1. The Startup
Journey
Your 12-Step Action Plan

2. Glory Enyinnaya - ‘’The Digital Business Growth Expert’’
• Started career at Accenture
• Managed change arising from different digital technologies - Microsoft, SAP, Oracle, SAGE and
other bespoke software packages
• Worked for clients in Oil and Gas, Public sector, Banking, Telecommunications etc
• MBA from Lagos Business School
• Launched an online consulting platform ‘’Kleos Africa’’
• Faculty member, ‘’ecommerce and platform strategy’’ at LBS
• Lead mentor, Keystone Startup Advantage program
• Published in the Harvard Business Review
• PhD in Entrepreneurship with a focus on the fintech industry

3. Poll - ‘’What’s the most difficult part of the startup journey?’’
1.Understanding entrepreneurship
2.Building business acumen
3.Creating an innovative product
4.Conducting initial market research
5.Sizing the opportunity
6.Assessing the feasibility
7.Creating a business plan
8.Crafting your branding strategy
9.Test-marketing the product
10.Building your team
11.Defining your entrepreneurial strategy
12.Legal incorporation

4. Learning Objectives
• Understand entrepreneurship
• Build business acumen
• Create an innovative product
• Conduct initial market research
• Size the opportunity
• Assess the feasibility
• Create a business plan
• Craft your branding strategy
• Test marketing
• Build your team
• Your entrepreneurial strategy
• Legal incorporation

5. Phase 1:
Understand
Entrepreneurship

6. Meet Amara
• Recent Computer Science graduate
• She reads the story of a successful female
entrepreneur in Forbes Africa and wonders if
she has what it takes
• She takes an online quiz to determine if she has
entrepreneurial qualities

7. Understand Entrepreneurship
• The Entrepreneurial Vocation: ‘’The call to stewardship’’
• Classes of Entrepreneurship
• The Technology Entrepreneur
• The Social Entrepreneur
• The Small Business Entrepreneur
• Action Steps
• What does entrepreneurship mean to you?
• Do you have the traits of an entrepreneur?
• Why do you want to be an entrepreneur?
• What type of entrepreneur do you want to be?

8. Appraise Yourself
• Assess Your Entrepreneurial Traits
• Autonomy, Risk taking, Self-belief, Resilience
• Avert Business Failure
• Managerial incompetence, Lack of experience, Lack of capital, Failure to plan
• Identify Key Success Factors
• Integrity, strategic planning, lifelong learning, mentorship, work-life balance
• Action Steps
• Take a test to determine your entrepreneurial personality
• https://entrepreneurscan.com/

9. Phase 2:
Build Your
Business Acumen

10. Meet Amara
• She registers for a short course on
entrepreneurship from a leading business
school in Lagos - Riverview Business School -
after speaking with the Riverview Marketing
Manager, Kelechi
• She also takes free online courses on
entrepreneurship from Coursera and edX

11. Acquire Soft Skills
• Keep Abreast Of Innovative Ideas and New Trends
• Create a goal setting system and train yourself to keep score
• Take a course on communication skills
• Take a course in negotiation, mediation and conflict resolution

12. Acquire Hard Skills
• Take a course in accounting
• Take a course in personal finance
• Take a course in business law
• Action Steps
• Learn and practice innovation and creativity, goals and goal setting, business
communication and negotiation
• Take an online course in accounting, personal finance and business law

13. Phase 3:
Create an
Innovative Product

14. Meet Amara
• Amara has a weight problem and is trying to
find a personal trainer
• She asks for a lot of referrals but is unable to
weigh the efficacy of each.
• She hits on an idea for a business - a
marketplace for personal trainers called GetFit

15. Create An Innovative Product or Service
• Analyze Existing Products
• Positive: Non-negotiable, differentiator, exciter
• Negative: Tolerable, dissatisfier, enrager
• Observe the world around you
• Identify a problem eg illiteracy
• 5 Whys: lack of education, lack of schools, lack of funding, budgetary constraints,
competing priorities
• Action Steps
• Use Ace Matrix and 5 Whys to brainstorm solutions to endemic problems

16. Phase 4:
Conduct Initial
Market Research

17. Meet Amara
• She creates a survey and emails it to her blog
followers.
• The responses prove that there is a market

18. Conduct Initial Market Research
• What the Customer wants
• What the Competition cannot deliver
• What the Company can offer
• Integration of insights
• Strategic imperatives
• Action steps
• What’s your reaction to this product?
• Rate the product’s attributes
• What product do you need that other companies that offer similar products are yet to
provide?
• How willing will you be to subscribe to this product at 5k per month?

