5. Innovate to your business model Some business owners get so excited about the prospect of new innovation that they start rushing products and services into the marketplace without focusing on where success will be best achieved. In the long run, we find this haste makes waste in time and money. It can also take a business off-course from a direction that will bring sustained innovation and growth. Understanding what is unique about your business model and the values by which you will operate can begin a flurry of ideas for years to come. Creating a unique business model is a basis for innovation that helps focus a large vision down to hundreds of possibilities for new products and services. Otherwise, without a business model programmed by your core strengths, those ‘good’ hundreds of possibilities can easily turn into a mess of thousands that will overwhelm or stifle an organization’s creativity and ability to grow. For the opportunity-seeking entrepreneur, business modeling may seem like too much structure that could potentially limit the organization. Yet paradoxically, from it can spring innovative products and services that a) currently do not exist, b) are designed by what the business can realistically deliver, and c) reach untapped consumer demand. That’s why successful business owners in 2011 will create unique business models and use them as tools for introducing new products and services to specific customer segments that make the most sense for their available resources. They will (with a sense of urgency) take a few extra steps to target the most viable segments who desire the business’ most reliable core strengths. << Growth Trends #4 : Growth Trends #6 >>