6 BD Professional Specialties
What is Business Development?
Every BDR does not have to become an AE.
Not every Business Developer starts as a BDR.
Here are the 6 Functional Specialties of BD:
1. Prospect Development: Many business developers start their BD careers in Prospect Development as a BDR where they cultivate and nurture prospects through the Activation Phase.
2. Customer Development: Collaborate with operations personnel to monitor and nurture the customer experiences that drive corporate growth.
3. Corporate Development: Conduct mergers and acquisitions for their corporation.
4. Community Development: Identify, attract, and collaborate with members of the community to drive corporate growth. This specialty consists of these sub-specialties:
- Partner Development: Also called "Nearbound"...they Create and nurture
corporate partnerships to drive growth.
- Audience Development: They grow the corporation’s community of prospects, customers, and corporate partners.
- Economic Development: They initiate or leverage community assets to promote the starting and growth of corporate partners.
5. Product Development: Allocate corporate resources to create and continually enhance the corporation’s products.
6. Full Cycle Business Development: Seasoned business developers with mastery of one or multiple business development specialties. They also have proficiency across all business development integration activities. They are typically found in Startup corporations where they help the founders achieve initial Product Market Fit and lay the business development foundation for scalable growth.
NOTE: Some Salespeople and Marketers may do some of these functions.
They too, can leverage their experience to become business developers.
Tony Gray, BDP
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Learn more in the “Business Development Body of Knowledge (BD-BOK).”
Get your copy of the BD-BOK on Amazon today!
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Boost your BD career with the Business Development Professional (BDP) certification from the Global Business Development Association (GBDA).
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