What business are you in?

How asking such an obvious question can transform how you see opportunities and threats.

What business are we in?

It’s one of those questions, it looks so obvious, until you look at it differently, ask it in a different way. It’s important because if you don’t ask what business you are actually in, you limit your opportunities, and increase your risks. 

You need to ask two questions to get to a more interesting, more potent answer: What are ‘Jobs To Be Done’ (JTBD, one of Clayton Christensen’s many significant contributions to strategy) and what are the Emotional Roles To Play (ERTP) for those you are trying to help? It grounds you in the category, but is a bridge to beyond the category. 

Let’s pick something that looks run of the mill, looks clear - air fresheners, the aerosols/sprays or those little things you plug in. JTBD: One is the masking of unpleasant odours, it’s a -1>0. Another is a 0>1, making somewhere smell nice, somewhere feel better. ERTP: One is based on avoiding unpleasantness for you, and avoiding embarrassment/shame with others. Another is grounded in pride, the pleasure of being grounded in a place. 

So, on the surface, that air freshener is probably in the 'home cleaning' aisle, it’s seen as a more functional product, but there is a bigger role it could play, especially in the 0>1. What other businesses are in the same space of pride and pleasure of being in a particular place? Architecture, and especially Interior design. Of all the senses, of all the levers to pull, isn’t smell the most potent? It's the hidden, most powerful design lever of all. Maybe rather than just being in the air freshening business, you are also in the interior design business? That means you can re-frame your products and services to be grounded in the category but also play in another one entirely. 

That’s useful all over the business especially in New Product/Service Development, in innovation: if you are in the interior design business can you match products to particular types of designed environments? Can you match those to particular kinds of year? Or particular kinds of situation (there’s the 'good impression’: meeting the parents for the first time, renting on Air BnB, or Sunday morning relaxation). Can you develop up services to help navigate those products? You get the idea. 

It provides a natural bridge into other growth areas. There’s the positive, the potential growth engine, but there’s also a risk limitation lever: the reverse is also true, you are projecting into competitors outside your category who could, with the right framing, wander dangerously into your world and business.

So, what business might you be in if you widen your view? What opportunities and threats reveal themselves when you do?