The 5 parts of every business: A simple way to stress-test your idea

Learning goal

No matter how creative or exciting your idea is, it’s not a real business unless it works in five key areas.

Most early-stage founders get stuck because they obsess over the product but ignore sales, delivery, or cost.
This simple framework helps you pressure-test your idea early, before you waste time or money.

Why it matters

1. Every real business has 5 moving parts
   All you need to know is this:
   If even one of these is missing or broken, your business won’t survive.

The 5 parts are:

• value creation
  Can you build something people want or need?
  Think: product, service, or solution to a real problem.

• marketing
  Can you get the right people to pay attention?
  How will people discover you? Who are you targeting?

• sales
  Can you turn attention into revenue?
  What’s your process for getting a “yes”? How will people pay?

• value delivery
  Can you deliver what you promised, on time and with quality?
  Will your operations actually work at scale?

• finance
  Can you make more money than you spend?
  How much will it cost to run this? Will it be profitable?

2. Most failed startups break on 1 of these

• Great idea, but no clear way to reach customers (marketing failure)

• Lots of interest, but no paying users (sales failure)

• People pay, but service breaks down (delivery failure)

• Business grows but bleeds money (finance failure)
  This framework helps you spot these weak points early before it’s too late.

3. Use it as a checklist
   Before you build or pitch, run your idea through all 5 parts.
   If you can’t explain each one clearly, you’re not ready to move forward.

Quick checklist

• Value: you’re solving a real problem

• Marketing: you know how to reach your audience

• Sales: you know how to convert interest into revenue

• Delivery: you can reliably fulfill what you offer

• Finance: you can make the numbers work

What to do next / StellarPH tip

Use this framework to run a quick “sanity check” on your idea.
Then show it to someone outside your team. If they don’t get it, simplify.