How does VouchFor Work? from john stewart on Vimeo.

When big businesses make a strategic misstep it can cost them a pretty penny, but you can learn from their mistakes for free. John Stewart, serial entrepreneur and founder of Toronto-based Vouchfor!, a marketing referral platform in the cloud, shares how he’s applied lessons learned from various industries to his own start-up.

1. Keep it simple. I’ve seen too many companies make the mistake of over complicating their product or offering as they grow, especially large enterprises – they begin to lose their identity. They’re trying to offer their customers more and more, when often times the simplicity of their offering is what made it popular in the first place. It doesn’t matter if you’re a six-person company or sixty thousand, you should be able to explain what your company does in 15 seconds or less. Being the best at one thing is far better than being mediocre at twenty things.

2. Don’t try to change people. Companies that have a big slice of market share often times make the mistake of believing that they can control customer behaviour. Never assume that you know what your customer wants better than the customer themselves. My best successes have been in building applications that enable a common human behaviour, vs. trying to change it, which isn’t intuitive and can lead to costly marketing needs and slow adoption. Ebay and Craigslist are both successful examples of this. They took a human behaviour that has existed for centuries (auctioning or bartering) and revolutionized the concept using modern technology.

3. Invest in people first, technology second. Often companies focus on technology first, then people. Companies often think, ‘we have to have the best product above all else’. While having a great product is critical to your success, if your finances aren’t in order or you don’t have someone to promoting your fabulous product, you won’t have a very sustainable business. Big companies can get fat and end up carrying around a lot of dead weight – people who are unmotivated to think outside the box. You really need to hire the people who will add the most value to your project, then make them “incentives” to share their ideas and products. That’s what creates a truly successful business.

4. Don’t forget patience and flexibility. Things can take time to germinate and unfold. If you’ve hired people you believe in, give new ideas time to get off the ground. Trial and error is a good thing. At the same time, you should be prepared to ‘pivot’ and make changes to your current business model. Big businesses often get stagnant – the bigger you are the harder it is to change. If you remember to always stay nimble and respond appropriately to market changes and changes in human behaviour, you’ll keep your business relevant.

John Stewart is the founder of Toronto-based Vouchfor!, a marketing referral platform in the cloud. For over 15 years, he has been a successful internet entrepreneur with significant experience inside the search engine marketing, optimization, and website development realms. John's ultimate goal has been to improve the human experience and enhance local commerce via the web.