Case Study (What Went Wrong)
Introduction
In any business venture, passion and huge customer base are the driving force of success. Lack of any of these two factors will make a business to suffer a great deal. Thus, before starting a business or implementing any business idea, it is necessary to evaluate the aspects of passion with regards to the business venture in question. It is passion in a business idea that makes a proprietor to push on during times of challenges. Lack of passion in a business venture would make the proprietor to give up so easily when the business is hit with challenges during the early stages. The success of any business is also hinged on the market share. A business which can penetrate the intended market will automatically go through a number of constraints. The driving force of the business venture is the customers. If the customers do not buy into the business idea, the business will fail.
The YouCastr’s firm as seen in the case study failed mainly because of these two factors. The firm’s model of revenue never took into account important elements that the company could explore to raise revenue from the users of the platform. They operated on assumption that people would just find it easy to pay commission after using the site for commentating (Stalder, 2010). This paper will evaluate the case study presented on how lack of passion and few customers can kill the business. In the light of YouCastr, the paper will give an explanation of six most common reasons why firms pursue growth, and highlight and explain the difference between internal and external growth strategies. Franchising as a solution for YouCastr will also be discussed in this paper.
There are a number of reasons why firms pursue growth. Key among these reasons is entrepreneurial purposes. As stated by Sexton (1997: 97), the very essence for growth is enterpreneurship. Thus, informed by this argument, firms have focused on growth as a tool that makes them to be more enterpreneurial. In pursuit for growth, firms creat new economic activities which is what enterpreneurship is concerned about. A number of firms also pursue growth as a means to improve the personal income for the firm. However, in other circumstances, it has been noted that instaead of success, some firms end up experiencing the negative results of growth. It has been noted that there is a close association between growth and the financial performance of the firm. Because of this, firms pursue growth.
Firms also pursue growth basically to reduce the risk. They do this by diversifying or using diverfication strategies. A number of firms are also involved in massive acquisitions. Because of this, firms cushion themselves from any kind of risk that may result due to adjustments in the market and other forms of risks. The pursuit of growth by firms can also be attributed to the desire of firms to maximize wealth. The pursuit of growth by firms can also be attributed to the firms’ desire to have high share of the market. Because of this, firms expand their operation and explore new markets by either enhancing the quality of their product or introducing new products that meet the demands of the emerging market. It the intial stages of Youcastr, the ought to have considered product-market combination factors and forecasted the possible challenges that would have a risen. As the business continue to grow, time becomes an important factor. There should not be a rash for the business to pivot if all the avenues for the initial plans have not been explored.
Firms can either employ external growth strategies or internal growth strategies. The external growth strategies that can be employed by firms include mergers and ahquisitions (Stalder, 2010). Firms can also employ the internal growth strategies such as increasing the assets and output by reinvestment the cash flow in the business that is already existing. Most of the cases, these growth strategies for growth can be used simulteneously. Because of the fact that internal growth strategy encourage enterpreneurship and also has the ability to provide a more corporate controll, YouCastr should pursue internal growth strategies. Internal growth strategy is also the best for YouCastr since it is associated with good investment return, low cost. It also encourages innovation.
In franchising, there are three elements which are very key, use of a name which common by the business, pay some amount of money to the parent firm, and benefiting from training, guidance and assistance from the parent firm (Stalder, 2010). Franchising is therefore a method of doing business whose majar aim is expansion and it entails the marketing the product or the services by using the trademark, patent or trade name of the parent and an individual or a group. Because franchising has been used in the acquisition of capital, YouCastr can employ franchising to solve their lack of capital. It is also a very vital marketing strategy that YouCastr can use to solve the problem of few customers for their product. Through franchising, YouCaster would also be able to obtain a business model which is working and by using trademarkes which the consumers know, the market share will improve remarkable.
Conclusion
In general, YouCastr failure was attributed to the fact that the proprietors did not have the knowledge of the kind of market or consumers that the product was intended for. The revenue model was also very poor. Thus, they needed to do an extensive market reseach.
Reference
Sexton, D. L. (1997). Entrepreneurship research needs and issues. Chicago, IL: Upstart Publishing Company.
Stalder, C. L. (2010). People and places: an exploration of Boston start-up formation (Doctoral dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology).
