How To Develop An Effective Business Strategy And Be Ahead Of The Competition
It is not all about jumping into starting a business; you need to create an effective business strategy to succeed. According to Michael Porter, “the essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.” What this statement means, in essence, is that if you don’t have a business strategy in place, then you will end up doing everything without achieving results. So, in business, you need to come up with an effective business strategy that will help you stay ahead of the competition.
Also read: How to increase sales for your business
In today’s business world, competition is inevitable, and if you can’t stay abreast of the business trends, then you might find yourself out of business. In business, the art is in knowing what to do and what not to do at each point in time. You don’t run your business five years on with the same strategy that you started with. By the time your business has grown, the strategy you started with must have been obsolete. So, innovation is the key to a sustainable business establishment, but without a strategy, you won’t know how and what to innovate. I get the feeling that you are starting to appreciate the importance of having an effective business strategy.
Tips On How To Create An Effective Business Strategy
- Critically analyze your current state
The first task on your hand when you are working on creating an effective business strategy is to examine your current state. You need to review your past business performance as well as your current state before you can start thinking of future strategy. Consider your annual revenues, customer inventory, and your most sorts after products and services. After that, you can begin to look into how your business operates.
Then you would have to look at your market position, employee’s performance, sales processes, profit margins, and customer satisfaction. While conducting your review, you will need to make use of SWOT analysis. At this point, you need to outline the things that worked well, those that would have been better, then consider the news opportunities in the market. You will need to do this with your team to ensure that you have all the relevant information.
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Study the external factors
When trying to develop an effective business strategy, it is essential that you consider these factors that are outside your control. Industry trends, government policies, and regulations, legal compliance, tariffs, etc. are worth looking into. Also, you need to study technological advancements and environmental factors. Depending on how it impacts your business or industry, external factors can either be threats or opportunities.
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Refine your mission statement
Your business purpose is defined by your mission statement. You can’t effectively create a business strategy if your mission statement is not in line with what you want to do. Your mission statement outlines all of your company’s primary objectives. In fact, it is the core of “why” you started the business. Ensure your mission is big enough that you continually work to attain it. The mission statement must focus on the long-term goal and objectives of your business. To have a better understanding of your business mission, it must clearly answer questions such as, “what do we do?” “Who do we do it for?” and “What problem do we solve?”
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Develop and reform your vision
Your vision must agree and align with your mission statement, and if the two aren’t in tandem, then your business has no clear path. Where you want your business to be when it grows is your vision. It should define what you want to be known for as well as the future direction of your business. Ensure that your vision is realizable with an outlined pathway to achieve it.
- Outline and define your strategic objectives
You will need to develop defined goals for all the areas of your business. These strategic objectives should reaffirm and highlight those critical priorities that will deliver on your company’s mission and vision. You will need to create SMART goals for the business and ensure these goals are realistic, measurable, achievable, and time driven. Your strategic objectives should include long-term goals of often more than five years. These long-term goals may be less specific and more generalized short-term goals because it involves a more extended period of time.
Also see: How to avoid bad debts in business
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Create an execution plan
Here, you will need to turn all the aforementioned strategies into a detailed execution plan. You won’t have to deal with this action alone, ensure that you carry your team along in the process. At this stage, consider inputs from experts and players in the industry. It will help you come up with a robust execution plan to create an effective business strategy
Important Business Strategy Areas
- Marketing strategy
Your marketing strategy is an integral part of your business strategy, and you need to pay excellent attention to it. It is through your marketing strategy that you present your business to the world, so if you fail at it, then your business won’t enjoy the quality publication. Your short, medium and long-term goals must be synchronized with your marketing strategy.
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Financial strategy
Without money, you can never run any business. So, you will need to have a quality financial strategy that will help you source funds to expand and grow your business. It is not always accessible to source funds to start a business. You can read my previous article on how to source funds for your business.
Conclusion
Building an effective business strategy requires a lot of work, and you need to be prepared to put in this work at all times. Your business will be stagnant with a good business strategy to move it forward. So, it is imperative as much as it is essential for you to create a functional and effective business strategy for your business.
I would like to get you to take on this topic, so don’t hesitate to share your thought on the comment sections provided below.
