An Introduction to Business Development

 

What is Business Development?

The exact definition of Business Development will mean different things to different people, but for me it is about activities aimed toward making the business better including building relationships with existing customers, building relationships to potentially win new work and build partnerships with others, pitching for new work and working with others internally. The end goal of all of this is to bring in work, improve your offering and increase profitability.

Generally speaking Networking furthers my Business Development Goals. However, Networking is only a small part of Business Development.

Further Reading:

• What, Exactly, Is Business Development? (via Forbes)
• Sales vs. Business Development: What’s the Difference? [FAQ] (via Hubspot)

Joined Up Business Development

While some companies will have “Business Development Executives” (or other similarly named roles) business development activities generally extend across different departments within the company. Everyone has their own role to play. Therefore it is important that all departments with in the business have aligned business development goals. In addition if you are in a role where you are required to “win business” you also need to have your own business development goals.  You will need to develop your own goals separately but still make sure that they are aligned so that you can draw on support when you need to.

However, for joined up Business Development to be successful. You need to have your finger on the pulse of the company.

If you are representing your company you need to know not just about your company’s goals but also:

• the business model of your company
• your recent successes
• the overall industry
• competitor developments
• primary sources of sales/revenues
• the customer profile
• target and new market opportunities
• future expansion plans

By having an understanding of these things you shoud be able to hold a conversation about business when you are out networking. If you get asked.

How can you use your networking to further your business development?

Often your networking goals and your personal business development goals will be aligned.

For example you may want to get X number of referrals – your network can help you do this. You might want to do more work for X existing client – your internal networking strategy can help you with this.

So when considering your networking goals and what you want to get out of attending a particular event – don’t forget to also consider your business development goals (and the goals of your company).