TWELVE Reasons Why Businesses Fail

I have signed up for a copy of the 7 Steps to Successful Startup by Naeem Zafar, a member of the faculty of Haas Business School at the University of California Berkeley. In this free guide Naeem shares insights and lessons learned starting and running companies. He served as the CEO of three Silicon Valley startups, raised over 70 million dollars in venture capital and helped create a company that went public and was later sold for over $150,000,000. These Reasons why businesses fail have been helpful. Hope you find them useful too. Share it with your friends who are CEO’s, business leaders and startup hopefuls.

1. Solving a problem that most users are not willing to pay to solve your way
2. Thinking that you can do it all by yourself (without a founding team)
3. Lacking trust among team members—and not addressing the issue.
4. Being overconfident or dogmatic and not questioning yourself.
5. Lacking a crisp, singular focus—trying to be everything to everyone.
6. Marketing myopia: not having the vision to anticipate changes in the marketplace.
7. Confusing a hobby with a business.
8. Pricing incorrectly and not knowing your real competition.
9. Failing to properly define your market and customers.
10. Not having enough cash or financial resources available.
11. Focusing on a market segment too small to sustain you and the others in it.
12. Starting a business for the wrong personal reasons