19. Phase 5: Size the
Opportunity

20. Meet Amara
• She prepares an opportunity report for her
Riverview class project

21. Size the Opportunity
• Executive summary
• Opportunity description
• What is the customer pain? How painful is the pain? Who are your key customers?
What are their preferences and behaviors? Are users and buyers different? What is
your product or service? How innovative is your product or service?
• Revenue model and key assumptions
• Revenue streams, cost structures, key assumptions, break-even point, scalability
• Risk factors and mitigation strategies
• Multi-year financial projections
• Income statement, balance sheet and cash flow
• Action steps
• Why is the opportunity attractive? Can you make money from it? Not every problem
is an opportunity. What are the pitfalls?

22. Phase 6: Assess
the Feasibility

23. Meet Amara
• She has lunch with her Riverview professor, Dr.
Rose Darego, who asks her questions about the
feasibility of her business model

24. Assess the feasibility of your business model
• The customer’s value proposition - Cost, quality
• The business environment - PESTEL
• The industry
• Threat of new entrants, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers,
threat of substitutes, competitive rivalry
• The sustainable competitive advantage
• IP, processes, capabilities resources
• The economic logic
• Revenue forecast, customer acquisition and retention cost, time to obtain a customer,
gross margins, capital required, break-even analysis
• The team
• Mission, aspirations, risk propensity, execution ability, relationships

25. Phase 7: Create a
Business Plan

26. Meet Amara
• She and her team create a draft business plan
• After conducting a market analysis, financial
forecasts and marketing strategy, they
conclude that the idea is profitable

27. Develop the business plan
• The company overview
• Vision, mission, business model, product description, product benefits
• The marketing plan
• STP, 4Ps
• The operations plan
• Scope of operations, team, board
• The financial plan
• Financial projections, funding, risks

28. Phase 8: Your
Branding Strategy

29. Meet Amara
• She creates an elevator pitch for GetFit
• Her team mate, Bola, designs a logo and
graphic identity
• Her team mate, Ben, builds the financial model
• As the programmer and CTO, she builds the
website

30. Choose a name
• Choosing a name
• Availability, pronunciation, positive associations, spelling, memorable, not too long
• Brainstorming
• Social media
• Registering a domain name
• GoDaddy, Bluehost, Name cheap
• Changing your name

31. Build Your 60-second elevator pitch
• Problem
• What You Do
• Your Unique Selling Proposition
• Your Results
• CTA

32. Create a brand identity

33. Create a Prototype
• Creating physical goods
• Creating software
• Creating services
• Action steps

34. Phase 9: Test
Marketing

35. Meet Amara
• She sends the link to the website to her blog
followers. A healthy number sign up
• She revises her prices and updates her business
plan.

36. Test the Prototype
• Create hypotheses
• Run tests
• Pivot
• Achieve product-market fit
• Action steps

37. Phase 10: Build
Your Team

38. Meet Amara
• She hires Bola as her Marketing Lead
• She hires Ben as her CFO
• She asks her former boss, Sandra, to be on her
advisory board

39. Assemble a team
• Team vs group
• Assigning team roles
• Action steps

40. Onboard your co-founders
• Ownership of the shares
• Background and rationale of the agreement
• General commitments
• Competition restriction clause
• Exit situations
• Action steps

41. Appoint advisors
• Identify the stage of the company
• Agree the advisor’s involvement
• Action steps

42. Phase 11: Your
Entrepreneurial
Strategy

43. Meet Amara
• She registers GetFit as a partner to the
National Trainer’s Association, as part of the
value-chain strategy

44. Choose an entrepreneurial strategy
• Value chain strategy
• Disruptive strategy
• Blue ocean strategy
• Action steps

45. Phase 12: Legal
Incorporation

46. Meet Amara
• She asks her friend, Martha, to incorporate the
legal entity

47. Incorporate the Business
• Sole proprietorship
• Partnership
• Limited liability company
• Action steps

48. Launch Party!
NOW THE REAL WORK BEGINS …

49. Let’s Connect
• Website: www.gloryenyinnaya.com
• Email: glory@gloryenyinnaya.com
• Phone Number: 08022951048

50. THANK YOU