Re:Focus: Market Opportunities Don’t Exist

A very successful shoemaker in the United States was considering expanding his business into India. He decided to conduct some market research to help him properly assess the market opportunity before he could make his final decision. He sent one of his sons to travel the country from north to south.  He sent his other son to travel the country from south to north.

After one year away, his two sons returned with their reports.

“We must expand to India,” said the son who traveled north to south. “No one there has shoes, the market opportunity is amazing.”

“There’s no point expanding to India,” said the son who traveled south to north. “No one there has shoes, there’s no demand.”

 A market opportunity is not a thing that exists or doesn’t exist. No amount of research can conclude that there is or isn’t a market opportunity.  A market opportunity is nothing more than a perception.  Some perceive opportunities where others do not.  Some succeed where others fail.  And some fail where others succeed. This is the reason it is unwise to wake up everyday in pursuit of market opportunities.  Why not chase unicorns? There is not a single example of a person or organization that ever achieved greatness by chasing a market opportunity. 

Greatness starts with a problem that needs solving. The opportunity comes from marketing a solution that works. Sharing that solution becomes a cause.  The cause inspires people to help.  And when people are inspired to help, organizations become great.

If we were to look into the history of the successful American shoemaker, we might learn about a problem that he set out to solve that inspired him in the first place.  Something few people know is that he grew up very poor in a very rural part of the country, a mile and a half from the nearest town.  They were so poor they didn’t own a car or horse.  They were so poor, they didn’t even have shoes.  They had no way to cross the rocky, dirt roads to get to town.

One day, a passing traveler gave him a pair of shoes.  The young boy put on the shoes and, for the first time in his life, he could walk across the sharp rocks on the dirt road without cutting up his feet.  It was this one pair of shoes that made it possible for him to walk to town to get a job.  It was this job that helped lift him and his family out of poverty.  It was this one pair of shoes that inspired him.  He vowed that he would see to it that everyone in the world would have shoes so they could walk to and from work and provide for their families.

India, as it turns out, has many poor people and many sharp, rocky dirt roads.  Is the opportunity to sell shoes or is to help people to live in dignity and provide for their families simply because they can walk across rocky, dirt roads to get to work?

Solve a problem, pursue a cause and, who knows, you might just sell a billion pairs of shoes in the process.

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