So many times we can learn a business lesson from everyday things around us, we just need to stop and take notice.In this post, I want to point out a few powerful marketing lessons that we can learn from this children’s nursery rhyme: Jack be Nimble
Jack be Nimble
Jack, be nimble,
Jack, be quick,
Jack, jump over
The candlestick.
Jack jumped high
Jack jumped low
Jack jumped over
and burned his toe.
The 1st thing I think of is the definition of the word “nimble” which is: quick and light in movement or action; agile. ”with a deft motion of their nimble fingers”
The next point is to be nimble enough to get started fast….learn along the way….pivot when needed, but get in motion! Motivational speaker Les Brown says “Leap and grow your wings on the way down. Put all your bets on you, and on your ability to achieve your goals. Throw caution to the wind! If you have a catastrophic set-back…know that you have the power to over come it.”
The business principle that can be applied here is Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
“A core component of Lean Startup methodology is the build-measure-learn feedback loop. The first step is figuring out the problem that needs to be solved and then developing a minimum viable product (MVP) to begin the process of learning as quickly as possible. Once the MVP is established, a startup can work on tuning
the engine. This will involve measurement and learning and must include actionable metrics that can demonstrate cause and effect question.”
source
Get your idea in motion and started with a scaled-down version without all the bells-and-whistles. Get it in the customer’s hands and see what they “do” with it. If it’s a product or a service, either way, you can survey them to ask what they like and would change. MVP is getting you moving in the right direction and then you may find that a “Pivot” is needed, good!
What does Jack do when he “ burns his toe?”
Because it will happen in your business, your MVP will crash and burn. Pivot! Your best customer moves on, keep persevering! The mark of a successful person or business is that they get knocked down but they get up again. (and again and again!)