The 7-Step Easy Business Model Validation Process for Mompreneurs

This won’t be any of those overly long blogs you constantly find when you search for something a bit technical or formal.

I mean, it’s business model validation. How hard can it be? How hard should it be, right?

So in less than 7 minutes, I’ll prepare you to validate your business model.

I’ll skip the “find a problem, create the solution” or the “meet a need” anthem. You’ve had enough of that already 

Shall we begin?

1. Clearly Define Your Business Model:

I had not treated this as anything of importance previously. 

However, two incidents changed my mind. 

The first one was when I first transitioned to being a mompreneur. Because I didn’t take the time to decide exactly what my business would be and how it would be, I ended up with a big mess. 

I couldn’t even contract or outsource a good team because I could not share that beautiful vision with them. This led to the second incident.

The second incident was when I tried to share my business model with my husband. You should have seen us that night, lol.

We were like a couple of confused, well, couples. I was trying to explain my model to him and got upset when he asked logical questions I couldn’t answer correctly. 

After that incident, I didn’t need a fortune teller to tell me I needed to take the time to decide, and then define my business model. 

Doing so will not only save you from potential detours, but also allow you to clearly communicate what you do to your customers, team, and investors if you decide to roll that way.

2. Identify and Understand Your Target Customers:

You already decided who your customers would be when you chose the need to meet or the problem to solve.

Well, say you decided to open a restaurant on a busy street, your customers are obviously the people who live in that street and around the area right?

Well, not exactly, even with that, you’d still have to categorize.

• Maybe you want to focus on the working class within that area.
• You could decide to focus on vegans.
• You could decide to focus on budget eaters.

That’s not all, but you get the picture, within the vast pool of potential customers, you should decide who your target customers are.

This way you can improve your business and stand out.

Think of it this way, a big eatery joins the competition in that area, they offer everything and you focus on serving a particular class. The odds are even with all that, you’d have customers who’d still choose to come to you because they know your business specializes in serving that class.

3. Test Your Business Model:

You can’t validate your business model if you haven’t tested it somehow, somewhere. 

The good thing is, that you can easily test almost any model, digital or physical. 

Run a restaurant? Open up, serve meals, and leave a questionnaire/survey at each table.

Run e-commerce? Just start, and then check customer response. 

Run a consulting service? Start, and run a survey after some time.

Don’t just rely on basic global data on the internet. After all, your methods will have subtle differences from the standard…won’t they?

Based on feedback, you can 

• Make adjustments 
• Get enough data to improve into a completely new model in the same business concept.

4. Time For A Little Mathematics:

You’re almost done with your validation, you’re at the final part.

Now you’ve defined your business model and done other things I suggested… including the tests.

It’s time to add the numbers.

When you decided to start your business, 

• How much monthly revenue did you decide was good enough?
• How much did you decide was okay cost-wise?

Now you’ve tested your business model,

• How much revenue did you make in that time frame? (1,3, or 6 months).
• How much did you spend?
• Did you make a profit, loss, or break even?
• Were there timely improvements?
• Did you meet any milestones?

Make sure your business model made more money during the test than it took away. 

If it didn’t, before deciding the model has a problem check if,

• There were timely improvements. 
• You kept meeting milestones. 

If your answers are positive then you have a viable business model.

If your answers are negative, then your business is not viable. It would be best to consider other models.

Business Model Validation Complete: What’s Next?

I told you I’d have you ready in less than 7 minutes right? Well, Charmaine keeps her word 😉

Passion led you here, preparation will lead you further. Now you’ve successfully learned how to easily validate your business model, it’s time to go further.

After your business model validation, start, and improve as it goes. It’s that simple, there’s no need for you to complicate things.

P.S. If you want to do a SWOT analysis for your business and don’t know how to, check out this article where I shared an easy way to conduct one.

You could also listen in on my podcast, A (Mostly) Stay-at-Home Mom, where I share weekly tips for busy moms earning or looking to earn a side income. Find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and my homepage!