There are no shortcuts in business. That is a clear statement from Mark Cuban, and it matches what every great businessperson in history has said. Success is a long road, full of ups and downs, and at times very hard. But according to Cuban, there are some things every entrepreneur should master, or at least try to.
There are many more, but Cuban sets out the ones he considers most important, because they helped him succeed in business and become a billionaire. He has also written an enjoyable, recommended 79-page ebook called How to Win at the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It.
(Read: the fascinating life and career of Mark Cuban)
1. Know how to sell.
As we have said many times, life is one long sales pitch. We are selling all the time. What Cuban means, though, is that you must be able to convey why your product or service is what the customer, or the customer’s company, needs. A sale is not about making a sale. It is always about helping the customer with your product.
2. Put yourself in the customer’s shoes.
If you know how to help your customers succeed, you can succeed. You must be able to quickly understand your customers’ needs, market demand, and the needs of the companies you work with or for.
Every person and every industry is different, so you have to invest a good deal of time in finding out what an industry needs. It is a process you never finish learning, so you have to keep informed and up to date. If you don’t understand what your customers need, if you don’t know how to improve the companies you work with, you don’t really know how to succeed in business.
3. Learn everything you can about technology.
The beauty of technology, according to Cuban, is that it changes practically every day. Any new technology you saw yesterday, today or at any time was invented by someone, and that person knew the product better than anyone and probably knew what the market needed at that moment. The day that technology becomes known to everyone, you lose your competitive edge, because you know only what everyone else knows.
New technologies make change possible, and where there is change, there is opportunity. But in this technological age of constant change, the best does not always win; the fastest does.
4. Always ask yourself how you would design a solution if the current one didn’t exist.
Cuban says that 99% of what we do in business today is done the same way it has always been done. Successful businesspeople look at things as ordinary as buying clothes, eating in a restaurant or making a payment, and think about how to reinvent them.
Many don’t ask people what they want because, as Henry Ford supposedly said, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” Many successful entrepreneurs create a new app, service or product, and only once they have created it do they decide what to do with it. *That said, this advice shouldn’t be taken literally.
5. Create value.
Ultimately, an entrepreneur is someone who makes life easier for other people, and whose contribution brings a positive change in the way things are done. If you create something of value for people, they will welcome it with open arms, so you won’t need to focus so much on making money. You just need to focus on improving people’s lives and solving problems. The money will follow.
6. Be nice.
People hate dealing with unpleasant people. It is always easier to be nice than to be a jerk. So don’t be a jerk. It will open doors for you.
This article originally appeared on Mark Cuban’s blog, Blog Maverick, and has been adapted and modified.
Further reading
- Andrew Carnegie’s 10 rules for getting rich
- If you’re going to fail in business, this is the way to do it
- The main mistake I keep seeing small business owners make
Featured image: Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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