In this article, Mark draws inspiration from a 19th-century essay to offer a growth lesson: Your opportunity for revenue might be closer to home than you think.
In an essay written in 1890, ‘Acres of Diamonds’, Russell H. Conwell tells the story of a farmer who sells his land to search the world for diamonds, only for the new owner to discover a vast diamond mine on the farm.
The central idea of the work is that “one need not look elsewhere for opportunity, achievement, or fortune; the resources to achieve all good things are present in one's own community”.
Our own community
For growth companies on the path to Series B, that community is existing customers.
And yet, like that farmer, searching for diamonds, sales teams are often drawn to new markets, new features, and big bets, while overlooking what's in plain sight and already in their CRM.
It’s a lesson I learned early in my career that has served me well in leading sales teams and regions for enterprise software businesses, and it’s something I see in my current work as a Non-Exec Director and advisor to growing B2B tech companies and founders looking to scale for Series B investment.
Sales teams often ignore the real potential in our backyard while chasing something shinier over the horizon.
The diamonds beneath our feet
Perhaps your next phase of growth isn’t addressed by just going broader. It may be about digging deeper to uncover the ‘acres of diamonds’ beneath your feet.
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Instead of waiting for the perfect hire or new product line, ask ‘How do we deepen our value proposition and where are the diamonds in our existing customer base?
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Realising revenue from promoting under-monetised products or the adoption of underused features.
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Reduced churn through deeper integration into the customer's workflow or business.
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Revenue uplift through pricing and packaging that connect features, integrations, module packages, and scaling metrics to customer value.
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High-value power users or innovative early adopters who would happily pay for bespoke, solution customisation for their specific needs.
The most valuable diamond
The “diamonds under our feet” are not just these revenue opportunities, but the most valuable is the customer data and access we have.
Mining this data can reveal insights critical to growth decisions, such as which markets or categories to target, where to invest in the product, and the optimal pricing and packaging strategy.
As Conwell shares in the same essay:
“Know what the world needs first and then invest to supply that need.”
We should be constantly testing the assumptions that have built the business, but may not take us to the next stage.
Finding your diamonds
Pulling one final quote from Conwell's essay, it contains a call to action that serves as a useful filter for the business leaders I speak with.
“Begin where you are and what you are”.
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Start with the customer conversation. Are you systematically capturing what customers want the product to do, or just logging support tickets? The insight is already there if you're listening for it.
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Look at usage data, not just revenue. Which features are used most vs. monetised least? That gap is where the diamonds are.
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Test your pricing assumptions. When did you last validate whether your packaging reflects the value customers actually get? Most SMEs set pricing once and leave it.
Better diamonds
Of course, business leaders are not faced with the same choice as Conwell’s farmer.
It is not a matter of whether to sell the farm and seek new diamonds or stay; we need to do both, find those new diamonds and mine the ones in our own backyard.
By taking this approach, understanding our community, products, and pricing, finding diamonds beyond the farm becomes easier.
We can help
If you’re leading a software business and believe there are “acres of diamonds” (or maybe just a lucrative handful) in your existing product and customers, we provide a second pair of eyes that can see where growth might be hiding in plain sight inside your business.
