One of the biggest challenges many businesses face is deciding which opportunities they should focus on and which they should leave for another day. It’s so easy to become seduced by one opportunity after another, only to find that none of them are concluded and their value isn’t realised.

Over the years, I’ve watched a number of businesses go bankrupt by mismanaging opportunities and becoming confused over what they should be working on. The owners didn’t make the difficult decisions to shelve a great idea, not do some development or say no to a fantastic potential partnership.

If you find yourself surrounded by opportunities and wondering which one you should pursue then there are a number of questions that you may wish to ask yourself. By addressing these questions then you’re very likely to gain a clarity to your thinking that will help you make wiser decisions.

Why am I in business?

This may seem obvious but it really gets down to the bedrock of why you’re doing what you’re doing. Some people get into business because they want to make money, others for the lifestyle and yet other individuals just want to create something. There are innumerable reasons for starting a business and the great majority of them are very personal.

Let’s imagine you enjoy the lifestyle provided by your business, then selecting opportunities that will take up all of your time is probably not a good option. Everyone assumes that all businesses need to grow….this is not always true and asking this question will help you come to grips with what you really want.

What does the business do?

Working out what you are good at and where you add value for clients is critical to understanding where your focus should be. Believe or not, your business can’t do everything.

I’ve walked away from a lot of deals because they would be a distraction to our primary business of monetising domain name traffic. I’ve had untold numbers of people approach me about partnering with them to develop an awesome domain but in the end, I inevitably way no. Developing websites just aren’t our thing right now….they may be in the future but not now.

So many domain owners believe they are domain managers, traffic monetisers, stock item salespersons and are awesome at selling their premium domains. Their time is soaked up with a multitude of tasks and although they are busy they really aren’t focused on what they are good at. To be quite honest with you, each of those tasks require specialised skills and to expect yourself to do all of them well is nigh impossible.

Where’s your business going?

Sounds pretty obvious but thinking about where you would like to be in the future is an important consideration that will have a direct impact on the opportunities you pursue. If you plan on becoming a domain monetisation specialist then you really have to ask yourself why you’re brokering domains.

Having a clear picture of what your business will look like in the future is the only way I know that will allow me to build towards that future. By not having a vision for your business would be like building a house without a set of plans.

Of course, there is only one thing worse then a lot of opportunities…..and that’s no opportunities. If this is your case then you have a very different kind of problem to solve and my guess is you’ll need to address it very quickly or you’ll end up burning a lot of cash.

So this past couple of weeks I’ve been working like mad expanding one of our product lines. It fits in with the three questions but even still my business partner wisely insisted that we do a check against the third question. This has brought crystal clear clarity to the project that would have otherwise not been evident.

These questions have really helped me stay focused on what we do at ParkLogic and I hope they can help you in your own decision making. I look forward to catching up with you all at NamesCon in Vegas.