Spotting opportunities is a skill every entrepreneur needs to succeed.

Author, Ekaale Ekuam

11^th February, 2019

Why are some people more successful than others in any form of business venture that they put their resources on? A business opportunity is defined as having the chance to meet a market need, interest or want, through a creative combination of resources.

 Identifying and then acting on these so called opportunities is not always as easy as it may sound. I will take an example of David Muriethi not his real name, I consider him a street smart Nairobi hustler who has perfected his skill in spotting opportunities. Every day early in morning and in the evenings as I drive down during the usual Nairobi traffic jam, David Mureithi and other hawkers line up  different routes around Nairobi’s traffic jams, selling what I would call a bouquet of products from screw drivers, towing ropes, property magazines, sweets, newspapers just to mention a few.

The moment the weather changes and starts to rain in Nairobi streets the same guys in a split of a second move from the usual traffic jams to the pavements and walk ways of Nairobi streets, part of the wares are not the usual screw drivers or the property magazines but umbrellas of all sizes, shouting on top of their voices the umbrella prices, to the walking human traffic who are rushing to catch matatus to different estates across Nairobi suburbs.

How are these guys able to switch their merchandise within minutes and take a different queue and even change the sales pitch to a different audience?

These type of smart entrepreneurs in my view have perfected the art of analyzing opportunities, where others have missed, by doing very simple things like thinking outside the box.

To back this up they are able to identify pain areas and in the process employ an innovative solution to that problem in this case drivers in the Nairobi traffic experience a myriad of problems.

My car once stalled in the middle of Uhuru Highway and in two minutes I saw this guy approach me with battery jumpers before I even establish what the real problem was, another guy appears with a real battery ready to jump-start my car. While we were still negotiating on the actual charges, from a distance I could see this breakdown truck driving from the opposite side of the road towards my direction ready to tow my car.

 Luckily, these guys know each and the matter was settled amicably but I parted with Ksh 500 for using this other guy’s battery to jump-start my car. Just like that he made quick bucks from my problem through an innovative solution of a stand by battery service.

Who would have ever thought of this type of a venture? Any stalled car in the middle of the Nairobi traffic is a potential client to this battery service guy. Am sure he can spot a slow moving lane, pick up the particular car requiring his services.

The second skill is knowing what is inside the box, in other words knowing anything and everything about your industry, past present and predictions for the future. These same guys know the weather patterns, to allow them stock umbrellas in downtown stalls of Nairobi, they also know anytime it rains a lot of cars with hidden problems will stall in traffic, they know how to put their margins in all their merchandise. They have information of the market at their disposal they are able to know fast moving products and none fast moving.

In simple terms they know what works and what has failed and are able to innovate around the gaps in the market.

The other key learning outcomes from these hawkers is that they have confidence and learned from their past failures and this has made them take numerous risks to sell variety of items.

Most successful entrepreneurs do what other people don’t what to do, they consider the new approach boring or time consuming but with time people have transformed businesses and  made them very successful, breaking away from the norm of doing business.

This street hawker could be making more money than many of us who are on eight to five jobs. We must consider doing what makes us happy financially and transform ourselves to smart entrepreneurs by enhancing our skill on spotting huge opportunities around us.

Let us expand our entrepreneurial horizons to make a difference in everything that we do in the market place.

Author is an Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management Expert

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