the world was provided with a bowl of ice cream, but the success of venturing to make this come to fruition would depend on motivation.
If you were to say that every day everyone in the world should be provided with a bowl of ice cream because ice cream tastes good, you would not meet with much success. In fact, the idea of making this reality would be seen as humorous.
Say, though, you thought that everyone in the world should be provided with a bowl of ice cream every day because there are too many hungry people in the world and you want to change that, you would be met with more success. You are starting with a problem: there are hungry people. You see how it ought to be: there ought to be fewer hungry people in the world. You propose a way to make this reality: provide every one in the world with daily ice cream. If this didn’t work, you’d then move on to a different way to make the “ought to be” a reality.
This may seem like a silly example, but try applying it to real, successful entrepreneurship ventures. Jeff Bezos, for example, started with the problem that books were difficult to attain for many people. He saw that it ought to be easier for people to access great literature, information, and entertainment through books. His solution to make this a reality became Amazon.com, which has since proven to be a huge success.
Sales, too, should be this way. If you don’t start with a problem it will be difficult for a prospect to see it as worth parting with their money for something frivolous and/or unnecessary. If you start with a problem, however, you will see fewer cases of buyer’s remorse and more successful sales.
testacr22
Great comparison. For the salesperson, the main difference in this mission to “create the world as it ought to be” is that the roles are reversed: salespeople create the world that the client is envisioning, whether explicitly or subconsciously. The approach always starts with the pain and moves towards a sales relationship that results in a mutual outcome that fulfills the ideals of both people in this partnership. Once this ideal world is realized, a genuine feeling of rapport is developed.