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Van Gogh Alive: I’ve been transformed into a world of magic through art. This possibly sums it all to me about the Van Gogh alive experience I’ve had last week. The show is arguably one of the best I’ve seen and would love to revisit at the earliest opportunity. Before I start sounding like someone advertising for the show, I would like to state that this article is about the entrepreneurial curiosity about this business model which is letting me publish this article.

From an entrepreneurs perspective, I would like to talk about key factors such as product, market and revenue models.

Product/Industry

As an entrepreneur, the first thing you need to think about is your industry. With Van Gogh alive, I could only connect it to the entertainment industry. The key reason for identifying your industry is that it enables you to define your target market. In this case, it is the entertainment industry.

Key competitors in this industry are cinemas, shopping malls and to a certain extent restaurants as well. This might sound a bit of a stretch, but from a customers’ point of view, these are all the activities that are fighting for the entertainment budget. If you are positioning yourself as the founder of this type of service, you’ll need to think about % of conversion into your product/service.

Customer Type

The next most important thing for an entrepreneur is the market. Arguably the product/market go together. In other words, you are better off looking at the product/market fit to identify where you exactly stand. For a business like this – van Gogh alive, the target market is – fan following of van Gogh’s paintings, art students, connoisseur of art and culture.

Once you figure out your customer type, you can start focussing on the marketing areas. For instance, you might get better returns for your ads on Instagram as opposed to Facebook or Twitter. This helps you manage your marketing budget based on where your ideal customers are likely to sit. If you are an entrepreneur trying to figure this, I would recommend defining your customer persona. (You can use a free tool such as hubspot persona generator for such activities)

This helps you create sample personalities and delve further into understanding their likes, dislikes etc so that you can target your advertising accordingly. 

Business Model, Revenue Stream

As an entrepreneur, one of the first things you have to think about in your business plan is the revenue model. For an entertainment event like Van Gogh Alive, the revenue models are:

• Tickets – Interested visitors for this entertainment
• Merchandise – Souvenirs
• Advertising partners – any other joint ventures, etc
• Food and Cafe – a small mark up or contracted out to a vendor for a fee

Tying these things together in your business model canvas is a brilliant way of providing a snapshot of the revenue model of your startup. Worth thinking if there are any parallels you can draw into your entrepreneurial venture.

Investment and Funding

This type of business comes under a heavy investment model. Looking at the quality of the product/service offered, you can notice the amount of effort that has gone in. I would like to think they have followed the MVP – Minimum Viable Product model for this development where the product/service is iteratively tested for its outcome and constantly improved.

However, you can equate this to a business model which thrives from large investments. By nature, investments of this size are usually via individual investors or investing organisations. If you’re an entrepreneur thinking of a similar business model which asks for a large investment, you’ll need to create a case for return on investment. Normally this type of business falls under scalable startup entrepreneurship to be able to deliver the scale and desired impact.

Scale in case of this van Gogh alive business model would be a touring business established across different parts of the world. If this is successful and provides the revenue planned, the same can be extended to other types of entertainment activities making it a replicable model for success which is the core tenet of scalable entrepreneurship.

Summary for an Entrepreneur: Van Gogh Alive

It is amazing to keep your eyes open for inspiring businesses around you. The Van Gogh Alive exhibit was a truly spectacular and wonderful creation. I’ve added a small video in this article for you to get a glimpse of this beauty. Of course, all this beautiful content belongs to the team at Van Gogh alive and I’m just sharing the magic I saw.

I would urge fellow entrepreneurs to step out and see what inspires them in businesses around. As always, there is something or the other you will pick up with your entrepreneurial lens. I would love to know your thoughts on this type of article. If you like this, I will replicate it with other business activities around me to add to the experience on this website. Please let me know your interest in a comment below.

Van Gogh Alive – More about the experience here.