Business Developer : Grow Through A Swiss Army Knife, Not A Salesman 🚀

A sweat mixture to grow and get up strong from volatile market.

By scanning the job market, I realized that the position of Business Developer is very much in vogue in companies. However, no two ads are really alike. Sometimes it seems like a catch-all word when it comes to customer acquisition involving digital.
He is much more than just a salesman.

The Business Developer’s job is to diversify the company.

It creates traction in markets where the company is not yet present.

Closely linked to the company’s innovation, the Business Developer intervenes on strategic projects with high added value.

His missions, which he strives to take up with method:

• Develop a new business model: or diversify activities.

To turn to the proposal of services, recurring revenue modes, co-design, platform model, circularity …

• Build a new offer: or create new sources of income.

Use its unique skills in another market, understand an unresolved need of its customers, adapt to new uses…

• Integrate a new geographical sector: or internationalize the offer.

Differentiate the company’s offer from the one already present, find the gaps unexploited by the competition, strengthen the brand image…

The place of the Business Developer is very close to the managers to assimilate the vision of the company.

He will thus understand the stakes and strategic choices and move in the same direction.

To do that, the BizDev must be agile by combining the skills of different professions!

• Design: understanding a need by listening to users’ problems.
• Marketing: communicating in the right place, at the right time with the right message. And that goes a lot through the #digital.
• Sales: attracting business opportunities with prospects and partners; mastering the entire sales cycle and defining the most efficient channels.
• Public Relations: talking about your company in the ecosystem so that it is recognized for its unique expertise.

It is a Swiss Army knife that will be able to bridge and weave links between these different professions, and to press on all these business levers.

The Business Developer must therefore be able to work in different areas without being an expert in them. He or she is therefore condemned to lifelong learning.

He will be alone or part of a small team. His or her immediate environment must allow this emulation; he or she must be able to rely on internal or external experts to assimilate the methods.

He will then have various missions that differ according to the phase of his project.

• Identification

Market study — Needs study — Analysis of its targets

• Growth

Traditional and digital sales — Creation of marketing content — Social media Traffic manager — Public relations

• Management

Leading the business unit thus developed — Leading innovation missions — Leading public activities

The Business Developer’s missions are very rich in material for the managers because his transversal vision carries the level of analysis and projection between the operational and the strategy.

Discussing his reports and his vision can be inspiring to better understand the uses and the place of the company.

Finally, he has a profile that likes challenge.

• Firstly, he must be Agile

Its soft-skills are essential for adapting to different missions and understanding its work under the “test & learn” method.

• But also Technology lover

His intellectual curiosity allows him to be at the forefront of technology and current events in different markets.

• Finally, a leader

He must know how to get his entourage on board and be a catalyst in the company and during his external interventions.

I also add a lot of organization, listening and economic interest.

My vision I built it from my past and present experience.

I share vision and learn every day from my surounding. I have encountered successes and failures and the most important thing is to understand them. I thrive in this role and I wish to share.

I did my classes in Taiwan for Rennes School of Business with an international development mission. Then in Rennes for a magnificent entrepreneurial adventure at The Service Network with missions of new business model. Today, I am stronger than ever at GenieVision and I am applying all these skills to launch a new offer!

I am passionate about team management and business strategy. Through my studies in business, entrepreneurship and international business, I have taken material from it and put it on paper for the first time.

Feel free to share your vision or to complete mine.

Quentin Chassine 🌱