How to improve business understanding if there is no opportunity to get in touch with the business?

How can you improve your business understanding before you have the conditions to get started with the business? The author divides business understanding into three parts: business model, business model, and business execution. The relationship between them and how to execute them are sorted out in layers. Let's take a look!

There is a common confusion: How can I improve my understanding of the business if I don’t have any contact with the business on a regular basis?

This problem is very common for students who have not yet started an internship or new data analysts who are far away from the business team. If they don’t know the solution, it will indeed greatly affect their subsequent development.

Let’s chat briefly today.

1. What is business understanding?

Analyze first and then talk about the method.

Understanding the concept is the first step to follow-up actions. So first of all, we need to be clear about what business understanding is.

I think business understanding can be divided into three levels:

1. Business Model : This is the strategic aspect of the business. The questions to ask are: “What is our business model? How do we make money?”
2. Business model : This focuses on the strategic aspects of the business. You need to understand the business process, such as: "How do we acquire users? What strategies do we use to keep them interested?"
3. Business Execution : This is the detailed execution side of the business. Questions covered include day-to-day operational processes, such as: “How do we replace a creative?”

If you can clarify these three questions, you will have a more comprehensive understanding of the business.

1. The first level of business understanding: business model

The business model answers a basic question: “ How does the company make money ?”

To understand a company's business model, the specific approach is to first analyze the target market and customer segments to clarify the company's value proposition . Then, determine which channels to reach customers, what kind of customer relationships to establish, and how to generate revenue .

In addition, the key resources and activities required to realize the business model, as well as possible partners , should be identified. Finally, the cost structure should be carefully analyzed to ensure the sustainability of the business model.

The business model is the easiest to understand among the three types of business . What products does your company sell and to whom? Even if you don’t see the entire sales process with your own eyes, you will have a general idea of ​​this information.

Because you yourself are a consumer and may also be using this company's products.

However, you may not be aware of more in-depth information such as the cost structure of your partners.

If your company or the company you want to research is a listed company, you can get a preliminary understanding of this information through the disclosed financial statements.

If your company does not have financial reports, you can probably get some information about partners and costs by chatting with others. People generally like to gossip about their own company because this information often contains some interesting stories between senior executives and suppliers or among senior executives, which are not difficult to find out.

I have worked in several companies, and most of what I know about large corporate strategic directions, interesting stories between suppliers, and complaints about strategies are obtained through casual chatting with colleagues.

People just love gossip, especially gossip about higher-ups.

2. The second level of business understanding: business model

The business model focuses on the business process and the tactics chosen to execute the business model strategy . Even if the business models of two companies are very similar, there will definitely be some differences between the two business models.

Because different companies have different resources and capabilities, the methods and approaches they choose when implementing business strategies will be different.

For example, Company A also provides video services. Company A has stronger content production capabilities, so in terms of content acquisition, Company A relies more on its own content team . By building its own content, it expands its content library.

Company B has more channel capabilities for copyright cooperation, so it tends to adopt cooperation or copyright purchase methods to acquire content .

Although the business models of these two companies are to sell content services through the Internet and their customer base is similar, the production link of obtaining content has two different business models: self-built content and purchasing copyrights.

The business model also includes more specific processes .

If you create your own content , what mechanisms and processes can ensure that you can produce content of sufficient quality?

If you purchase copyrights , what means are there to ensure that you can purchase content of sufficient quality?

In addition to content acquisition, there are many different business models such as customer demand identification, product development, marketing, sales, delivery to customer support, supply chain management, etc.

It is more difficult to understand the differences in business models than in commercial models . Many specific operating methods can only be discovered within the company.

Because many of these operating methods are time-sensitive. Some methods from half a year ago may be outdated. The business model within the company is constantly being updated, so if you are outside the company, it is difficult for you to understand it so clearly.

But we don’t need to limit the business model of a certain company, because for beginners, what is more important is that you need to know what are the common business models on the market?

There are various short video platforms, various books, and various tutorials. There are a lot of introductions to business models in various industries. You can find the corresponding content according to the business you want to know.

For example, if you want to learn about supply chain management, then search for content related to supply chain management. If you want to learn about channel delivery, then search for content related to channels.

It is not difficult to search for this relevant information. The difficult part is that if you don’t know that business is structured as “business model, business model, business execution”, no matter how much content you watch on business practices on short video platforms, it will be difficult for you to form a complete and comprehensive understanding of the business.

Of course, the above method can only give you a superficial understanding of the business model. If you want to have a deeper understanding, you still need to consult with colleagues in the company who are responsible for this business.

3. The third level of business understanding: business execution

Business execution involves daily standard operating procedures (SOPs), which are specific guidelines and steps that employees should follow in their daily work.

These SOPs ensure that business activities are performed in a consistent and efficient manner, while also helping to reduce errors and increase productivity.

Business execution varies even more from company to company .

Even if the same online delivery tool is used, there will be huge differences due to the different number and capabilities of team members.

We need to know who is responsible for a business action, which one he handles, what kind of action he needs to complete, how long it takes to complete the action, and other specific information.

Sometimes having this kind of information won't help you analyze more deeply , but it will help you avoid making outrageous suggestions when you make them.

For example, you think the ad landing page needs to be replaced with new materials. You hope that the right side can provide 30 sets of different materials for ab testing.

When you made this suggestion, the business side just laughed.

He asked, "Do you know how many ads you can make in a day? Do you know that making an ad creative is not just about changing a sticker? Do you know that you need to review, verify, and test it before it goes online?"

You don't know, you don't know anything, you just know that you need to do ab testing.

Regarding business execution, the best way is to stay with the business team and watch their daily work. This is very different for each company, and each company has different processes and efficiencies. The information you get through public channels may not be helpful to the current company.

There is another way to accumulate this kind of experience. After we analyze some conclusions, we synchronize our analysis conclusions with the business side. The business staff will discuss these conclusions and discuss the subsequent plans. This is your best opportunity to accumulate business execution experience. Many analysts who are very familiar with the company's business often have been deeply involved in multiple different business teams. They are very familiar with their execution style and process.

Because the biggest differences between different companies are in business execution, if you can be very clear about business execution, then you will be very scarce to the company.

2. Conclusion

Understanding business models, analyzing business models and mastering business execution, these three levels constitute the core of business understanding.

If you have no contact with the business, it is still possible to figure out the first two through public information . But the last one, business execution, must be in contact with the front-line business, which is unavoidable.

Author: Jason

Source: WeChat public account "Sanyuan Variance (ID: sanyuanfangcha)"