Historically, our premium advisory services were only affordable for mid-market companies. Now, AI automation allows us to deliver these exact same services to small businesses at a fraction of our historical cost. Our Visionary wants to open a new market segment immediately, but our Integrator is worried about diluting our focus. How do we strategically evaluate this expansion?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Run this opportunity directly through your Core Focus filter on the V/TO. Your Core Focus consists of your purpose, passion, or cause and your niche. If your niche has always been defined by company size, you must ask if serving smaller businesses aligns with your passion and operational strengths. AI may make the delivery cheaper, but smaller businesses have vastly different buying behaviors, customer service expectations, and retention rates than mid-market enterprises. Serving them requires a completely different sales pipeline and support structure. Instead of rushing to launch a new product line, use your next quarterly planning session to IDS the issue. If you decide to pursue the small business market, do not mix it with your core business. Create a separate, ring-fenced business unit on your Accountability Chart with its own dedicated resources and metrics on your Scorecard. This prevents your core business from being derailed by the operational complexity of managing thousands of low-paying clients, maintaining your enterprise value for a clean exit, and keeping your core team fully aligned on their primary goals.