Opportunities is all that matters

Here are six steps to help you identify opportunities.

STEP 1: Pay attention to details around you.

It is very common to browse a website and feel the user experience and entire design is crappy. For most of us, we complain and say “just look at the useless thing they call a website” but actually that is an opportunity to learn User Experience Design (UX Design) and use it to make money.

Learning UX Design is easy, quick and almost free as long as you can browse the internet. When you complain in this situation, you lose an opportunity.

Rather, why not learn UX design, create a personal website to highlight what you can do, and as you go about your day, when you come across something that is a bad design, you find a way to promote how you can make it better.

Ok, you might say, "I am not good with techy stuff and building websites or UX design is not my thing" But you are a smooth talker. Why not identify those design flaws, build a business case, connect with the people who need the service (maximize your network) and hire freelancers to do it.

All you do here is research to identify the opportunity or know one when you see it,

create a story to sell how you can make that design experience better, reach the client, sell what you can do, find a designer and boom. Make money with design without actively designing anything.

I can go on and on but bottom-line, when you pay attention to details, you will surely discover opportunities in almost everything you do.

Step 2: See the bigger picture

There was a time, I was speaking to a group, and one guy said to me, “most of my friends buy stuff from Ali express. Is there a way I can be the middle man for them? How can I find an opportunity in that?”. I asked him if he had heard about drop shipping and he said no. Long story short, I had to explain what drop shipping is and last time I heard from him; he has started a drop shipping business.

It might be a small idea for you but trust me, if you can see the bigger picture, you will be amazed. If you are still in school, there might be about 50 or more business centers in or around your school. That is an opportunity.

Step 3: Research Opportunities

I know some of us might say, “it is not easy to see opportunity in everything” and I agree with you but there is another way to go about it and that is to research.

we are currently in the digital era and almost everything we do is on the internet. Why not research what’s trending and turn it to an opportunity.

You can basically observe what is happening or trending around you or do it online.

With tools such as SEM Rush https://www.semrush.com/dashboard/, Trends24 https://trends24.in/ and more. Even just a google search gives you a whole lot of insights. You can actually identify trending topics and keywords and start thinking of how to turn it into an opportunity.

If people are talking about it, they will surely buy it.

Step 4: Turn your niche into an opportunity.

According to Ryan Robinson, “A niche doesn’t have to be your passion, but it does have to be an interest of yours” Let’s look at these few questions also from Ryan;

What's an interest or dream from your childhood that you find exciting?What’s the absolute best part of your day? Do you have any hobbies or hobbies that you want to learn?What is a deeply held value of yours?What’s one achievement that you’re incredibly proud of?

According to Ryan, for each of these questions, you are able to define items that you care about. Basically, you are exploring your niche. There are many more ways to identify your niche but as soon as you identify it, you can take the next step to figure out how do people experience it.

Then you try to find the common challenges today with that niche. you go on to document what you can do to make a difference and then you apply the final three simple steps below.

Step 5: Monetize your ideas and opportunities.

You can have the best opportunities but if you do not monetize these opportunities, you are simply learning. It is good to learn but I know you will agree with me that is better to turn that knowledge to a revenue generating endeavor. How you monetize the opportunity and the idea is another topic beyond this, but the main point is to ensure you monetize the idea.

Step 6: Iterate

No matter how beautiful and amazingly you transform your opportunity, it is still a MVP; a Minimum Viable Product. This means, the product can become better after testing and feedback. I recommend always iterate and make it better even if you already started making money from it because people are watching, and they will put you out of business if you do not transform.

The only way you can identify opportunities out of seemingly impossible situations is when you become a continuous learner. By learning continuously, you are able to see diverse ways of expressing those situations and by extension turning them into opportunities. When you fail to learn, you will see an opportunity and you will miss it.

We have been talking about how you can find opportunities that can help you become an entrepreneur but what about opportunities in your current field of interest, job or domain?

As you can see, the world of works is changingand if entrepreneurship is not your thing, you do not need to force it but you also need to maximize the opportunities in your industry.

One way to go about it is understanding the skills that are in high demand today and the skills needed for you to build the future. Do not limit yourself to the skills needed to succeed within the walls of your country.

Have a global mindset, build your skills beyond what you are taught in the classroom, Not sure any lectuer will teach you skills such as Agile, Design Thinking, Block chain, Service Mindset, AI and a host of many other skills which are in high demand, but when you go ahead to build yourself in these areas, you discover your leadership.

learn what you need to become relevant to and tomorrow.

Cover Photo by Carl Heyerdahl on Unsplash