No one is immune to complacency. A company sits back to ride a wave of success only to find some scrappy startup making a leaner, meaner product targeted directly to its users. Suddenly, it becomes irrelevant — or at least loses some of its relevance.
That’s what happened to Microsoft. It had held onto the belief that its dominance would allow it to dictate the pace of innovation, and that was a mistake.
But with the appointment of Satya Nadella as CEO, Microsoft is experiencing resurgence.
Following the crowd has never been the way to emerge as a leader. However, learning from companies that went from small startups to enterprise successes is just plain smart.
Enterprise applications are in the middle of an enormous growth spurt. International Data Corporation predicts that these businesses will generate $50.8 billion in revenue by 2018, amounting to a compound annual growth rate of 17.6 percent.
Companies such as HubSpot and Slack are grabbing headlines for their innovative offerings and impressive growth trajectories. What are they doing that’s so special?
The new generation of consumers feels comfortable being “asset poor” but “experience rich.” This new way of thinking has given rise to the sharing economy. PricewaterhouseCoopers predicts the global revenues of the sharing economy could hit $335 billion in 2025, up from $15 billion in 2014.
The beauty of the sharing economy is that it allows sellers to get more value from their resources, and it allows buyers to enjoy products and services without commitment.
While this creates great opportunities for entrepreneurs, there are things that need to be in place for the growth trajectory of the sharing economy to continue to skyrocket. And it pays to learn from both the established and fledgling companies leading the charge.
Getting a marketplace to scale is often just as difficult as building one. The challenge is not only demand, but also supply. And it takes the right balance between the two to improve — or maintain, for that matter — sales volume and profit margins. Because without enough buyers and sellers, what’s the real incentive for either to hang around? Continue reading
Niche markets almost always develop out of an unmet need. You start by finding people’s pain points — either in their personal or professional lives — then dream up ways to solve those problems.
That’s exactly what HotelTonight did when it saw the need for last-minute hotel bookings via mobile devices. In three taps, users can find deals and book rooms anywhere at any time. The whole process takes 10 seconds. And as a mobile-only platform, hotels can offer exclusive deals that aren’t available online.
But filling an unmet need isn’t the only lesson niche marketplaces can lend the business world.
In late March, Amazon Home Services launched as a marketplace to connect customers with more than two million service offers across more than 700 professional services. The move was no surprise. Amazon wants to be a one-stop shop for consumers, and adding services is the obvious next step.
But Amazon’s method was surprising — and surprisingly smart. Instead of tackling the industry on its own, Amazon partnered with TaskRabbit to launch the new platform.
This is a departure from Amazon’s usual practice of directly taking on competitors. The partnership was a strategic move, and it offers a lesson for entrepreneurs and business leaders.
We recently partnered with CoVenture to do some research around the future of marketplaces and marketplace infrastructure. Find out more on Ali Hamed of CoVenture’s medium post here, but you can see the deck below. Let us know what you think!
